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

Tapping Reeve House (1773) and Litchfield Law School (1782)

Litchfield Law School (left) & Tapping Reeve House (right)

Tapping Reeve, a lawyer, and his wife, Sally Burr Reeve, settled in Litchfield in 1773. The next year, Reeve began teaching law to his wife’s brother, Aaron Burr, who was living with the couple. Starting with this single student, Reeve developed a curriculum which would be taught to almost 1,000 students over the following decades, as he expanded from his home to a one-room school house he had built next-door, in 1784. Because this was a time before the creation of formal law schools at the major Universities, this Litchfield Law School is regarded as being the oldest law school in the country. The school’s students included such notables as John C. Calhoun and Oliver Wolcott, Jr. In 1798, Reeve was joined by James Gould and the two operated the school together until 1820. Gould would continue to run it until 1833. The law school building was later moved from the site, but was eventually returned and restored in 1976. Today both the house and school are open as a museum run by the Litchfield Historical Society. (more…)

The Mark Twain House (1874)

Built in 1874 on Farmington Avenue in Hartford’s Nook Farm neighborhood for Samuel Clemens (aka Mark Twain) and designed in the High Victorian Gothic style by Edward Tuckerman Potter (who was known for his churches, including the Church of the Good Shepherd). Mark Twain lived here from 1874-1891 with his wife, Olivia Langdon Clemens, and their three daughters: Suzy, Clara and Jean. His wife was the one primarily involved in planning with the architect–apparently all Sam Clemens asked for was a red brick house! He also had a servant’s wing and a carriage house and employed about seven or so servants, including his butler, George Griffin, maid Katy Leary and coachman Patrick McAleer. It was while living here that Mark Twain wrote such classic works as The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court. Bad financial decisions, including his investment in the Paige Compositor typesetting machine, led to near bankruptcy, and forced the Clemens family to move to Europe in 1891. After a round-the-world lecture tour, Clemens was able to pay off his debt, but as his eldest daughter Suzy had died in the Hartford house during a return visit there in 1896, the family never returned there and he sold the house in 1904. Over the years, the house was used as a school, a library and an apartment building. It was restored in the 1960s and 1970s and is open as part of The Mark Twain House and Museum.

First Church, Farmington (1771)

Built in 1771 in Farmington as the third Meeting House of a congregation which originated in 1652. The First Church of Christ, Congregational was built by Capt. Judah Woodruff and features a steeple which has been described as perhaps the most beautiful in New England. The building‘s Greek Revival porch was added in the nineteenth century. This church shows the evolution from a square colonial Meeting House to a Georgian church with a tower at one end. In the nineteenth century, the freed Amistad survivors were supported by members of the congregation and attended services here when they came to Farmington in 1841, awaiting the funds to return to Africa.

Sarah Whitman Hooker House (1720)

Built in the early eighteenth century on New Britain Avenue in West Hartford for Timothy Seymour. The house was gradually expanded throughout the century from an original one room “with chamber above” into a saltbox. In the first decade of the nineteenth century, a later owner removed the saltbox addition and remodeled in the Federal style, enlarging the house to its current size. The home is named for Sarah Whitman Hooker. Her husband, Thomas Hart Hooker, a descendant of Thomas Hooker, bought the house in 1773. When he died after going to fight at Boston in 1775, she lodged two Tory prisoners of war in the home during the winter of 1775-1776. The house has been restored and is currently a open as a museum.

Hartford Times Building (1920)

Built in 1920 on Prospect Street as headquarters for the Hartford Times, the city’s evening newspaper, which existed from 1817 to 1976. Designed by Donn Barber, the Beaux-Arts building features six green granite Ionic columns salvaged from the Madison Square Presbyterian Church in New York (designed by Stanford White; built in 1906, demolished in 1919 to make way for the Met Life Building’s expansion). The recessed porch also features allegorical scenes. For many years, the building hosted campaign speeches by presidential candidates. Current plans for the building involve its adaptive reuse as an annex of the neighboring Wadsworth Atheneum, as such it will be an important part of the Adriaen’s Landing development.

Memorial Building, Rockville (1890)

Built in 1889-1890 in Rockville (part of Vernon) to serve as the Town Hall, the second floor features a Grand Army of the Republic Hall. It is the longest continuously operated GAR hall and the only one still intact with its original contents in Connecticut. Today it is open to the public as the New England Civil War Museum. The museum displays original stained glass windows and Civil War artifacts, including the Thomas F. Burpee Collection and the Hirst Brothers Collection. Originally planned to be constructed of wood, it was eventually decided to build the Memorial Building in stone, as the nearby Congregational church, which had been made of wood, burned down twice! After the church burned down in 1888, the new Union Congregational Church of 1890 was also built in stone. The Memorial Building was built by GAR veterans, one worker falling to his death during the construction. In Central Park in front of the building is the Cogswell Fountain, donated to the town by the temperance activist Henry D. Cogswell in 1883.

Gay Manse (1742)

Built in 1742 on North Main Street in Suffield for the Reverend Ebenezer Gay, who was ordained as minister of the Congregational church that same year. The “Gay Manse” is notable as one of the earliest gambrel-roofed houses in New England. It is also one of the oldest houses in Suffield and features a classic Connecticut River Valley doorway. When Gay died in 1796, he was succeeded by his son. Rev. Ebenezer Gay, Jr. served until his death in 1837 and also ran a school in one room of the manse, while housing the town library in another. Today the house is owned by Suffield Academy.