Whitman House (West Hartford, Connecticut) facts for kids
Quick facts for kids |
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Whitman House
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 Location in Connecticut
Location in the United States
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| Location | 208 North Main Street, West Hartford, Connecticut |
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| Area | 0.7 acres (0.28 ha) |
| Built | 1764 |
| Architect | Whitman, John, Jr. |
| Architectural style | Colonial |
| MPS | Eighteenth-Century Houses of West Hartford TR |
| NRHP reference No. | 86002028 |
| Added to NRHP | September 10, 1986 |
The Whitman House is a very old and special house in West Hartford, Connecticut. It was built around 1764. This makes it one of the oldest buildings still standing in the town! It's so important that it was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.
What Does the Whitman House Look Like?
The Whitman House is on North Main Street in West Hartford. It is a two-and-a-half story house. It is made of wood and has a large chimney in the middle. The roof is pointed, and the outside walls are covered with overlapping wooden boards called clapboards.
The house sits on a foundation made of brownstone. The back of the house has a sloped roof. This makes it look like a saltbox house. The front of the house has six window openings. They are not perfectly even. The main door is not in the center. It is a wide double door. It has decorative columns on each side. A fancy border is above the door. Inside, the house still has many original features. These include special wooden panels on the walls.
Who Lived in the Whitman House?
The first part of the house was built around 1764. It was built by John Whitman, Jr. He was an important landowner in the area. He helped with efforts to make West Hartford a separate town. Before that, it was part of Hartford.
John Whitman, Jr. had a sister named Sarah Whitman Hooker. Her house is also still standing today. The Whitman House was made wider around 1813. It was also fixed up a lot in 1913. A dairy farmer named Frederick Duffy lived there in the early 1900s. He was one of the first in the area to use milking machines. He also stored grain in tall structures called silos.
