The City Trust (later Citytrust) Bank Building, at 234 Main Street in Danbury, was erected in 1912-1913. Originally two stories, the building was remodeled and enlarged (to match the Union Savings Bank next door) in 1929-1931 by Morgan, French & Co. of New York. An Otis elevator was installed in 1931 to reach the new upper floors. Citytrust, based in Bridgeport, failed in 1991 and the building has since been a church.
At 111 Main Street in Danbury is a commercial and apartment building erected in 1890-1891. The upper stories of the front facade feature different window designs on each floor. A stone set in the middle of the facade on the fourth story is inscribed: “Marshall, 1890.” The building’s original cast iron storefront was covered when the storefront was later extended. Painted advertising, much faded over the years, on the exposed north wall, reveals a former owner whose business occupied the building: “Cornelius Delohery Undertakers and Home Furnishings.”
A sign on the house at 41 Central Avenue in East Hartford reads: “Mary E. Phipps, 1887.” The building now contains apartments.
The house at 35 Moss Street in the Pawcatuck section of Stonington is listed in the Mechanic Street Historic District as the Henry S. Gavitt House. There was a Henry S. Gavitt (1861-1928), who was an iron molder in Stonington and is buried in Maine. Another Henry S. Gavitt lived in New London. The house was built in 1905.
The building at 686 Main Street in Winsted was built in 1846 as a country store by Samuel Coe. At the time, the Beardsley House, a hotel and commercial block that burned down in 1939, was located just across the turnpike. Coe had previously been in partnership with Luman Hubbell, who is described in the History of the Hubbell Family (1881), by Walter Hubbell:
LUMAN HUBBELL, of Winsted (in Winchester), Litchfield County, Connecticut, son of Silliman Hubbell and Hannah Taylor, was born in Danbury, Connecticut, August 28th, 1797.
His parents moved to Winchester in 1800, and at the age of fourteen years he was apprenticed to Earl P. Pease, a woollen manufacturer of Norfolk, Connecticut, and took up the branch of “blue dyeing,” in which he became so proficient that he received one thousand dollars per year for his services, “a large salary in those days.”
He resided in Massachusetts for several years, and returned to Winsted in 1828, where he became a permanent resident.
In 1831 he formed a partnership with Mr. Coe, under the firm name of Coe & Hubbell. A large business was established by this house, and in 1846 they erected a new-store, and were preparing to move into it when Mr. Hubbell was attacked by a sudden illness, from which he died October 8th, 1846.
The Coe Store remained in the family for several decades, being operated for a time by James W. Coe. The building was vacant in 1887. Around that time, the originally Greek Revival structure was altered, the roofline being lowered to its present shallower pitch. Since then it has housed a variety of businesses. The current storefronts date to the twentieth century.
The house at 59 Barbourtown Road in Canton was built in 1800 by Elijah Barber (1748-1820). Elijah’s son, Daniel, raised the house higher and Daniel Hiram, a later owner, added an ell. In the 1830s, when there was a boom in raising silk worms, a silk worm house, or “cocoonery,” was erected on the property. In 1844 a disease struck the mulberry trees in Connecticut that fed the worms and the industry failed. The silk worm house was replaced by a barn, which later became a residence. Roy C. Webster, who had been a “Yankee Peddler” in his youth, bought the Barber House in 1926 and restored it.
Planning began in 1834 to erect an Episcopal chapel in Bethel. Dedicated to St. Thomas, the building was erected the following year on Center Street (now 95 Greenwood Avenue) and at the time was part of St. James’ Parish in Danbury. In 1909, the old white frame church was taken down to make way for a new edifice, built of stone that came from stone walls on outlying farms. Services were held on Christmas Day in the unfinished structure in 1909. The new St. Thomas Episcopal Church was dedicated a few weeks later, on January 16, 1910. Additions, which included a chapel, parish hall, kitchen and an upstairs caretaker’s apartment, were made in the 1970s.
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