Adjacent to northeast of the First Congregational Church of Cheshire is a house built around 1835 (1831-1836) for Rev. Joseph Whiting, who served as the first minister in that church building, from 1827 to 1836. The house was owned by a number of ministers over the years. Arthur Sherriff, headmaster of Cheshire Academy from 1923 to 1966, was a later resident of the house, which was sold to the Congregational Church in 1969. The Greek Revival-style house has a later Colonial Revival porch.
Known as Stone Row, the Officers’ Quarters at Fort Trumbull in New London were built around 1830 and housed military officers for over a century and a half. Until 1910, army officers occupied quarters in the building, followed by officers of the Revenue Cutter Service, the Coast Guard and finally the Navy, who converted it to offices in 1995. The building once had small wood dormer windows, but the Coast Guard replaced these with full-length shed dormers along both sides of the building. In 2000, the structure was adapted to serve as the Visitors’ Center for Fort Trumbull State Park.
The Coopers were early settlers in Hamden. James Cooper built the house at 2052 Whitney Avenue around 1810 (or perhaps as early as 1780). The widow of Cooper’s grandson William married Thomas Hartley in the 1870s and the house remained in the Hartley family for over a half-century.
The yellow brick building of the Hartford B.P.O. Elks Lodge #19, organized in 1884, was built on Prospect Street in 1903. Designed by John J. Dwyer, a Hartford architect, the building was constructed in the Renaissance Revival style. The Hartford Club, nearby on the same street, was built the same year in the Georgian Revival style. The Elks Lodge has retained its original elegant interiors.
The Shetucket Grange Hall in Scotland was built around 1840 as the Union Church. The building was moved from Pudding Hill to the center of town in 1900 to become a Grange Hall. As described in Vol. I of the History of Windham County, Connecticut (1889), by Richard M. Bayles,
[In Scotland,] The principal attention of the people is directed toward agriculture, and some improvement may be seen in that direction in recent years. Among such improvements may be noticed the organization of a Grange. Shetucket Grange, as it is named, was organized with twenty-four charter members, June 10th, 1887. The ceremonies of organization and installation of officers, which took place on the same evening, were conducted by D. M. Master Tucker of Lebanon, assisted by D. K. Bowen of Woodstock and members of Little River Grange of Hampton.
The first building constructed to serve as a bank in Torrington was built in 1917 for the Torrington National Bank at 236 Prospect Street. The Bank was founded in 1899 and in 1930 it became the Torrington National Bank and Trust.
The first Catholic mass in Chester was held in 1851 and a church was built on Middlesex Ave in 1855. At that time, the Parish served the towns of Chester, Deep River, Essex, Old Saybrook, Westbrook, Old Lyme, Lyme, and Haddam. The Parish received a full-time pastor in 1876 and the current church replaced the original one on the same site in 1891. To make way for the new church, the first church building was sold and moved to the corner of Main Street and Middlesex Avenue. The new St Joseph’s Roman Catholic Church was dedicated on February 16, 1892. The church was enlarged in 1929, at which time the peak of the gable roof was lowered and two smaller towers on the right of the front facade were removed.
You must be logged in to post a comment.