Historic Buildings of Connecticut - Exploring the Nutmeg State One Building at a Time

David R. Sloper House (1760)

Robert Sloper of Branford moved his family to a farm in Southington in 1730. His son, Ambrose Sloper (1734-1822), who lived to the age of 89, built a house there in 1760. Having outlived his son, also named Ambrose, who died in 1810, Sloper left the farm to his grandson, David Root Sloper (1801-1887), who was a farmer and cement manufacturer. In 1831 he married Cornelia Bristol, who died in 1837 at the age of 24. His second wife was Eliza Augusta Woodruff. The farm was next operated by David R. Sloper’s daughter, Cornelia Sloper Neal (1851-1948), and her husband Lloyd Neal (1852-1878), and after Mr. Neal’s early death by William Orr (1858-1906), who was married to Cornelia’s sister Julia (1855-1922). After 1905, members of the Pocock family used the farm, which was willed by Cornelia Sloper Neal to the Southington-Cheshire Community YMCA in 1949. The farm has since developed into the YMCA Camp Sloper Outdoor Center (1000 East Street in Southington).

YMCA sources state that the Sloper house was built by Ambrose Sloper in 1760. Heman R. Timlow states, in his Ecclesiastical and Other Sketches of Southington, Conn. (1875), that David R. Sloper “owns and occupies the old homestead of his father and grandfather, on East street. Several years since he built himself a new house, which occupies the same location as the old one.” The house’s Greek Revival style also indicates a later date of construction.

John P. Jones House (1882)

The Stick Style/Queen Anne Style house at 1063 Main Street in South Windsor was for John Pantry Jones in 1882, the same year he was elected to the Connecticut General Assembly. John P. Jones was born in Hartford in 1832 and his family settled in South Windsor when he was fifteen. Jones was a prosperous farmer and tobacco grower who served in a number of town offices in South Windsor: Assessor, member of the Board of Relief, Selectman, and Agent of the Town Deposit and School Society Funds. He was descended from early settlers of Hartford. His grandfather, Nathaniel Jones, who served in the Revolutionary War, had a farm in Hartford near what later became State Street and Front Street. His father, John Pantry Jones (1791-1880), who served in the War of 1812, ran a retail grocery and oyster business in Hartford for thirty years and had a house at the intersection of State and Commerce Streets. In 1847 the family moved to their farm in South Windsor.

Eli Coe House (1805)

The house at 455 Main Street in Middlefield was built in 1805 by Esquire Eli Coe (1758-1835), a prosperous farmer, on the site of his father David Coe‘s former homestead. Eli Coe served as Justice of the Peace and selectman of Middletown. A later owner (1867-1888) was Rev. Spofford D. Jewett. During his ownership the house served as a post office.

Powder Mill Barn (1845)

Powder Hollow, in the Hazardville section of Enfield, was once the site of the Hazard Powder Company, which flourished in the mid-nineteenth century. The company furnished an estimated 40% of all the gunpowder used during the Civil War. Surviving friom the company’s original complex of buildings is a barn built around 1845. Constructed as a horse barn, it was converted by Ralph Sweet for Square Dancing in 1959. The Powder Mill Barn (also known as the Powder Hollow Barn) is also a popular rental hall for weddings, auctions and other events.

Second Baptist Church, Suffield (1840)

The Second Baptist Church of Suffield was established in 1805 by members of the First Baptist Church. The original wooden church was replaced by a brick Greek Revival edifice in 1840, located at 100 North Main Street. The church was designed by local architect Henry Sykes, who had trained under Chauncey Shepherd of Springfield and Ithiel Town of New Haven. Additions were made to the church in 1953 and 1959.

Moses Downs House (1785)

Built around 1785 by Moses Downs, the house at 639 South Britain Road in Southbury served for many years as the parsonage of the South Britain Congregational Church. The house has a Greek Revival door surround, added in the 1830s or 1840s.

Nathan Lester House (1793)

Happy Independence Day! The Nathan Lester House & Farm Tool Museum on Long Cove and Vinegar Hill roads (153 Vinegar Hill Road) in Gales Ferry is owned by the town of Ledyard. A typical Connecticut farmhouse of the period, the Lester House was built in 1793 by Nathan Lester, whose father, Peter Lester, had originally purchased the farm. The house is also known as the Larrabee House because Hannah Gallup Lester, Nathan’s only child, married Captain Adam Larrabee. The house remained in the family until 1908, when it was bought by Dr. and Mrs. Charles B. Graves. In 1965, as a memorial to her parents, Elizabeth Graves Hill gave the house and 11 acres of land to the Town of Ledyard. This property included the Ledyard Oak, which was the second largest white oak in the country and appears on the Ledyard town seal. The tree was officially declared dead in June, 1969. A new white oak was planted near the original Ledyard Oak in 2009.