In the 1920s, wealthy business men built handsome new homes in West Hartford neighborhoods that lined the eastern end of Farmington Avenue. Two of these outstanding side streets, Arnoldale and Beverly Roads, feature homes that were built to impress. Their styles range from Shingle to Colonial Revival to Bungalow to Spanish Revival. On Saturday, May 19, 2018, we will continue our celebration of Historic Preservation Month with a Sidewalk History Walking Tour of Arnoldale and Beverly.
Every home has a story, and we can’t wait to hear what award-winning architectural historian Mary Donohue has to share with us.
Here is a sneak peek (sans spoilers):
Ludlow Barker’s home, pictured above from a newspaper feature, once stood on the corner of Beverly Road and Farmington Avenue. Pianists will fawn over this advertisement from the Hartford Courant in 1903:
Ludlow Barker started selling Newby & Evans Pianos in 1886. His plaintive enthusiasm for the product, laced with testimonials through history about the power of music, gives a sense of Barker’s personality. A particularly compelling excerpt:
I verily think, and am not ashamed to say, that next to divinity no art is comparable to music. – Martin Luther
The tones of a Newby & Evans Piano thrill one! They are selected with great care by Ludlow Barker.
Ludlow Barker & Co. was operated by Barker himself until his death in 1910. His obituary in the Hartford Courant indicates his funeral was held on November 23, 1910, at his home.
Barker’s stately house at 711 Farmington Avenue was demolished in 1966. Farmington Avenue Apartments now stand in place of the home.
Though we won’t be able to gawk at what was once there, we will have the chance to learn more about houses like these:
Park Road, so named because the street led to Hartford’s first park, South Green, extends 12 blocks west of the Hartford city line to South Main Street. The area’s terrain and streams made it an ideal area for farming. In the 1920s and 30s, as the automobile increased in popularity, roads to and from Hartford, like Park Road, became more traveled. Population increases in the Park Road neighborhood led to new housing developments that offered a combination of single and multi-family dwellings. At the same time, numerous commercial strips and family-owned businesses lined Park Road to serve the needs of local residents.
To celebrate Historic Preservation Month this May, the Noah Webster House & West Hartford Historical Society is offering three walking tours of West Hartford! Architectural historian, Mary Donohue, will lead the forge through Park Road on Saturday, May 5, 2018 at 10 a.m.
You are about to get a sneak preview, of sorts. Some throwback images from the Noah Webster House & West Hartford Historical Society show just how much the quirky business district has changed (and a bit of what has stayed the same).
Rest assured, there are no tour spoilers below!
132 Park Road
(Jacobs Paint and Wallpaper Co. is no longer there, nor is Perry Pharmacy. Can you tell what businesses are there now?)
178 Park Road
(My, do we wish we could get a brake adjustment for $1!)
185 Park Road
202 Park Road
338 Park Road
(And it’s still a Shell station!)
353 Park Road
(Now Park Road Cleaners.)
In the 1990s, a neighborhood task force worked with the town to help reinvigorate the area. New lighting and landscaping were installed and the reconstruction of Park Road itself contributed to the stability and growth of the area. When the repaving of Park Road was finally completed, a celebration parade was held to mark the event and to bring shoppers back to the area. This Park Road Parade has become an annual event.
More information on this and the tours of Arnoldale & Beverly Roads (Saturday, May 19) and Elmwood (Saturday, May 26) can be found at noahwebster.yapsody.com!
When my kids were little, in the 1990s, there were big signs at Rockledge Golf Course disallowing sledding and skiing on a great hill off South Main Street. Now, the town has opened the course in a movement across the country to use parks in the winter as well as the summer.
In the 1940s, the town encouraged skiing and skating in the parks. The town bought the 70 acre West Hartford Golf Club for $20,000 in 1943.
The town used the course as both a summer and winter venue. The Recreation Department set up three ski trails at Buena Vista and provided a first aid toboggan. The West Hartford Outing Club organized activities on a “Practice” and “Advanced” slope. They also helped get the pond in shape for skating.
In February 1945, the ski committee of the West Hartford Outing Club sponsored ski racing at Buena Vista. Elementary, Junior and Senior High boys and girls ran a series of races in February with the hopes of winning an emblem for their ski jackets at the end of the season.
Buena Vista Skiers circa 1946
On the Sunday after Christmas in 1947, according to the Hartford Courant, over 600 people skied on the three slopes. By the second week in January 1948, the town provided lights for night skiing. There was also a hill for coasters and tobogganers.
The Recreation Department offered free ski lessons to both children and adults. By February 12, 1948, the Rec Department counted almost 8,000 skiers and skaters.
At the same time, the town set up a skating rink behind Hall High School (the present Town Hall in the town’s center). The rink was three inches of solid ice on the ground, so parents did not have to worry about their kids falling through. On January 22, 1948, the Rec Department planned to add lights. Students at Hall could skate during gym periods. Residents could also skate at Fernridge Park, Beachland Park and Buena Vista. All three places had warming huts for skaters.
