The Stoner Mansion is a Tudor Revival house, on Stoner Drive, off Mountain Road in West Hartford. It was completed in 1928 for Louis Stoner, a manufacturer who became wealthy from the Jacobs Chuck company, which produces holding/clamping devices for stationary equipment and portable power tools. The family hosted famous parties at the mansion, which was situated on an extensive estate on a hillside with views of Hartford and a private golf course. Later, the family faced financial hardship and Louis Stoner committed suicide. In the 1950s, his widow, Clara Stoner, began to sell off lots of the property, with early houses being built down Stoner Drive, near Mountain Road. In the 1970s, homes were being built closer to the mansion itself. The Stoners eventually left the house and their furniture was put on auction in 1973. The mansion then had a number of other occupants: there’s a blog post by one former resident whose parents bought the house in 1974. In the 1980s, the house was owned by a man who was later arrested for tax evasion. Left empty for a decade by later owners who never moved in, the house deteriorated and had to be extensively restored by its most recent owners, one of whom owns an interior design company which, for a time, has been based in the mansion. The house will soon have new owners.
I have many fond memories of “Stoner Mansion”. I spent all of my childhood weekends with the fabulous Khan family who bought the house in 1974 upon arriving from Pakistan. We are all still very close, and it’s Stoner Mansion’s existence that really bonded us all.
I too was a friend of the Kahn’s and spent many a weekend at the house after they moved there from their modest digs on Wiltshire drive. Fis, me and Asad would mixed up Long Island iced teas, fire a bowl, and party till the cows came home always careful to placate “Hoggie” who lived in the servant house lest we risked getting in trouble for our teenage indiscretions.
I too was a friend of the Kahn’s and spent many a weekend at the house after they moved there from their modest digs on Wiltshire drive. Fis, me and her brother Asad would mixed up Long Island iced teas, fire up a bowl or hooch, and party till the cows came home always careful to placate “Hoggie” who lived in the servant house lest we risked getting in trouble for our teenage indiscretions.