Greek Revival

Ralph Ingersoll House, New Haven, Connecticut

by

The house at 143 Elm Street, at the corner of Temple Street in New Haven, around 1935-1942. Image courtesy of the Connecticut State Library, WPA Architectural Survey Collection.

The house in 2018:

The north side of the New Haven Green was once known as Quality Row, for the many elegant homes that lined Elm Street. All of the houses along the eastern half of the Green, on the block between Temple and Church Streets, were demolished by the early 20th century, but several survive here on the western half, including this mansion. It was built in 1829 as the home of attorney and politician Ralph I. Ingersoll, and it was designed by Ithiel Town and Alexander Jackson Davis, two prominent architects of the early 20th century.

Ralph Ingersoll came from a prominent family that included his father, Jonathan Ingersoll, who served as lieutenant governor of Connecticut from 1816 to 1823. Ralph would also go on to become a leader in state politics, serving as speaker of the Connecticut House of Representatives from 1824 to 1825. He then served four terms in Congress, from 1825 to 1833. At the time, Connecticut did not have separate Congressional districts, so Ingersoll and the other five representatives were elected at-large by the entire state. From 1830 to 1831, he was simultaneously the mayor of New Haven, and he was later appointed U. S. Minister to Russia, serving from 1846 to 1848. During his time as a congressman, Ingersoll also received a prominent visitor to his home in 1833, when President Andrew Jackson came here during a visit to New Haven.

Ralph Ingersoll and his wife Margaret lived here together for over 40 years, and two of their sons would also go on to have successful political careers. The oldest, Colin, was elected to two terms in the U. S. House from 1851 to 1855, and his brother Charles served as governor of Connecticut from 1873 to 1877. The 1870 census, taken two years before Ralph’s death, shows him living here along with Margaret, their daughter Grace, and three servants. His real estate holdings were valued at $57,000, along with a personal estate of $12,000, for a net worth equivalent to nearly $1.4 million today.

Charles Ingersoll inherited this house from his father, and he lived here during his time as governor. The 1900 census shows him widowed and living here with his sister Grace, his children Justine and Francis, daughter-in-law Lucy, three servants, and a nurse. He remained here until his death in 1903, and the house was subsequently owned by Ingersoll family relative Frank H. Whittemore. He was a physician, and this building served as both his house and his office. His son, E. Reed Whittemore, was also a physician, and he also practiced medicine here with his father.

In 1919, Yale University purchased the house, thanks to a gift of $100,000 from Harriet Williams in memory of her son, Earl Trumbull Williams,. He was a 1910 graduate of Yale, and went on to serve as a lieutenant in the army during World War I. However, in 1918 he was killed by a falling tree while on leave from his post at Camp Devens in Massachusetts. This house became the Earl Trumbull Williams Memorial, and it was initially used to house the Yale University Press.

The first photo was taken several decades later, in the late 1930s or early 1940s. By this point it was still occupied by Yale University Press, which would remain here until 1959. Over the years, the exterior of the house has remained well-preserved – even the two trees in front are still standing from the first photo – and it is still owned by Yale. Today, it is used for offices, and it was recently used as the temporary home of Dwight Hall, a community service organization that was located here while its building was undergoing renovations in 2017-2018.

Tontine Hotel, New Haven, Connecticut

by

The Tontine Hotel, at the corner of Church and Court Streets in New Haven, around 1900-1907. Image courtesy of the Library of Congress, Detroit Publishing Company Collection.

The scene around 1918. Image from A Modern History of New Haven and Eastern New Haven County (1918).

The scene in 2018:

The first photo shows the Tontine Hotel, which had been a New Haven landmark for nearly a century before the photo was taken. It was built sometime in the mid-1820s – sources differ on the exact date – and its design was the work of noted local architect David Hoadley. The Tontine was a prominent hotel in its early years, and its notable visitors during this time included Indian chief and orator Red Jacket, who gave a speech here in 1829, and Daniel Webster, who came here in 1832.

However, perhaps the most significant group of guests came a year later, when President Andrew Jackson came to New Haven in June 1833, accompanied by then-Vice President Martin Van Buren, Secretary of War Lewis Cass, Secretary of the Navy Levi Woodbury, and Governor William L. Marcy of New York. The party arrived in New Haven by steamboat at around 1 p.m. on the afternoon of June 15 and went to the State House, where the president was addressed by the governor and the mayor. Jackson was then escorted through the streets in a procession that took a circuitous route through the city, eventually ending here at the Tontine. Jackson spent the night at the hotel, and in the morning he attended Sunday services at Trinity Church before departing for Hartford.

