St. Anne’s Church, Waterbury (1906)

St. Anne’s Parish in Waterbury was organized in 1886 to serve the city’s French and French-Canadian Catholics. The parish’s first church was built in 1888-1889 on Dover Street. In 1906, work began on a much larger church, with the exterior being completed in one year. In 1912, the basement was finished and used for services while the rest of the interior was being worked on. It took several years to accumulate the necessary funds and there was also a delay due to the First World War, but the finished church was dedicated in 1922. The Gothic-style church has a structure of steel and brick with an exterior of granite and Vermont blue marble. The church survived fires in 1971 and 1978 and work was also undertaken in 1979 to repair the two great spires and dome. These signature features continue to impress motorists traveling through Waterbury on I-84.

UPDATE: Sadly, the condition of the two towering spires continued to deteriorate and they were removed in August, 2019.

Our Lady of Lourdes Church, Waterbury (1909)

As described in the first volume of the History of Waterbury and the Naugatuck Valley (1918), “In the year 1899 the Italian Catholics of Waterbury were organized into Our Lady of Lourdes Parish by the Rev. Father Michael A. Karam, the first pastor, at the request of the Right Rev. Bishop Tierney.” The parish’s first chapel was later replaced with the current Our Lady of Lourdes Church on South Main Street, begun in 1903 and completed in 1909. It was modeled after the Roman church of Santa Francesca Romana. According to the History quoted above:

The church has a frontage of 70 feet on South Main Street and is 127 feet in depth. The height of the nave or body of the church is 55 feet, and the campanile or bell tower is 100 feet in height. The basement was first completed and roofed over, and used for a number of years for church services, and was occupied also while the super-structure was being built. The general plan consists of a high nave, lighted by clerestory windows, with two aisles. Each aisle terminates in a semi-circular apse in which the side altars are placed. The main altar is also placed in a large semi-circular apse, surrounded by an entablature and columns in which are arches and niches for the numerous statues with which the interior is adorned. The exterior of the church is built of gray pressed brick and trimmed with Indiana limestone and terra cotta. The main roofs are of slate. The campanile, which was afterwards destroyed, was built near the rear after the manner of Italian churches.

Nuttinghame (1740)

Wallace Nutting (1861 – 1941), a former minister, became a leading antiquarian, entrepreneur and a major figure of the Colonial Revival movement in the early twentieth century. He authored books, reproduced antique American furniture and opened colonial houses as museums, including the Webb House in Wethersfield. He is most well-known for his photographs of country landscapes and the interiors of colonial houses, which were hand colored by women who worked for him and sold through a catalog. In 1906, Nutting had moved to a farm in Southbury, where he soon established a studio in a new barn he built on the property. He restored the old farmhouse, built in the 1740s, and named it “Nuttinghame.” Quite a few Nutting pictures feature Nuttinghame and the landscape that surrounds it. One notable image is titled “Nuttinghame Blossoms.” A particular parlor in the house was featured in many Nutting pictures, including: “A Bit Of Sewing,” “A Sip Of Tea” and “An Afternoon Tea.”

As Nutting‘s business prospered, he decided to move his operation to Framingham, Massachusetts in 1912, where he bought an Italianate house he called “Nuttingholm.” The Framingham house was later demolished, but his earlier house in Southbury still exists. In 1953, the farm was purchased by the comedic pianist Victor Borge. In the mid-1960s, Borge sold the property to a development company, which built a retirement community called Heritage Village. The Nutting/Borge house is now called the Meeting House and has executive offices, meeting rooms and a kitchen for use by community residents.

Stonington Custom House (1827)

On Main Street in Stonington is a granite Greek Revival building that served as a custom house. Built around 1827, it originally served as a bank. The Stonington Bank was chartered in 1822 and operated until the end of the Civil War. Stonington had some direct trade with the West Indies and was made a Port of Entry in 1842. It was probably around this time the building began to be used as a custom house.

William Wadsworth House (1848)

Located on an elevated lot, at the intersection of Madison and Higganum Roads in Durham, is the William Wadsworth House, built in 1848. Wadsworth was a farmer and a descendant of Col. James Wadsworth, one of the town’s most prominent citizens. William Wadsworth, who also served as town clerk and Justice of the Peace, sold the property to Angeline L. Scranton, although he continued to live in the house until his death in 1870. Scranton married Orrin Camp, of Oquawka, Illinois, in 1873 and sold the house before moving west. The fine Greek Revival-style house has been vacant and in a deteriorating condition for many years.

The Dr. S. Waldo Hart House (1870)

Dr. Samuel Waldo Hart was a leading citizen of New Britain in the nineteenth century. He was the son and namesake of New Britain’s first physician and, according to his biography in the Official Souvenir and Program of the Dedication of the Soldiers’ Monument (1900) [the construction of which he supported], “His father’s practice, which was large in this city, was carried on to its zenith under him.” Furthermore, “He spent much time in travel in Europe and the West and in Central America, where his cultured mind received a keen enjoyment of varied observations. His letters from abroad were entertaining inasmuch as he was a master of English descriptive style.” He also served as the city’s second mayor, from 1872 to 1876. Perhaps built in the 1870s, Dr. Hart‘s house (which also held his office) is on South High Street.