In the nineteenth century, as the Bayliville section of Middlefield developed into an industrial area, many houses were erected for local workers. A good example of one of these is the house at 53 High Street. It was built in 1866 by Martin Moon, who possibly worked at the Metropolitan Washing Machine Company. Moon purchased the land using the severance pay he received after his service in the Union army during the Civil War. The house was later owned by the Lyman Gun Sight Corporation.
The house at 278-280 Naubuc Avenue in Glastonbury was built sometime about 1809, the year it was purchased by John and Jemima Alford. The couple would later take in workers at the nearby Curtis silverware factory as boarders.
The house at 271 Cherry Brook Road in Canton was built c. 1790 by Sgt. Daniel Case for his son, Elam Case (1772-1848). The upstairs fireplace has “ELAM” carved in the stone base. A later owner, William Elliot, built a pool to replace an ice pond that was destroyed in the Hurricane of 1938. The pool is fed by a brook that comes downhill through a pine grove set out by Benjamin F. Case, Elam’s grandson, who was born in the house. As related in Reminiscences (1908), by Sylvester Barbour:
Mr. Rollin D. Lane, a Canton boy, early orphaned by the death of his father, relates to me a pleasing incident in the life of another of those early Canton men, Mr. Elam Case, grandfather of Benjamin F. Mr. Case’s family lost a little household article, of no great value, and Rollin happened to find it, and he promptly returned it. Mr. Case proceeded to reward him, and, in doing that, to leave on the boy’s mind an impression that would probably never be effaced. He said to the lad, handing out 25 cents: “Here are 12½ cents for your finding the article, and 12½ cents for your honesty in returning it.” In those days one of the pieces of silver money was one stamped 12½ cents, and commonly called ninepence. Such a fatherly address of commendation of a good deed is worthy of imitation by actual parents.
The house at 31 Tolland Green in Tolland was built in 1760 and has had a number of alterations over the years, including the addition of Greek Revival-style detailing and two Victorian bay windows. For a time in the nineteenth century, it was the home of Judge Loren Pinckney Waldo (1802-1881), who later sold it to Henry Underwood. Henry’s daughter Miriam was the last of the family to live in the house.
A lawyer, Loren P. Waldo served in various state offices. He served terms as a state representative, state attorney general and judge of probate. In 1849-1851, he served in the U.S. House of Representatives. Unsuccessful at reelection, he next served as Commissioner of Pensions under President Pierce (1853-1856) and then was a Judge of the Superior Court of Connecticut (1856-1863). He later practiced law in Hartford until his death in 1881. Waldo’s address to the Connecticut Historical Society on The Early History of Tolland was published in 1861. (more…)
At 25 Union Street in Deep River is a house built in 1838 to serve as the parsonage for the nearby Deep River Congregational Church.
The house at 1745 Huntington Turnpike in the Nichols section of Trumbull was built in 1838. A sign on the house gives the name of Samuel Edwards. Could this be the Samuel Edwards who was born in 1800 and died in Trumbull in 1880?
The history of the Methodist church in New Hartford begins with the establishment of the New Hartford Society of the Reformed Methodist Church in 1845. A Methodist church building was erected on Maple Hollow Road in the village of Bakerville in the 1850s. It was destroyed by fire on September 23, 1954. Ground breaking for a new Bakerville Church, located at 1087 Litchfield Turnpike, took place in the fall of 1957. The exterior of the church was built first, followed by construction of the attached Fellowship Hall. It was in Fellowship Hall that the first church service was held on April 6, 1958. The church sanctuary was consecrated on December 11, 1960.
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