The Tontine Hotel was still in business when the first photo was taken some 70 years later. At the time, it was known as White’s New Tontine, as its proprietor was George T. White. An advertisement in the 1902 city directory declared it to be “Under New Management. All the Modern Improvements. Refurnished Throughout,” and rooms ranged from $1.00 to $2.00 per night. The first photo also shows a restaurant in the basement of the hotel. The signs indicate that it was a buffet that offered “White’s steaks, chops and game in season,” and the directory described it as a “cafe, restaurant, and rathskeller” that was open from 6 a.m. until midnight. In addition to this restaurant, there are several other amenities visible in the first photo, including a barber shop and a “boot blacking emporium” that were both located on the left side of the building.

Despite its historic significance, though, the site of the Tontine Hotel was eyed for redevelopment soon after this photo was taken. It was demolished by around 1913, in order to make way for a new federal courthouse and post office. Unlike the fairly modest brick hotel, the new courthouse was an imposing marble structure. It had a Classical Revival design, including a large front portico with ten Corinthian columns, and it was the work of noted architect James Gamble Rogers. The cornerstone was laid in 1914, in a ceremony that featured a speech by former president and future chief justice William Howard Taft, but the building was not completed until 1919, a year after the second photo was taken.

Like the architecturally-similar New Haven County Courthouse, which stands nearby at the northeastern corner of the Green, the federal courthouse was threatened with demolition in the mid-20th century. However, like the county courthouse, it was ultimately preserved, and it underwent a major renovation in the 1980s. The post office moved out in 1979, but otherwise the building remains in use, as one of thee federal courthouses in the District of Connecticut. In 1998, it was renamed the Richard C. Lee United States Courthouse, in honor of the longtime mayor of New Haven who helped to preserve the building, and in 2015 it was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Exchange Building, New Haven, Connecticut

by

The Exchange Building, at the northeast corner of Church and Chapel Streets in New Haven, around 1900-1912. Image courtesy of the Connecticut State Library, Herbert Randall Survey of New Haven and Environs.

The building in 2018:

The Exchange Building was completed in 1832, as one of the first major commercial blocks in downtown New Haven. The brick, Greek Revival-style building stands four stories tall, and it is topped with a large cupola. It has a roughly square footprint, with 18 window bays here along Church Street, plus 17 window bays around the corner along Chapel Street. Over the years, it has housed a variety of businesses and offices. Perhaps most notably, attorney Roger Sherman Baldwin had his law offices here during his work on the 1841 Amistad case. Baldwin successfully defended the Africans who had been illegally sold into slavery, and he subsequently became governor of Connecticut from 1844 to 1846, and a U. S. Senator from 1847 to 1851.

By the time the first photo was taken around the turn of the 20th century, the ground floor tenants included the F. S. Butterworth & Co. investment broker, the O’Neill-Shortell millinery shop, Alfred T. Ostermann’s florist shop, and Riker’s Wholesale Drug Store, which occupied the corner storefront on the right side of the building. Many of the upper floor windows are lettered with the names of the professional offices that were located there, although most of these are not legible in this photo. On the far left side of the photo, the Exchange Building abutted the 1856 Third Congregational Church, which had been converted into the New Haven Free Public Library in 1890.

At some point during the 20th century, the distinctive cupola was removed, and the building featured a large billboard that overlooked the corner of Church and Chapel Streets. However, the exterior was renovated in the early 1990s, including the addition of a new cupola and a restoration of the storefronts, and today the Exchange Building looks much the same as it did over a century ago when the first photo was taken. As a result, the only significant difference between the two photos – aside from the skyscraper in the distance, is on the left side, where the church-turned-library once stood. It was demolished around 1912, and was replaced by the eight-story Second National Bank of New Haven building, which still stands on the left side of the scene today.

State House, New Haven, Connecticut (2)

by

The Connecticut State House on the New Haven Green, viewed from the southwest around 1875. Image courtesy of the New York Public Library.