On January 13, 1958, the Rec Department claimed 5,000 people “flocked to West Hartford skating, skiing, and coasting in one of the biggest turnouts in town’s history.”
As late as 1972, the Parks and Rec Department sponsored free downhill ski lessons at Buena Vista.
This year, the town has once again opened a golf course to the public in the winter. What fun to go cross country skiing at Rockledge. And, what about opening up some of these ponds to skating? Or having an outdoor rink at some of the parks or schools?
Ice is in the news. Connecticut’s rivers are being clogged by ice jams and the U.S. Coast Guard is sending out ice cutters to take care of the mess. With all the hubbub about ice right now, I can’t help but think that 2018 would be a boon year for the ice harvesting industry, were it to still exist.
Ice jams on the Farmington River, January 2018. Photo by Tessa O’Sullivan.
But alas, the ice harvesting industry has long gone by the wayside. Refrigeration pretty much took care of that in the 1930s. Still, you might encounter an oldtimer or two who remembers their grandmother using the old icebox. So where exactly did that ice come from?
If you lived in West Hartford at the turn of the 20th century, you didn’t have to go far. Edwin Arnold founded the Trout Brook Ice & Feed Co. on Farmington Ave. in West Hartford in 1879. A complex of company buildings were situated on the banks of Trout Brook. When the brook froze over, the ice was sawed in to blocks, stored in an ice house using an early conveyor belt, and packed in sawdust to keep cold. The company employed huge red wagons to carry the blocks of ice to homes in the area. Hundreds of workers purportedly came by trolley from Hartford to report for work during the ice harvesting season.
Ad for The Trout Brook Ice & Feed Co., once located on Farmington Ave. in West Hartford, Connecticut.
Trout Brook Ice & Feed was located on Farmington Avenue, near the intersection of what is today Trout Brook Drive. Notice in this 1909 map that Trout Brook Drive does not exist! Notice also the pond to the right, resulting from a dam in the brook.
But Trout Brook Ice & Feed didn’t just service the Greater Hartford area. With an influx of immigrants to metropolitan area, the need for ice grew. At the same time, increases in technology meant more factories setting up shop along the rivers. Many sources of natural ice in metropolitan areas became contaminated from industrial pollution or sewer runoff. And so, ice from a pristine rural community like West Hartford, Connecticut became desirable. At its peak, Trout Brook Ice & Feed would ship up to 50 carloads per day by railroad to New York City.
An early conveyor belt used to transport heavy blocks of ice into the ice barns for storage.
Business was good for Trout Brook Ice & Feed. So much so that in 1912, Edwin’s son Fred Arnold purchased land along what used to be the Middle Road to Farmington to build another ice pond to keep up with demands. In addition to dredging for the new pond, the company built ice barns for storage and laid trolley racks to carry the ice to Farmington Ave. for shipment throughout the region.
Women working at an American ice factory during World War I. National Archives & Records Administration.
Now, as increases in technology allowed for new refrigeration methods in the early 20th century, there was a chance that the ice industry would die out. However, when the United States entered World War I in 1917, the American ice trade rebounded. The nation’s existing refrigeration capabilities were challenged by increased shipments of chilled food to Europe during the war. Factories upped their production of munitions, which used up ammonia and coal that might otherwise be used for refrigeration plants. In short, the ice industry was called upon to relieve the refrigeration burden and maintain adequate supplies.
Vintage ad for the Kelvinator, “the Finest in Electric Refrigeration,” 1934.
Unfortunately for the ice business, the years following WWI resulted in the industry’s collapse. The introduction of inexpensive electric motors resulted in the modern refrigerator replacing grandma’s ice box. In 1927, Arnold sold Trout Brook Ice & Feed Co. to the Southern New England Ice Co. That company dissolved nine years later. And it wasn’t the only ice company to do so.
In the 1930s, natural ice harvests declined dramatically and ice warehouses were abandoned or converted for other uses.
In 1936, Wallace B. Goodwin (of the Goodwin Pottery family), purchased land west of Ridgewood Road with the dream of creating a development that would offer “seclusion” but not “isolation.” He had trouble finding funders for his project because no one believed that a neighborhood out in the woods would be a desirable location. Eventually, Goodwin was able to purchase land between Wood Pond and Tunxis Roads, which included the land around Wood Pond and Woodridge Lake. The first house was built in 1937 for Charles Derrick, the Hartford Electric Light Co. CEO, designed by Norris Prentice and built by Charles Robinson. Guess what? The development was a hit and by 1941, 44 houses had been sold.
A ca. 1940 aerial photo of Woodridge Lake and Wood Pond, originally built by the Trout Brook Ice & Feed Co. In the late 1930s, the land around the lake and pond were developed into a residential neighborhood. By 1944, the Woodridge Association that still exists today had been formed.
