Starr Cottage (1885)

The house at 144 South Street in Litchfield was built in 1885 by Almon B. Fuller, a furniture dealer and real estate speculator, who immediately sold the house to F. Ratchford Starr, who also owned the William F. Baldwin House immediately to the south. The two houses were known as the Starr Cottages. An insurance salesman and seasonal resident from Philadelphia, Starr had begun a highly successful dairy farm in Litchfield called Echo Farm in the 1870s. Starr also wrote several books, including Farm Echoes (1886) and The Lamb of God (1888). He sold the business in 1887 and died in 1889, his daughter inheriting the two houses. She willed the houses to Florence Frost, who resided in the Baldwin House until her death in 1923. In 1914, Frost sold the house at 144 South Street to Kate J. Thomas of New York City, who lived in it until her death in 1928. The house was acquired by Melvin Diems in 1949.