The scene in 2018:

As discussed in an earlier post, Connecticut at one time had two capital cities, with legislative sessions alternating between Hartford and New Haven. Each city had its own capitol building, and over the years New Haven had several different ones that were all located on the Green. The last of these, which is shown in the first photo, was completed in 1831. It featured a Greek Revival design, with columned porticoes on both the north and south ends of the building, and it was the work of Ithiel Town, a noted architect who was also responsible for the nearby Center Church and Trinity Church.

The dual capital arrangement lasted until the 1870s, when it became clear that the state no longer needed two capital cities that were just 35 miles apart. Both Hartford and New Haven wanted to become the sole capital, but the decision was left to the voters of Connecticut, who chose Hartford in a statewide referendum. The New Haven State House was used for the last time in 1874, and starting the following year the legislature met exclusively in Hartford’s Old State House. A new state house, located in Bushnell Park in Hartford, was completed in 1878, and it has remained in use ever since.

In the meantime, the now-vacant state house here in New Haven was the subject of several redevelopment plans, including preserving the it and turning it into a library. However, the fate of the building polarized many New Haven residents, with some admiring it for its architectural and historical significance, while others saw it as a daily reminder of the city’s defeat in the race for the state capital. Notwithstanding an 1887 referendum, in which city voters appropriated $30,000 to restore the building, the city council chose to demolish it two years later instead. This portion of the Green has remained undeveloped ever since, and today the only surviving remnant from the first photo is the iron fence in the foreground.

State House, New Haven, Connecticut

by

The Connecticut State House on the New Haven Green, seen from the south side of the building, sometime around the 1870s or 1880s. Image from The Connecticut Quarterly (1895).

The scene in 2018:

During the early colonial period, the modern-day state of Connecticut actually contained two separate colonies. In the northern part of the state was Connecticut Colony, which was centered around Hartford on the Connecticut River. To the south, along the shores of Long Island Sound, was New Haven Colony, which was centered around its namesake town. These two colonies were ultimately merged in 1664, but the divide between Hartford and New Haven persisted for many years. In 1701, the two towns were designated as co-capitals of the Connecticut Colony, and legislative sessions altered between them, with the May session being held in Hartford each year, and the October session here in New Haven.

Two capital cities also meant two capitol buildings, and New Haven had a series of different state houses that were all located here on the New Haven Green. The last of these, which is seen in the first photo, was completed in 1831, replacing an earlier brick state house that had been in use since 1763. Its design was the work of Ithiel Town, a prominent Connecticut architect whose earlier New Haven works had included Trinity Church and Center Church, both of which are still standing nearby on the Green. Together, these three buildings demonstrated Town’s wide range of abilities, between the Federal-style Center Church, the Gothic-style Trinity Church, and the Greek Revival-style State House.

Town’s imposing design for the State House gave the building the exterior appearance of an Ancient Greek temple. It was built of stone, and had porticoes on both the north and south sides of the building, with classically-inspired columns, entablatures, and pediments. On the interior, the building included space for both the state and county governments. The basement and the first floor housed county offices, along with the county courtroom, a jury room, and various committee rooms. The upper floor had the two legislative chambers, with the House of Representatives at one end of the building and the Senate at the other, and there was also a room for the secretary and two rooms for the governor.

Following its completion in 1831, New Haven’s State House served, along with the older Hartford State House, as one of the state’s seats of government for more than 40 years. However, by the 1860s it was clear that maintaining two separate capitol buildings was both expensive and redundant. Railroads had significantly shortened the travel time between the two cities, which are a mere 35 miles apart, and the practice of having two capital cities apparently had more to do with each city’s sense of prestige than with any major convenience. Both cities lobbied hard to become the sole capital, and even Meriden threw its hat into the ring as a sort of compromise candidate. In the end, though, the question was settled by the voters of Connecticut, who chose Hartford as the capital, perhaps in part because of that city’s promise to contribute land and $500,000 toward the construction of a new State House.

The final legislative session at the New Haven State House was held here in 1874, and the following year Hartford took over as the state’s only capital. The new State House was completed in 1878, and still stands in Hartford’s Bushnell Park. In the meantime, the old 1797 State House was used as Hartford City Hall for many years, and it has since been preserved as a museum. However, here in New Haven the public sentiment was strongly divided over the fate of the city’s former State House. Having been vacated by both the state government and the county courts, the building was in need of a new use, and many argued in favor of preserving it and converting it into a public library. Perhaps with this proposal in mind, city voters approved an 1887 referendum to spend $30,000 on repairs to the building. However, the city council overruled this decision, and determined to demolish the iconic structure instead.