A newspaper article from the mid-1940s describes the neighborhood:
“Few Hartfordites are aware that there is a winter-summer resort just a stone’s throw from West Hartford Center – Woodridge Lake, just back of Ridgewood Road, formerly the old Arnold ice pond. Now this mile and a half long lake is a sight on Sundays – you see skaters, ice boats, toboggan slides, and 19 cabins dotting the edge of the water with smoke curling up from the fireplaces.”
The homes were originally intended as summer homes for the well-to-do of Hartford. In the past 20 years, an increasing number of residents have vastly expanded and modernized the homes for year-round use. Some residents built entirely new homes and kept the original, smaller cottage on the property. It is said that the foundations of the Trout Brook Ice & Feed ice barns can still be found on the properties.
Today, there is not a trace of the building complex that once occupied Farmington Avenue alongside Trout Brook. There is, however, a street that bears its name, though few would know that an ice company once stood at its intersection with Farmington Ave. The iceman may have come and gone before our time, but its history is still worth remembering.
Vestiges of the Trout Brook Ice & Feed Co. include this vintage ice pick, donated to the museum by Joan and Arnold Casinghino.
The earliest trolley, the Hartford and West Hartford Horse Railway, laid tracks along Farmington Avenue in 1894.
The section of Farmington Avenue west of the Center but east of Mountain Road doesn’t normally get much attention. It’s a relatively quiet residential area peppered with a variety of house styles that intersects at almost every block with a side street. Even at rush hour when there’s moderate traffic, it’s hard to imagine that at trolley once ran up and down this street.
In 1894, when the first plans for the Hartford & West Hartford Horse Railroad Company were approved, Farmington Avenue was sparsely populated with about 10 houses between today’s Pleasant Street and Mountain Road. These were mainly farm houses with large swathes of land. Up until that time, the intersection of Farmington Avenue and Main Street was where the action was, with a variety of fine houses (including the home of William H. Hall) built in today’s West Hartford Center.
In the late 19th-century, West Hartford experienced a population boom. With an ever growing influx of immigrants in Hartford, more established residents began moving west into West Hartford. Increased transportation – like the trolley – allowed businessmen to work in the Capital City but to live in the rural splendor of West Hartford.
Trolley tracks laid on Farmington Ave. next to the Reservoir (looking east)
The earliest form of mass transportation was the “horse railroad” begun in 1863. Steel rails were laid on major Hartford streets and train cars sat on the tracks and were pulled by horses. The Hartford & West Hartford Horse Railroad Company began laying down tracks on Farmington Avenue in West Hartford in 1894. Service began shortly thereafter, but there were still kinks to work out. The local churches were bothered by excessive noise and trolley cars jumping the tracks at different switches. And with winter’s arrival, patrons began appealing for stoves, fur robes, and better closed compartments within the cars.
Still, the introduction of the trolley along Farmington Avenue was an attraction for most. A trolley car house on the north side of Farmington Avenue, just east of Pleasant Street, which had been recently created to provide access to the newly laid out Fairview Cemetery. By January 1, 1895, two “special” trolley cars showed up at the car house with finished rooves and luxuriously upholstered cross seats. Around the same time, wires and poles were installed to allow for all of the horse-drawn cars to be converted to electric cars.
The trolley “car house” was located on Farmington Ave. just east of Pleasant St.
By June 1895, the trolley had helped spur a demand for building lots along Farmington Avenue. Real estate speculators purchased tracts of land and began to subdivide them into lots. Ironically, the lumber and other materials needed to build new homes on Farmington Avenue were often transported to the building sites by the trolleys. The growing attraction of the area is further demonstrated by the creation of the side streets Westland Avenue and LeMay Street. Laid out in 1905, Westland Avenue gained additional attention when Edward W. Morley, a nationally recognized chemist and professor, built a house at 26 Westland Avenue in 1906. George LeMay built a home “off Farmington Avenue at 1114” in 1905; by 1909, it was known as 9 LeMay Street.
Competition between trolley companies produced more alternatives, like branch lines. In 1899, Hartford & West Hartford Railroad was bought by the Farmington Street Railway. According to a 1901 book called Trips by Trolley Around Hartford, one could take the Hartford Street Railway from City Hall in Hartford to West Hartford Center (a 25-minute trip) for 5¢. If you
wanted to continue on to Farmington, you had to switch to the Farmington Street Railway in the Center, which ran every half-hour in the summer. It cost 10¢ to make the 25-minute trip to Farmington or 15¢ to reach the street railway’s terminus in Unionville (a 40-minute trip).
Trolley service left from Hartford’s City Hall (the Old State House). This trolley’s “West Hartford” sign can be seen faintly.
