The former Mount Saint John School in Deep River, Connecticut, sits atop a hill on the western banks of the Connecticut River and is a visual landmark in every sense of the word. The school was founded by the Diocese of Hartford, who acquired the site in Deep River and began construction on the present building in 1907. Completed by 1908, the stone building (architect not known at this time), served as an industrial school for 100 boys in the Hartford region aged 8-16. The school, led by the Xaverian Brothers, was intended to educate troubled young men in the Catholic faith and learn working skills for a profession. The use changed numerous times throughout the 20th century, and ended up becoming the Mount Saint John School. Then under the Norwich Diocese, the school became known as the Mt. Saint John School. The school closed years ago and the historic building and surrounding campus’ future are uncertain.
The finest extant Queen Anne Victorian-era house in the town of Deep River, Connecticut, is located on Main Street and since the 1930s, has been home to the town’s public library! How’s that for adaptive reuse?! This residence was built in 1881 for Richard Pratt Spencer (1820-1910), a local prominent businessman who lived to be 90 years old. Spencer lived here with his second wife, Juliana Selden, who was 32 years his junior, and three children until his death in 1910. When Spencer’s widow died in 1932, the heirs sold the property to the Saybrook Library Association (before the town renamed Deep River in 1947), which then, in turn, sold the building to the town for a small price in order to convert it into a library. Opened to the public in 1931, the Deep River Public Library has been preserved inside and out with historic fireplaces, woodwork, and features. The only notable change occured in 1995 when a children’s room addition was built to resemble an old porch. The library even retains the original pebbledash finish in the gables, a rare detail not commonly found in typical old houses of the period.
The Southworth House, also known as the Old Stone House, in Deep River, Connecticut, is a significant example of a stone, Greek Revival style house built for an important local family. The Southworth House was constructed in 1842 for Deacon Ezra Southworth (1803-1859) from stone harvested from one of the Southworth family’s quarries. Ezra was the son of local shipbuilder, Job Southworth who began building ships at the Deep River landing in the 1790s. Ezra Southworth branched off into manufacturing, becoming a partner and patent holder producing ink wells. His son, Ezra Job Birney Southworth (1844-1919), went into business with his father-in-law in shipping and served as a member of the State Legislature twice. In 1882, Ezra Jr. added the wooden ell onto the rear of the Stone House along with the wrap-around veranda and likely the rear barn as well. Ada Gilbert Southworth Munson was Ezra J. B. Southworth’s only child to live to adulthood and inherited the family home. She was a founding member of the Deep River Historical Society and bequeathed her family home to the Society in 1946, who have maintained the significant home here ever since.
The Pratt, Read & Company Factory, located on Main Street in Deep River, Connecticut, was once the largest producer of ivory products in the world. The company was established in 1863, when Julius Pratt, George Read and their corresponding companies, merged to become Pratt, Read and Co. In 1866, the newly organized company built a new factory on this site. The business manufactured ivory combs, collar buttons, and toothpicks and specialized in the production of piano and organ keys. That factory burned in 1881 and as a result, over 160 employees were out of work. A year later, in 1882, the present factory was built of fireproof brick construction. The company, like many others, imported ivory from King Leopold’s Congo, where atrocities against indigenous people were common. The original Pratt, Read and Co. factory had an ornate pyramidal tower, which was removed in 1914. In 1936, the company merged with Comstock, Cheney & Co. and moved all operations to Ivoryton, CT. The Deep River factory was used for various manufacturing purposes throughout the rest of the 20th century until it was converted to condominiums as the appropriately named Piano Lofts.
The town of Deep River, Connecticut, was originally a part of the Saybrook Colony, a large area at the mouth of the Connecticut River that was settled by English colonists. As what has become Old Saybrook grew, settlers moved further and further away from the original settlement and, eventually they received permission to form their own parishes so that they would not have to travel so far on Sundays to attend church services. As these outlying parishes grew, they separated from Saybrook and became the present day towns of Lyme, Old Lyme, Westbrook, Chester, Essex, and Deep River. Residents of present-day Deep River traveled to church services in Centerbrook, a village in Essex until this church was built in 1833. First services were held here the following December. The Greek Revival style church is ecovative of many similar 1830s village churches in New England, employing elements of the Greek Revival architecture style, with large doric columns, corner pilasters, and square belfry also with pilasters. The congregation here has been active for nearly 200 years.