Even in the 1880s, long before the modern historic preservation movement gained widespread appeal, this was a highly controversial decision, with many praising the building’s architecture and its symbolic significance to the city of New Haven. Among the outside voices calling for its preservation was the Boston Advertiser, which published an editorial to that effect in 1889. In it, the newspaper argued:

That old State House is a priceless memento of a glorious past. It is a perpetual reminder that New Haven was originally an independent colony, and that, for nearly two centuries and a half it shared with Hartford the honor of being a state capital. Within those walls were uttered words whose echoes reached the continent and beyond the sea. Its style of architecture suggests the classic learning which, from the beginning, has been more faithfully taught in that locality than anywhere else in the world. . . . To tear down that building would be to obliterate one of the chief milestones on the path of time.

Not everyone in New Haven saw the State House in such a light, though. Apparently still embittered at losing the capital contest to Hartford some 15 years earlier, the New Haven Register responded to the Advertiser with an editorial of its own, arguing:

It will be news to most New Haveners to be told that the State House is a “priceless memento of the glorious past.” It is not, nor has it ever been priceless. It is a memento of New Haven’s folly in allowing Hartford to gobble up the capital. It is a perpetual reminder that New Haven in the past has shown a deplorable lack of public spirit in important crises. It is not a “chief milestone on the path of time.” Rather it is an encumbrance, a public nuisance, a bone of contention, an eyesore, a laughing stock, a hideous pile of brick and mortar, a blot on the fair surface of the Green. The Boston paper doesn’t know what it is talking about.

Both of these excerpts are quoted from The New Haven State House, a book that was published in 1889 shortly after the building was demolished. Interspersed within this history of the building were a number of advertisements, several of which attempted to use the demolition as a marketing strategy. One such ad declared “Two Great Mistakes! The greatest mistake ever made by New Haven people is shown by the destruction of the State House. The Second Mistake is in supposing that B. Booth has only second hand and auction goods at 388, 390 and 392 State St.” Another simply stated “The State House Gone. The City Market Remains,” and a third was for a photographic studio that promised “the Best Views of the Old State House that were made.”

Following the demolition of the State House, the area was cleared and reverted to open park land, as part of the New Haven Green. However, this western portion of the Green, known as the Upper Green, was also the city’s colonial-era burial ground, where an estimated 4,000 to 5,000 people were buried. The headstones have long since been removed – aside from a small portion of the graveyard that is located in the basement of Center Church – but the remains themselves are still interred here under the Green. Today, though, there is little here to suggest the presence of a burial ground, or the former presence of a state capitol building. However, the New Haven Green is not without historic buildings, as three early 19th century churches still stand on the far right side of this scene, including the two designed by Ithiel Town.

Old Town Hall, Enfield, Connecticut

by

The old town hall on Enfield Street in Enfield, around 1896. Image from The Connecticut Quarterly (1896).

The scene in 2018:

This building was completed in 1775 as the third meeting house of the Enfield Congregational Church. It was originally located on the opposite side of the street from here, and was built with a steeple, but without the Greek Revival-style portico that was later added to the front of the building. It was used by the church for more than 70 years, but by 1848 it had become too small. A new church building, which still stands across the street, was completed the following year, and the old church was preserved and moved to its current location, thanks to funding provided by local carpet manufacturer Orrin Thompson.

Following the move, the building became Enfield’s town hall. Reflecting architectural tastes of the mid-19th century, the building was renovated to include a portico at the front entrance, and the original steeple was presumably removed during the same time. The interior was also renovated, including converting the balcony into a second floor. The building was used as a town hall for much of the 19th century, until a new town hall opened in 1892.

The first photo was taken a few years later, around 1896. Following its use as the town hall, the building deteriorated for many years, but was restored in the 1920s and used as a community center for many years. However, by the 1960s it had again fallen into disrepair, and was in serious danger of demolition. It was ultimately restored again in the 1970s, by the Enfield Historical Society, and in 1981 it was opened as the Old Town Hall Museum. Today, the building still serves as a museum, along with being the headquarters of the Historical Society. It is one of the oldest surviving public buildings in the area, and it is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.