The year 1914 is considered to be the height of the trolley industry in America. In that year, 14 billion people rode on trolleys throughout the United States. There were now over 200 miles of trolley track in Hartford County (the lines being consolidated into The Connecticut Company). It’s no surprise, then, that residential development on Farmington Avenue grew significantly around this time, as more people began to take advantage of the easy transportation the trolley provided and moved farther west. The majority of houses built on Farmington Avenue between Westland Avenue and Garfield Road date from 1915-1930.
Additional side streets were drawn out [by 1917: Sunset Terrace, Wardwell Street, and Ellsworth Street (later changed to Garfield Road)], even if no houses had been built on them yet.
As romantic as the trolley seems to us today, they did not come without problems. To make way for them, the landscape of Farmington Avenue was changed. The street was widened and trees were removed, to be replaced with poles and wires. The road was now not as passable for horse-drawn carriages, pedestrians, and bicyclists. And once automobiles came into vogue, accidents involving the trolleys became common. The local residents – who might have moved to the area because of the promise of easy transportation – began to complain that the trolley did not stop frequently enough on Farmington Avenue. Passengers would wait at the designated area only to find a streetcar filled to capacity whizzing by with shouts of “Take the next car!” trailing behind.
The advent of the automobile correlated directly with the decline of the trolley. As more people drove to work, the use of the trolley diminished, eventually to be replaced by buses. The streetcar service from Hartford to Unionville ran until 1934, when trolley lines through Hartford County were reduced mainly within the City of Hartford. By 1941, The Connecticut Company had retired its last car.
The last West Hartford trolley, Park Road, 1934.
But here in West Hartford, the trolley had done its work. The development of Farmington Avenue from a patchwork of individual farms to a seamless community was only possible with the advent of the trolley, which attached the neighboring tracts into accessible strands of homes. Individual real estate and land decisions were made by the older generation as they retired away from town and sold off the land to prospective buyers; however, the increase in improved transportation, including the automobile, helped provide Farmington Avenue with a support network of side streets that coincided with the housing boom. Real estate companies and like-minded developers capitalized on these waves to provide a supply of “modern” suburbia to Farmington Avenue, a perfect storm that pushed residents from farmland to sidewalk to side street within three decades.
One of the earliest pieces of correspondence in the Butler Collection at the Noah Webster House and West Hartford Historical Society is this 1796 love letter from Erastus Wells to his sweetheart Abigail “Nabby” Benton back home in West Hartford – then still officially known as the West Division. Erastus was a sea captain, in port in Norfolk, Virginia on a voyage from New London. Click the links in the captions to open the images below at full size, or jump to the full transcript at the end of the post.
Erastus Wells was born in the West Division and baptized at the Congregational Church on October 13, 1771. He was the son of Ashbel Wells, who served in the Green Mountain Boys under Ethan Allen in New York in the late 1760s and again at the 1775 capture of Fort Ticonderoga, as well as in the state militia during the Revolutionary war.
Abigail “Nabby” Benton was the daughter of Capt. Asa Benton, a naval officer and later a merchant on Front St. in Hartford.
Further details of their lives are scant, but on July 9, 1806, the Connecticut Courant published a death notice for Captain Erastus Wells. He died on the fourth of July, at West Hartford, and is buried in the North Cemetery.
In a previous post, we met Jonathan Butler, 2nd, who inherited a cider mill and brandy still in the West Division from his father, Zacheus Butler. Jonathan’s daughter Maria married Erastus’ nephew George Wells, son of Ashbel Wells, Jr., in 1825, making Nabby Benton her aunt through marriage. Sometime after 1825, Maria recorded this recipe for “Aunt Nabby’s Gingerbread” in her recipe book.
Aunt Nabby’s Gingerbread. Teacup Molasses, 2/3 of Cream + Butter, 1 Egg, Table spoonful Ginger, tea spoon of Salaeratus, Tea cup of Sour Milk.
The recipe calls for “Saleratus”, an old term for baking soda, and omits all mention of flour – presumably any nineteenth century lady could figure that out on her own. It took me a few tries to get the proportions and process just right, but here is the recipe translated for the 21st century:
3/4 cup of Molasses
1/2 cup of heavy cream
1/2 cup of butter
1 large egg (or 2 smaller eggs)
1 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon powdered ginger
1 heaping teaspoon baking soda
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
Grease a loaf pan with butter. Preheat oven to 350 F.
Combine all ingredients except flour in a mixing bowl and whisk together.
Stir in flour with a wooden spoon until just combined.
Pour into loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes to an hour.
Aunt Nabby’s gingerbread
Full transcript of letter:
My Ever Eseemed Friend Norfolk Virginia. Sept 8th 1796.
