Parker Homestead (1777)

At 640 Wormwood Hill Road in Mansfield is a house originally built by Capt. Richard Fletcher (1736-1812) and sold, in 1777, to Zachariah Parker, Jr., who farmed on the property. The house would remain in the Parker family until 1901. Zachariah passed it to his eldest son, Thomas Parker, who had five sons and one daughter with his wife, Hannah Atwood Parker. The elder brothers, Miner and Pliny, married, but the three younger brothers did not. Their sister, Hannah Parker (1804-1895), kept house for her brothers at the Parker Homestead, where she lived until her death. Hannah Parker also taught school at Wormwood Hill and professed to be the first female teacher in Mansfield. Her nieces and nephews inherited the house and sold it in 1901 to Gertrude Cantor of New York. She and her sister, Alice Cantor, ran the property as a summer boarding house. To make more room for their many guests, the sisters raised the house from its original one-and-a-half stories to a full two stories.

Near the Parker Homestead and across the street is the Parker-Vagra House, at 661 Wormwood Hill Road. It was the residence of Amasa Parker, brother of Thomas Parker. It remained in the Parker family until Fred and Ida Parker sold it to Alex Varga, an immigrant from Hungary.