Historic Buildings of Connecticut

Exploring the Nutmeg State One Building at a Time

Museum

The Joshua Hempsted House (1678)

Joshua Hempsted is a well-known citizen of colonial New London because he kept a detailed diary for nearly fifty years, from 1711 until his death in 1758. Hempsted was a farmer, surveyor, carpenter, gravestone carver and local official who was born and lived in a house at 11 Hempstead Street, which had been built by his grandfather in 1678. Joshua added the east section of the house in 1728. It is New London’s oldest surviving house and was occupied by the Hempsted family until 1937. With the death of Anna Hempstead Branch, the house was left to the Antiquarian and Landmarks Society, which restored the house in 1956. Today, along with the adjacent house of Joshua Hempsted’s nephew, Nathaniel Hempsted, the Hempsted Houses are a Connecticut Landmarks site open to the public.

Samuel Parsons House (1759)

Built around 1759, the Samuel Parsons House, on Main Street in Wallingford, once served as a tavern when stage coaches stopped there. Featuring many traditional colonial elements, the house is transitional in style because it also has features of the Georgian style, including its two chimneys and the way its rooms are arranged inside. Caleb Thompson bought the house in 1803 and built wagons, carriages, and coffins in his shop on the property. His granddaughter, Fannie Ives Schember, leased the house to the Wallingford Historical Society in 1919 and later left it to the Society in her will. Owned by the Society since 1932, today the house is a museum.

The Stone House, Deep River (1840)

The Stone House in Deep River (which was known as Saybrook until 1947) was built in 1840 by Deacon Ezra Southworth for he and his new wife, Eunice Post Southworth. The house was built using stone quarried on the property. The original flat tin roof was later replaced by a gabled roof. A rear addition was constructed in 1881, just before the marriage of the Southworth’s son, Ezra Job Birney Southworth, to Fanny Shortland of Chester. The wraparound porch was added to the house in 1898. Deacon Ezra’s granddaughter, Ada Southworth Munson, who died in 1946, bequeathed the property to the Deep River Historical Society. It is now a house museum open to the public. On the property, there is also a late nineteenth century barn (now called the carriage house) and a section from an old bleach house, owned by Pratt, Read & Co., which was used for whitening ivory. At one time, Pratt Read in Deep River and Comstock, Cheney & Co. in Ivoryton, dominated the ivory products manufacturing industry in the U.S.

Amasa Day House (1816)

The Amasa Day House in Moodus (in East Haddam) was built in 1816 by Colonel Julius Chapman, who farmed on the property. After his death, in 1842, the property was sold at auction and purchased by Amasa Day. In the following years, Day, who was an insurance agent and banker, sold off parts of the land. The house was inherited by his daughter, Katherine and her husband, Eugene Chaffee, who worked for the New York Net and Twine Company, one of several twine factories in Moodus. Their son was Dr. Amasa Day Chaffee, a well-known art photographer. The house was donated to Connecticut Landmarks in 1967 and is now a museum.

The Moses Andrews Homestead (1760)

The Moses Andrews Homestead, on West Main Street in Meriden, was built around 1760 by Sgt. Moses Andrews‘s father, Samuel Andrews III. Moses was a Tory and during the Revolutionary War, the house was used as the first Episcopal place of worship in Meriden, with Andrews later acting as Lay Reader. The house remained in the family until 1864 and was then used for various purposes over the years, including as a school. In 1933, the house was restored, as a W.P.A project, to become a school and museum. When the school board ceased to use the property, it again became a museum organized by the Andrews Homestead Committee (formed in 1940). The house was again restored in 1954 and is now operated by the Meriden Historical Society as a museum. (more…)

Haddam Veteran’s Museum (1930)

The building which today houses the Haddam Veteran’s Museum was originally built in 1930 to be the town’s first firehouse. Located on Candlewood Hill Road, on the south side of Higganum Green, it was built after the Haddam Town Hall burned down in 1929. The sides on the second floor were later raised.

John Pratt, Jr. House (1732)

The John Pratt House, on West Avenue in Essex, evolved to its present form over many years. John Pratt, Jr. was the grandson of Lt. William Pratt, one of the first settlers of Essex. At the time, the Pratt’s were a family of blacksmiths. In 1701, John Jr. built the gambrel-roofed section, which is now at the rear of the Pratt House. In 1732, he began to construct the front part of the house, which grew over time. The house passed through several generations of the family and became a rental property in the early twentieth century. In 1953, it was given to the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities. The house has been owned and operated as a house museum by the Essex Historical Society since 1985.