Since I am safe arrived at this place I cannot help addressing the person whom my Soul Loves dear – First I will give you an acct of our passage. We left N. London on Sunday Morning at Nine oclock, and arrived here on Thursday Evening at 8 ofclock. We had a fine passage, and pleasant weather, but as for this place I cannot give any favorable account of it, surely I was never so much dissatisfied with any place that I ever was in. Although there are many people here which are very friendly + kind to me yet that place called W. Hartford is at present mostly in my thoughts, for which reason you may judge for yourself and I am sure you must very well know the cause.
O, My dear N- how the time does pass, one day appears as long as a week did formerly, and according to that how many weeks must pass away before I can once more behold, with Real Eyes, the person whom I so much adore. Do not think this to be vain thought or words of Flattery for upon the Honor of a Friend not a word is here written but what comes from the foundation of my Heart.
When I left home you will doubtless Recollect that I told you I expected to return in 8 or 9 months but I must now inform you to my sorrow that I shall not expect to be home before the latter part of June next – I do not expect to sail from here these six weeks. Yet do not be discouraged for as sure as we both live and you hold of the same mind that you appeared to be in when I left you, two days shall not pass before my promise is fulfilled.
How much do I lament my fate when I look around me in this Harbor + see the Numbers of Masters of Vessels here with their wives, The pastures of their joys with them to partake the bitter and sweet of life, but here I am alone to partake of the bitter itself, but let us hope all is for the best, & when once now we meet all will be well.
The line I wrote you from N London was wrote at a time when I was quite sick and scarce able to hold a pen, which I suppose Wm Bull told you if he delivered the letter according to his promise but my health soon returned after my getting to sea + I am now quite well.
Forget not I desire you to visit the place of my nativity which you will soon Recollect I enjoined upon you but I am fearful you will forget or on some bashful motive keep back and therefore not see the place and people who you know I prize in every respect next to yourself therefore on my account take every opportunity to fall on them as often as it is in your power, and I am sure you can spare one week in four. Your visiting there will not only oblige me but all our Family Especially – Polly & Hannah, who at all times will be ready to Receive you with the tenderness of an own Sister. You may tell them that I shall not write them by the Post, but will before I sail. Let them know the particulars of my intended voyage. As my paper is nearly filled I will conclude. And that you may have every blessing that you can wish to enjoy in my absence is the sincere wish of your Ever Constant, + Sincere Friend, Who will be Ever Ready to Serve, Love
& Adore you
Erastus Wells
PS. Give my best
Respects to Parents
Brothers + Sisters
and all that may and oblige. E Wells
The Antediluvians were all very sober
For they had no Wine, and they brew’d no October;
All wicked, bad Livers, on Mischief still thinking,
For there can’t be good Living when there is not good Drinking.
Around 1745, Benjamin Franklin penned these draft lines of a song on the virtues of drinking. “October” refers to hard apple cider – in that month the apple orchards growing on every farm began to drop their fruit, and farmers carted them to the local mill to process them into cider.
The work, A Treatise on Cyder-Making, is an anonymously authored guide to perfecting the drink’s production, with an introductory essay by an English connoisseur on his favorite varieties of apples.
The art of cyder-making was quite sophisticated in some circles. In 1769, the early Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, of which Franklin was president, enumerated among that distinguished group’s investigative goals, “what improvements may be made in the art of fermentation, making of wine, cyder, vinegar, &c.”
While artisans and philosophers quibbled over the details of process and profitability, the basics of brewing were widespread as folk knowledge. In The compleat housewife: or, Accomplish’d gentlewoman’s companion, printed in 1742 in Williamsburg, Virginia, a no-nonsense approach to cider is presented among the “several hundred of the most approved receipts” contained therein:
PULL your Fruit before ’tis too ripe, and let it lie but one or two Days to have one good Sweat; your Apples must be Pippins, Pearmains, or Harveys, (if you mix Winter and Summer Fruit together ’tis never good;) grind your Apples and press it, and when your Fruit is all press’d, put it immediately into a Hogshead where it may have some Room to work; but no Vent, but a little Hole near the Hoops, but close bung’d; put 3 or 4 Pounds of Raisins into a Hogshead, and two Pounds of Sugar, it will make it work better; often racking it off is the best Way to fine it, and always rack it into small Vessels, keeping them close bung’d, and only a small Vent-hole; if it should work after racking, put into your Vessel some Raisins for it to feed on, and bottle it in March.
Cider was the refreshment of choice for the colonists, who believed that drinking in moderation was good for body and spirit. In England, where polluted waterways made drinking water risky, people had come to drink beer and cider to quench their thirst. The early settlers continued the custom, despite the clean springs of the countryside, and industrial pollution soon justified the habit.
It would be more than a hundred years before the town of West Hartford was incorporated, encompassing the area known as the West Division of Hartford, in 1854. But in the meantime, the living and the drinking were good. The people raised horses, cattle, pigs and sheep, and grew the corn they learned to cultivate from the Indians and the flax and hemp that made them less reliant on English imports. In the sloping upland west of the meadows where their animals grazed and their crops grew, they grew lots of apples, and brewed lots of cider.