The town of Deep River, in Middlesex County, is located in the lower Connecticut River Valley and was originally colonized as part of the Saybrook Colony. The community was incorporated in 1859 as Saybrook and renamed Deep River in 1947. An early shipbuilding and quarrying town, it later manufactured wire goods, lace, glass, ivory combs, and piano keys and is today a small community of just over 4,500 residents. The original town hall for Saybrook (Deep River) was used until it was destroyed by fire in 1891. The community, which was bolstered by a vibrant industrial community, began planning for a new, stately town hall at a triangular lot at the corner of Elm and Main streets. Plans were completed by Springfield architect, Francis R. Richmond, who laid out the flatiron building with town offices on the ground floor with an auditorium/opera house space on the upper floors. The Romanesque Revival style building features prominent rounded corners with arched openings, a granite string course, and overhanging bracketed eaves.
The Gothic Revival style Immanuel St. James Episcopal Church of Derby is a landmark example of the style in this part of Connecticut and serves as the eastern anchor to the Birmingham Green in town. The church dates to 1843 and was built by The stone church was was built by stonemason, Harvey Johnson and Nelson Hinman, a carpenter. The land for the church was donated by Sheldon Smith and Anson G. Phelps, wealthy industrialists in town. The building originally had a wooden steeple, which was replaced by the present stone belfry in 1853. The church merged with another area congregation, which together, have preserved this significant structure, though the communications antennae on the battlements on the belfry is unfortunate.
The Derby Neck Library in Derby, Connecticut, is a beautiful example of an early 20th century library and one of a few Carnegie libraries in the state. The beginnings of the library began in 1897, when Wilbur F. Osborne and his wife, Ellen Davis Osborne, who lived at the nearby Osborne Farm, donated $50 to the nearby school to begin a small library in the building. After years of growth, Wilbur Fisk Osborne, requested funds from Andrew Carnegie, who was donating money to communities all across the country for such purposes, to build a new library for Derby Neck. In 1906, Carnegie donated $3,400 to the community, and planning began on the building. Sadly, Osborne died around the time the library opened in 1907. The building was designed in the Classical Revival style by architect, Henry Killam Murphy of Connecticut. Osborne’s daughter, Frances Osborne Kellogg, who inherited her father’s farmhouse nearby, directed the library until her death in 1956. The building was expanded in 1972 and again in 1999.
The former Derby United Methodist Church (now the Ghana United Methodist Church) is located at the northern edge of the Town Green in Derby, Connecticut, and is a great example of a ecclesiastical building constructed in the Romanesque Revival style. Its large round arches, tall square tower, and heavy detailing in brick and brownstone place it in the Romanesque Revival mode, all with stained glass throughout. The church was built in 1894 and dedicated in early 1895. The stately church building was designed by George Washington Kramer (1847-1938), an architect who designed many Methodist churches in the midwest and east coast.
The Housatonic River (also spelled the Ousatonic) is, after the Connecticut and Merrimac, the most powerful river in New England. Its location in Derby, Connecticut, was seen as a benefit to local businessmen, who after the Civil War, created the Ousatonic Water Company. The new organization made up of industrialists and businessmen, set off to complete the Ousatonic Dam (on the Housatonic River) towards the end of 1870. The dam precipitated the rapid development of the industrial villages of Birmingham (Derby) and Shelton. Aptly built on the corner of Main and Water streets, this handsome Italianate style masonry building was constructed by the 1880s for the Ousatonic Water Company for their company offices. The company was absorbed into the Connecticut Light & Power Company in 1927. The former offices have since been repurposed for a local business.
The Sterling Opera House in Derby, Connecticut, is a landmark performing arts venue and civic center in the state and significant as a rare and well-preserved building constructed in the Italian Renaissance Revival style. Built in 1889, the building is named for Charles A. Sterling, founder the former Derby-based Sterling Piano Company, who paid for much of the costs of construction and design for the building. For his namesake building, Charles Sterling hired architect H. Edwards Ficken, who also assisted with the designs for the famous Carnegie Hall in Manhattan, New York, to furnish plans for the unique building. The Opera House was built to serve both political and entertainment needs for the community, with the lower two levels and the basement serving as City Hall offices and the police station from when it opened up until 1965. The auditorium was used for hundreds of shows and live musical performances in its day, with many world-famous performers such as Harry Houdini and Red Skelton taking the stage at the Sterling. Shows were held up until 1945 when the curtain closed for the last time. In the past decades the building has been largely vacant and kept alive by grants and a dream by the city to preserve this significant landmark, possibly for reincorporation as the City Hall.
