Deming-Young House (1784)

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In 1784, Thomas Deming built a farmhouse on land in Newington (then still a part of Wethersfield) that had been in the Deming family since 1671. Thomas and his brother, Daniel, who had answered the Lexington Alarm during the revolutionary War, were both shoemakers. Thomas was also a founder and officer of Christ Church (Episcopal), organized in 1797 in what is now Newington. Another brother, Elizur Deming, also attended the church, and its business meetings and services were held in his house until a church building was completed. This may have been the same house built by Thomas Deming. The property was purchased by Fred Young in 1918 and was later inherited by his son, who died in 1990. In 1998, the Town of Newington purchased the Deming-Young Farm to prevent the house from being torn down and the land subdivided. The Deming-Young Farm Foundation was founded in 2001 to restore the house. The plan for the future is to make it a learning center focused on eighteenth century farm life.

Lubin Burton Rockwood House (1855)

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The home of Rev. Lubin Burton Rockwood, on Riverview Road in Rocky Hill, was built in 1855 or just before. Rev. Rockwood was a Presbyterian minister. Born in New Hampshire, he was a graduate of Dartmouth College and Andover and Union theological seminaries. Ordained in New York in 1845, he served as a pastor at Rocky Hill’s Congregational Church from 1850 to 1859. He also became president and librarian of Rocky Hill’s Social Library Association. The Associations books were kept at his house from 1855-1866.

The Capt. Amos Palmer House (1787)

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The Capt. Amos Palmer House is located on Main Street in Stonington Borough. The house was built by Amos Palmer in 1787, replacing his earlier home on the same site, which had burned down when a barn on an adjoining property caught on fire. When a British cannonball hit the house during the War of 1812, Capt. Palmer waited until it had cooled and brought it to the fort to be returned to its sender! From 1837 to 1840, the house was occupied by Anna Matilda McNeill Whistler, whose sister was married to Dr. George E. Palmer of Stonington, and her family. Her husband, the engineer Major George Washington Whistler, was working on the Providence to Stonington railroad. Their son, the artist James McNeill Whistler, was a child at the time. He later painted the famous portrait of his mother in 1871. The family frequently revisited the house. In the twentieth century, it was the home of the poet, Stephen Vincent Benét, and later the Canadian artist, author and filmmaker, James Houston.