While the colonists ate their fair share of fresh apples, the fruit’s real utility lay in processing and preserving it. When turned into cider, apples could be used for a variety of purposes, like making vinegar and molasses.
Fermentation and the basics of cider production were common knowledge, but producing exceptional cider could be a profitable enterprise. For both the commercial and home brewer, the first step was always to crush and press the fruit. While most farmers in the West Division had apple orchards, not everyone had their own cider mill.
A cider mill consists of the mill, for crushing the fruit, and a press, for squeezing the juice from the mash.
“Cider Making”. William Sidney Mount, 1840-41. Metropolitan Museum of Art. William Sidney Mount painted this scene of a cider mill in use around 1841, when cider mills had come to evoke the “down-home” American image of pastoral simplicity cultivated by the presidential campaign of William Henry Harrison.
In the West Division of Hartford in the eighteenth century, the cider mill was an important social hub for the farmers and craftsmen in the colony. Neighbors and family hauled their apple harvests to the mill, in wagons or sleighs, along with their own produce or goods for trading.
On the north side of town, near present-day Still Rd, a cider mill was operated by a man named Jonathan Cadwell in the last decades of the colonial era. After his death, the business was run by Cadwell’s nephew Zacheus Butler, and continued by Butler’s son Jonathan through the middle of the nineteenth century. Account books belonging to this business are found in the Butler Collection at the Noah Webster House and West Hartford Historical Society. They provide a unique window into the rural economy of the West Division.
Cider mill shop account books in the Butler Collection
Everyone with apples had need of a mill, and the owner profited as a middleman.
Account of “unkle William Gailer” (William Gaylord), November, 1755. To cydr mill 25 brrls, 3 pounds, 2 shillings and sixpence.
Every autumn, there was a rush to make cider before winter.
Ashbel Wells’ account, September, October & November, 1768. To the use of the Cyder mill Sundry times to make thirty Seven Barrels of Cyder, 9 shillings and 3 pence.
We do not know exactly when Jonathan Cadwell began his cider business, but on “Desember” ye 6th, 1754, he started using the earliest of the account books in the museum collections.
Desember ye 6th, 1754. Jonathan Cadwell’s account book.
Two weeks later, he recorded credit for John Hoskins’ labor to haul a worm tub from Hartford. A worm tub is an apparatus used in distilling strong liquor, and they used it to distill cider brandy.
Desember ye 20th, 1754. John Horskins (Hoskins) credit to bring a worm tub from town, 5 shillings.
Cider brandy was a local competitor to rum imported from the West Indies. By 1749, Jonathan Cadwell was licensed to sell brandy in larger amounts, by the barrel.
1759, Retaled brande by lisens two barrels.
By 1767, the shop was also selling rum.
Cornelius Flower’s account, November 1767. To one Quart of rum that was forgot, 1 shilling.
But cider production was the mainstay of the business.
Moses Gaylord’s account, October, 1765. To the use of Cyder mill & mare to make twenty four Barrels of Cyder, 9 shillings.
Those farmers whose cider didn’t last the year, or who favored Jonathan Cadwell’s brew, bought “cydr” at retail year-round.
Jeremiah Tyler’s account, June, 1762. Cydr, 8 pence a gallon.
Besides the cider he brewed and the brandy he distilled, Jonathan Cadwell and his family sold other things they grew and produced on their farm, including candles, butter, cheese, beef, veal, mutton, tallow and suit, turnips, onions, Indian corn, flax, and wool.
Moses Cadwell’s account, May 1755. Oats, Indian corn, turnips, candles, brandy, butter.
He traded with merchants, many on ships in port returning from trading missions, for imports like wine, rum, tea, and chocolate, and for fabrics and fastenings for clothing.
March ye 4, 1769. Half a Cake of Chocholate, 5 pence.
Most farmers paid for the use of the mill and press to process their apples with “country pay,” their own produce, rather than silver money or bills of credit issued by the colony. The shop naturally filled with whatever grew in the fertile soil of their farms.
Some of his patrons worked on the farm at odd jobs, making hay or plowing corn, to pay off their tabs.
Due to him 2 afternoon gobs to mak hay; due to him to an afternoon job make hay and git in 2 loads
There were many jobs to be done. In 1755, Jonathan records owing a patron for killing a cow for him.
November, 1755. Credit for killing a cow.
On quiet days or when a customer was running the mill with his own horses or oxen, the proprietor might lease out his team to transport friends to town, or farther, to New Haven or Rhode Island.
August, 1767. 16 shillings to ride to New Haven or Rode Island.
Sometimes he charged by the mile.
Amos Burr’s account, August 4th, 1797. To my horse to Somers 23 miles @ three pence a mile.
At other times the team hauled wood down from Avon mountain, or helped in clearing the highways.
May 31st, 1800. To my Cattle for wood at Mountain, 8 pence.