The Second Congregational Church of Derby was built in 1845 by members of the Birmingham Congregational Society, who grew tired of travelling across the river to the First Congregational Church in town. The present “downtown” of Derby was originally known as Birmingham and grew as the industrial center in the city, which historically was much larger than it is today. The Birmingham Congregation had this edifice constructed in the Greek Revival style, and it was added onto in 1859, 1889, and underwent alterations in 1915, when the facade was altered with Colonial Revival flourishes. The additions to the facade include the Palladian window, elliptical leaded window in the pediment, and panels with swags and wreaths. The top of the steeple was damaged by Hurricane Gloria in 1985 and removed, and was replicated in 2021.
The Westminster Meetinghouse (aka the Westminster Congregational Church) was built in 1770 by Canterbury, Connecticut residents who in the 1760s, created a separate religious jurisdiction, the Westminster Society, due to their reluctance to travel long distances to Canterbury village for required religious services. Local resident John Parks donated land to be used as a public green, as well as a site for a cemetery and this meetinghouse. Sherebiah Butts, captain of the local militia, was engaged as master builder and architect, who along with his sons and other helpers, constructed the church by 1770. The original church, originally a square-plan meetinghouse, initially faced east, but was rotated to face south by around 1840, when the entire structure was remodelled in the prevailing Greek Revival style. The church is said to be one of the oldest continually utilized meetinghouses in Connecticut.
Built c.1805 for Elisha Payne, this architecturally distinguished Federal style mansion in Canturbury, Connecticut is one of the most significant buildings in the state, not only for its architecture but historical significance. In 1831, a young white woman, Prudence Crandall, was asked to open a boarding school for girls in Canterbury. She purchased this mansion and began operations for the school, which was attended by many wealthy girls in town. In 1832, Ms. Crandall was approached by a young Black girl who worked as a servant in town, named Sarah Harris, asking to attend the school. Encouraged by conversations with both Harris and Maria Davis, a Black woman who worked for Crandall and shared copies of the abolitionist newspaperThe Liberatorwith her, Crandall agreed to admit Harris. Almost immediately, residents protested the school’s admission of a Black girl and parents threatened to withdraw their students, Crandall undeterred, closed her school and reopened in 1833, solely for Black and Brown students. Young girls traveled from several states to attend the school. The legislature of Connecticut responded by passing the “Black Law,” which prevented out-of-state Black and Brown people from attending school in Connecticut towns without local town approval. Crandall was arrested, spent one night in jail, and faced three court trials before the case was dismissed. In September 1834, a nighttime mob of men attacked the house, smashing the windows, leading Crandall to close the school out of fear for her students as no protections were afforded to them. These events made national and international news in the 1830s and galvanized the burgeoning abolitionist movement. Crandall would later marry and left Connecticut, never to return. For her vision and brave actions at this school, Prudence Crandall is Connecticut’s official state heroine and the house was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1991.
The Edward Waldo House in Scotland, Connecticut, is a vernacular Georgian house with saltbox roof and wings which from its erection about 1715 until 1971 was owned by members of the Waldo family. Edward Waldo (1684-1767) purchased land here along the Shetucket River in 1702 and by 1715, erected this house. The saltbox house which Edward Waldo built was one of the first houses in the town of Scotland and would remain in successive generations of the family for centuries. The house was the birthplace of Samuel Lovett Waldo (1783-1861), a portraitist who was a founder of the National Academy of Design as well as Daniel Waldo, chaplain of Congress, 1856-1858, and was one of seven Revolutionary War veterans who, having survived into the age of photography, were featured in the 1864 book The Last Men of the Revolution. The last Waldo owner, Miss Ruth Waldo died in1975. She insured the preservation of her family homestead by bequeathing the house, its contents, and about 15 acres of land to the Antiquarian & Landmarks Society of Connecticut Inc. and the surrounding acreage to the Connecticut Forest and Park Association, creating an enduring legacy for centuries to come. The house, set amongst a quiet country road, is evocative of early days in Scotland, Connecticut, and is one of the finest-preserved Colonial homes in this part of the state.
Buildings of New England 