John Kendrick House facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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John Kendrick House
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U.S. Historic district
Contributing property |
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North elevation, 2009
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 Location in Connecticut
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| Location | Waterbury, CT |
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| Built | 1866 |
| Architect | Henry Austin (possibly) |
| Architectural style | Italianate |
| Part of | Downtown Waterbury Historic District |
| NRHP reference No. | 82004360 |
| Added to NRHP | 1982 |
The John Kendrick House is a historic building in Waterbury, Connecticut, United States. It's a two-story brick house built in the 1860s. The house is designed in the Italianate style, which means it looks a bit like a fancy Italian villa. It's one of the few old houses left from that time around Waterbury Green. In 1982, it was added to the National Register of Historic Places. This means it's recognized as an important historical site.
The house was built by Green Kendrick, a successful businessman, for his son, John Kendrick. John was a lawyer who later became a judge and even the mayor of Waterbury. People think the famous architect Henry Austin might have designed the house, but there's no definite proof. Later, the house was given to the local historical society. It was home to the Mattatuck Museum for many years. The museum still owns the house today, even though it's not currently in use.
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About the John Kendrick House
The John Kendrick House stands on a small piece of land on West Main Street. It's right across from Waterbury Green, which is a park in the middle of the city. The house is surrounded by larger commercial buildings. It has a front lawn with a decorative iron fence. This gives it more space than the buildings next to it.
The house is made of brick and has two stories. It has a gently sloped roof with two chimneys. A two-story addition was built at the back later. It matches the original house well.
What Does the House Look Like?
The front of the house faces north. The main entrance is in the middle and has a beautiful wooden porch, called a portico. This porch is very decorative. Above the porch, there's a balcony that you can reach from a round-arched window.
Most of the windows are tall and have single panes of glass. The windows on the first floor have small, decorative cast-iron balconies. They also have stone sills and fancy tops. The second-story windows have similar sills but simpler tops. The wide roof has large, decorative wooden supports called brackets. These brackets have leaf carvings.
The entrance porch has square columns with fancy designs. Their tops are decorated with thick acanthus leaves. Above these, more decorative brackets support the porch roof.
Inside the House
A few stone steps lead up to the front door. The door itself is simple, with glass panels on the sides and above it. When you enter, you step into a central hallway. This hallway has a beautiful wooden floor with a pattern.
All the rooms in the house still have their original wooden details. This includes the baseboards, door and window frames, and decorative trim near the ceiling. When the Mattatuck Museum used the house, the rooms on the east side were combined. This created a large gallery space for exhibits. The hallway downstairs and the stairs have wooden paneling on the lower part of the walls. The upstairs hallway has similar paneling with flower designs. The library, which is upstairs, has an even more detailed wooden floor.
The room that used to be the museum office is the best preserved. It has all its original wooden details. It also has its original white marble fireplace. The fireplace has a curved shelf supported by decorative pieces. The opening for the fire is arched, and it has a carved shell design at the top.
History of the House
Greene Kendrick, a successful brass manufacturer in Waterbury, built this house in 1866. He built it for his son, John. At that time, many grand houses stood around Waterbury Green. This area was the center of a busy industrial city. John Kendrick didn't follow his father into business. Instead, he became a lawyer. He rose to become a judge and then the mayor of Waterbury. John lived a comfortable life. When he died in 1877, his belongings included expensive rugs and mirrors. These items were worth half of what an average factory worker earned in a year.
The John Kendrick House shows all the typical features of an Italianate house. This style was popular with wealthy people in the Victorian era. It has a square shape, a nearly flat roof with wide eaves, and a front with three sections. Most of the fancy decorations are around the main entrance. The house originally had a small tower on the roof, but it was replaced when the roof was redone. Italianate houses often used classical designs in new and creative ways. The porch of the Kendrick House is a good example of this. Its square columns and decorative tops are different from traditional classical designs.
We don't have any official records that say who designed the house. However, some clues point to Henry Austin. He was a well-known architect. Details like the iron balconies, stone trim, and the way the central part of the house stands out are typical of his work. Sketches found among Austin's papers, now at the Yale University Library, show a very similar house. These sketches are from the 1840s, before the house was built. Austin was also working in Waterbury in the 1860s.
Still, these clues aren't enough to say for sure that Austin designed the house. Other architects copied his ideas, just as he copied theirs. It's also possible that R.W. Hill, a Waterbury native who worked in Austin's office, designed it.
In 1911, John Kendrick's son, Greene Kendrick II, sold the house to the Mattatuck Historical Society. They wanted to use it as a museum. By then, most of the other old houses around Waterbury Green had been torn down. They were replaced by the larger commercial buildings you see today. The historical society changed the house to fit museum needs. They combined the east rooms into a large gallery for exhibits. The museum stayed in the house until its current building was built across the Green in 1987.