Jonathan Cadwell and the Butlers also sold livestock, which was pastured in adjoining meadows. The owner records charging his patrons for the grass in his lot, and rates for each head of livestock pastured each week.
Samuel Cadwell’s account, May, 1797. To keeping Your Cattle Six days, 3 shillings and 5 pence.
Sometimes he let out credit for “Bull Service”, thereby increasing his own herds through the bounty of his apple business.
July, 1776. To your Bull to three Cows, 4 shillings and sixpence.
He also took in boarders, some of whom offered their own services, like shoeing horses, at the shop.
Asel Nearing’s account, November, 1786. By Francis Shewing your Horse, 2 shillings and a penny.
In his book he listed all the days these workers were absent, mostly for elections or militia training.
February 27, 1769. This 27 Day of fabrwary Ulysses Tyler Came to live [with] me for Eight months. March, 1769. The Days that the above named person was absent from my Business…Most of the West Division residents were farmers, but some were artisans. The account books record credit for Moses Cadwell weaving cloth.
ienewarey (January), 1755. Deue to Moses Cadwell for weving 20 yards and a half of woollen cloath, 4 pounds, 12 shillings.
And for Simeon Grimes making shoes.
Simeon Grimes’ account credit, November, 1765. To my Self a pair of Shoes, 9 shillings. To a pair of Shoes for Timothy, 5 shillings.
The cider mill proprietors also seem to have acted as de facto local bankers. Orders from patrons to pay a third party some amount on the customer’s account were pinned into the account book pages.
November 29, 1770? Mr. Ebenezer Center please to pay unto Mr. Zachariah Butler and charge the same to the account of your Humble Servt the Sum of Eleven Shillings. Timothy Dodd.Hartford, Jenewary the 29, 1788. Sir please to let Isaiah Woodruff have Six Shiling and Charge the Same to me. Abijah Flagg, to Mr Zacheos Butler
The accounts record loaning cash on credit as well as receiving it for payment. As early as 1762, Jonathan Cadwell took payment in dollars – probably Spanish silver dollars, which circulated widely in the colonies – valued at 6 shillings in his book.
February 1762, William Whiting credit two dollers, 12 shillings.
The accounts also include transactions of Continental dollars, cash of the “new emission”, and certificates of credit from the state.
Isaac Flower’s account, April, 1781. To 200 Continental Dollars
In 1797, a U.S. dollar was also valued at 6 shillings.
Elizabeth Bunce’s account, April, 1797. To Cash five Dollars, 1 pound and 10 shillings.
To adapt to the dearth of coins in the colony during the eighteenth century, the colonial government collected taxes from farmers at the “country rate,” which prescribed that if not in money, the amount could be paid with the fruits of the harvest. In Jonathan Cadwell’s account book, he records a debt of 5 shillings for 2 bushels of “Ingon corn for the town” in 1757.
Timothy Skinner’s account, 1757. Due to me for 2 bushells of ingon corn for the town, 5 shillings.
Jonathan Cadwell’s estate inventory, taken by his nephew at his death in 1769, suggests an idea of his lifestyle near the close of the colonial era. He dressed in leather breeches and black stockings, with a coat made of blue serge twill, a checked shirt, and a black vest. If the weather was warmer, he wore striped linen breeches instead of leather. For winter, he had a beaver hat, a great coat, and woolen shirts and stockings. For accessories, he had a silk handkerchief, gold cuff links, and a pair of silver “bow’d” spectacles.
Jonathan was a communicant in the 4th Church of Christ of Hartford, which later became the Congregational Church of West Hartford. In his estate inventory, among his books are a large Bible, a Communicant’s Companion, and a psalm book.
His parents were founding members of the congregation at its inception in 1712, and in 1722 his son was baptized there. But the son did not survive childhood, and in 1740 Jonathan’s wife also perished.
He made a fresh start, and in December of 1740 was married for a second time, to Bethiah Butler. In November, they announced their intentions to marry in the church. This draft manuscript of the announcement is one of the oldest in the collection.
November the 23, 1740. This may inform all Consarned that Jonathan Cad Well and Bathiah Butler both of Hartford intend marryage.
Paper was scarce. Connecticut would not have its first paper mill until 1766, and in the meantime paper was imported from outside the colony. People in the West Division did not waste paper. In fact, perhaps the oldest manuscript in the Noah Webster House collections is the receipt on the reverse side of the draft announcement, dated 1734. The bill under it shows us Cadwell was selling butter and cheese, as well as lumber, by 1738.
Hartford, March the 4th 1734. I the Subscriber John Rippenner discharge Jonathan Cadwell from all former book accounts as witness my hand.
Jonathan and Bethiah had no children, but took in Jonathan’s nephew, John, who lived with his new wife Joanna in Jonathan’s south chamber. He helped out at the shop, taking his uncle’s team of oxen on day jobs to mow fields or haul wood.
