Prospect United Methodist Church (1894)

Prospect United Methodist Church, Bristol

The Methodist Episcopal Society of Bristol was formed in 1834 and a church on West Street was completed not long after. As related in Bristol, Connecticut (“In the Olden Time “New Cambridge”) (1907):

The young society was served in turn by noble and faithful ministers. The church multiplied and prospered. During the years 1857-8 the pastor was Rev. John W. Simpson. During this period a revival commenced on Chippins Hill, extended to Polkville (Edgewood) and other places. Conversions were many. On New Year’s Day, 1858, Mr. Simpson preached in the schoolhouse at Polkville. John Humphrey Sessions, who had previously “professed religion” attended the service, and before the meeting closed he was so impressed by a divine power that he here made a complete consecration of himself to God and precious results soon followed. That fact, simple in itself, has meant much to the town of Bristol and to the Methodist Church in particular. Mr. Sessions was an able, vigorous and successful business man. As he prospered the Methodist Church prospered.

In 1880, the congregation grew and moved to a new church, closer to the center of town, at the corner of the corner of Center and Summer Streets. This building was enlarged in 1888 and then replaced by a new edifice, which was dedicated in 1894. By then, the church was known as the Prospect Methodist Episcopal Church (now it is the Prospect United Methodist Church at 99 Summer Street). The church‘s construction was funded by John Humphrey Sessions.

Fuller’s Tavern (1769)

Fuller's Tavern, Berlin

George Washington recorded in his diary on November 10, 1789:

Left Hartford about 7 o’clock, and took the middle road (instead of the one through Middletown, which I went).— Breakfasted at Worthington, in the township of Berlin, at the house of one Fuller.

The tavern that Washington writes about still stands today at 1055 Worthington Ridge in Berlin. It was built circa 1769 and has later nineteenth century alterations. Ephraim Fuller, listed in the 1790 census, was probably the Fuller who ran the tavern. Additional details about the tavern are recorded in Catharine M. North‘s History of Berlin (1916):

Some years since, when the house was repainted, the date 1769 was discovered on the brick work of the chimney, about half-way between the roof and the top of the chimney. It was built to be used as a tavern with a public hall and ballroom on the second floor. […] Amos Kirby assumed the proprietorship of Fuller’s tavern about the year 1814, and lived on the place until his death in 1846 at the age of seventy-one. During the latter part of his years he carried on the business of a butcher and peddled meat about the town.

Around 1884, when wallpaper was being removed from the Tavern’s east room on the second floor, a mural displaying Masonic symbols was uncovered. The room had once been part of the ballroom, which once ran across the entire house from east to west and was later converted into a Masonic Lodge room. It is thought to have been the meeting place of Berlin Lodge, No. 20, organized in 1791, which later became Harmony Lodge No. 20 of New Britain and merged with Friendship Lodge No. 33 of Southington in 1995.

Enfield Shaker Village Meeting House (1827)

Shaker Meeting House, Enfield

Earlier this month I featured buildings at the Hancock Shaker Village on my site Historic Buildings of Massachusetts. Connecticut also had a Shaker village. It was located in Enfield, but not nearly as many of its buildings have survived and they have been restored as they have at Hancock. On this site, I’ve already featured the South Family Residence and the adjacent laundry, ice house and dairy. The Enfield Shaker community grew to include five “families.” Besides the South Family, there were the North, East and West Families and, centrally located, was the Church Family. The first to be organized, the Church Family had overall control over the entire Enfield Shaker settlement. The last Enfield Shakers left the area in 1917. The State of Connecticut purchased the former Shaker property in 1931 for what is now the Enfield Correctional Institution. One of only two buildings to survive from the Church Family is the former Meeting House/Trustee House. Built in 1827, the building had an open meeting hall for the entire community and (perhaps later?) housed the Trustees, who handled the community‘s dealings with the outside world. Shakers were associated with reform movements, such as abolitionism: Sojourner Truth once spoke at the Meeting House.