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

Berlin Congregational Church (1850)

The earliest Congregational church in Berlin was formed in 1712 as the Second Church of Farmington, later the Kensington Congregational Church. In 1772, the congregation divided into the separate East (Kensington) and West (Worthington) Societies. Two years later, the Worthington Society built its meetinghouse on Worthington Ridge. It would later become known as the Second Congregational Church of Berlin (the Kensington Church being the first) and then the Berlin Congregational Church. After the building was damaged by a fire in 1848, a new meetinghouse was constructed (c. 1850) in the Gothic style. The spire originally had four gabled dormers. The clock in the steeple was donated by town historian, Catharine M. North, in memory of her father, Deacon Alfred North. The church is located at 878 Worthington Ridge.

Hartford National Bank & Trust Company (1967)

The twenty-six-floor office tower at 777 Main Street in Hartford (at the corner of Pearl Street) was built between 1964 and 1967 as the headquarters of the Hartford National Bank & Trust Company. The city’s oldest bank, the Hartford National Bank, had its origins on this very same block back in 1792. From 1811 to 1912, the bank was located in a Greek Revival building on State Street. It then moved to a new building (demolished in 1990) at the corner of Main and Asylum Streets (considered to be Hartford’s first skyscraper). In 1915 it became the Hartford-Aetna National Bank. It merged with the United States Security Trust Company in 1927 to become the Hartford National Bank and Trust. At that point, the bank moved to the United States Security Trust Company’s building, located at the corner of Main and Pearl, which had been built for the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company in 1870. This building was demolished in 1964, along with the neighboring State Bank and Phoenix Bank buildings, to make way for the current office tower on the site. Designed by Welton Becket and Associates of New York, the building has gone by several names through various bank mergers: Shawmut, Fleet and, most recently, Bank of America. Vacant since 2011 and up for sale, plans are being discussed to convert the building into into mixed-income apartments.

Talcott-Hollister House (1851)

Various dates have been given for the Federal/Greek Revival house at 2146 Main Street in Glastonbury. Some claim 1780, while the Historical Society of Glastonbury records give 1850/1851. Notable for its tin roof, it is known as the Talcott-Hollister House. Replacing an earlier Talcott Homestead, torn down in 1850, it was built the following year by Jared Talcott. It was next home to his son, Capt. Charles H. Talcott, and later to Charles‘ daughter Charlotte and her husband, Norman E. Hollister (1845-1923).

Josiah Smith House (1797)

Real Estate sites give the date of the Josiah Smith House, at 74 Elm Street, at the corner of Main Street, in Ansonia, as 1797. The house was built by Josiah Smith and was owned by several generations of his family before it was sold to Jonah Platt. It is a late Georgian/Early Federal style house with a fan light window above the front door and a later Victorian front porch.

Bailey-Sibley House (1860)

The former residence at 208 High Street in Middletown was built sometime between 1859 and 1870. Its original appearance was in a different architectural style. It was a cross gabled building with projecting eaves and a Victorian porch. A one-story wing (later raised to two stories) was added to the rear in 1876. The brick house was built on a tract of land developed by Israel Bailey and was a rental property until 1892, when Jennie A. Bailey Sibley and her husband, Howard A. Sibley, acquired title to the property from other heirs of Israel Bailey. The house was altered early in the twentieth century when the current entrance porch and a classical pediment and cornice with modillions were added. The Sibleys occupied the house until 1920. The following year, it was acquired by Wesleyan University for use as housing. It is now Wesleyan’s Office of Public Safety.

James E. Johnson House (1839)

One of the nineteenth-century houses in the village of East Plymouth (pdf), located on East Road in the Town of Plymouth, was built around 1839, most likely by James E. Johnson, a blacksmith.

Jesse Hart House (1800)

Jesse Hart was a cabinet-maker, tavern-keeper and postmaster in Berlin. His brick house, at 203 Hudson Street, was built c.1800. It has chimneys at each of its four corners, with corresponding fireplaces inside. In 1813, he purchased the tavern at Boston Corners and became its landlord. As related in Catharine Melinda North’s History of Berlin (1916):

Jesse Hart, born 1768, married 1792, was a cabinet maker. Before he kept the hotel, at Boston Corners, he lived in the brick house, now owned by Leon LeClair. It is probable that he built that house. His first wife, Lucy Beckley, died in 1814 and, in 1822, he married, second, Mindwell Porter, daughter of Samuel Porter. Mr. Hart died in 1827, aged fifty-nine. Mrs. Hart survived him forty-eight years, and died July 6, 1875, aged ninety-one.

Hart was the half brother of Emma Hart Willard, a famous educator who began teaching in Berlin and later founded a school for girls in Troy, New York, that is now the Emma Willard School.