Due to me for Jon to mo half a day, 14 shillings. To cart hay, 10 shillings.
Joanna likely milked cows, made cheese and cider, cooked for their patrons, and spun thread of the wool sheared from their sheep. In September of 1759, Joanna and John had twin baby girls, but they tragically died two months later. The next June, John also died, at the age of 26, perhaps a casualty of the French and Indian War. He is buried in the Old Center Cemetery. A distinct handwriting in the account books between 1759 and 1760 is probably his.
Experience Tyler’s account, 1759, in John Cadwell’s hand.
After John’s death, Jonathan Cadwell decided to leave his estate to his other nephew, Zacheus Butler, who went by Zach (or Zack, or Zac – spelling was fluid then.). In 1763, Zacheus married the widow, Joanna. They inherited the business from Jonathan, and would run it throughout the Revolutionary period.
Jonathan left them his household property, including two great chairs, six chairs around the cherry-wood table, and a crown chair for lounging. For the table they had three pewter serving plates and six place settings, plus a tea table with six teacups and saucers.
Drinks were doled out in a quart decanter, two pint size decanters, and one at a pint and a half. They had two tumblers and six punch bowls. The kitchen was outfitted with brass utensils including a skillet, ladle, skimmer, and tongs, as well as iron pots and pans.
We can get some idea of Zacheus’ wardrobe a few years later from an accounting between him and a tailor, Cotton Murray, dated 1774. The tailor made him a pair of buckskin breeches and a coat and vest, which he paid for with 78 pounds of cheese, 8 1/2 pounds of pork fat, and 7 3/4 pounds of butter, plus 7 shillings and a penny in cash.
Zacheus Butler account with Cotton Murray. Buckskin breeches, a coat and vest, and silk, paid for in cheese, pork fat, and butter.
During the war, cider was an important provision for soldiers. One of the early acts of the new state government, in 1777, was to prohibit the distillation of cider brandy, out of concern that its manufacture would make ordinary hard cider scarce and expensive. At the same time, the government began licensing distillers of gin, or Geneva.
Among the shop records is a 1783 bill for dinner and drinks. David Little had a rum toddy and a glass of gin, and John Spencer had a gin toddy.
1783, bill for David Little and John Spencer.
But despite the wartime prohibition, cider brandy remained popular. In July of 1797, Jonathan Butler paid tax duties to operate his still for a month.
Rec’d of Jna Butler 2d five Dollars & Ninety Cents for Duties on his Still for One Month– Hartford, July 8th 1797 for J. Root Jr. Collector
In August of that year, he records serving brandy a gill at a time. A gill is about 4 oz., and was likely enjoyed on the spot.
Moses Abraham’s account, 1797. Brandy by the gill, 3 pence each.
In 1800, he received a printed license to distill more domestic liquor.
License to operate the still for two weeks, 1800.
Although official charges were in dollars and cents, for several years Jonathan Butler recorded values in sterling in his account book, and exchanged dollars at a rate of six shillings each.
Theron Seymour’s account, Decr 17th, 1815. To Cash ten Dollars, 3 pounds.
By 1823, he regularly used U.S. dollars for accounting.
May 8th, 1823. To two barrels of Cider, $2.33
As the country moved west in the first half of the nineteenth century, apples and cider preceded them in the wave of orchards planted by Jonathan Chapman, better known as Johnny Appleseed. Hailing from Massachusetts, Chapman traveled west to Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Indiana, planting apple nurseries along the way and selling the young trees to the frontier settlers. He made a living of it and became one of the first American folk legends.
Like many Connecticut natives in the early nineteenth century, three of Jonathan Butler’s children left home to go west, and we will feature their stories in future blog posts. With the new postal system and steam boat lines, staying in touch was easier than ever, and hundreds of their letters are preserved in the Butler collection.
In their letters, they asked their father about his business, and how much cider he made for the year. And they brought their Connecticut taste for cider with them: one had a brewery in Ohio, another made cider on a farm in New York, and the third shipped “choice old boiled” cider, from a family friend producing it in Indiana, by steam boat to Michigan territory.
The cider mill and still run by Jonathan Cadwell and later by Zacheus and Jonathan Butler is long gone, but stored in the museum, the records that survive tell its story. We hope you enjoyed it. Let us know what you think in the comments, and stay tuned for more of Webster’s West Hartford history.
In the 1990s, a neighborhood task force worked with the town to help reinvigorate the area. New lighting and landscaping were installed and the reconstruction of Park Road itself contributed to the stability and growth of the area. When the repaving of Park Road was finally completed, a celebration parade was held to mark the event and to bring shoppers back to the area. This Park Road Parade has become an annual event.
After John’s death, Jonathan Cadwell decided to leave his estate to his other nephew, Zacheus Butler, who went by Zach (or Zack, or Zac – spelling was fluid then.). In 1763, 
