New Britain herald., 1916-05-13
T0A>n Topics

|
 tory Of New Britain as it was sixty l five years ago can be obtained by a. 1 careful study of the old map found by | George Levitt when the old Stanley l house at the corner of Main and Elm ] streets was razed a, week or so ago. l At that time this column contained a comprehensive historical sketch of the l old house which was read with inter- | est No less interesting is the old map 1 printed in 1851 and showing the town
 and borough limits and containing the l names Of all streets then in eXistance | In this connection it is interesting to 1 note that every house in the city was
 marked on the map, together with the
 name of the owner Around the bor-
 der of the map are printed pictures of I several of the prominent homes and 1 buildings of that day.
 | Among these is the old Frederick 1 H. North mansion, now occupied by l the offices of the American Hardware corporation. Old MT. North was the i most prominent man in New Britain i in his day and incidentally it was i through him that the J. B. Sargent 1 Hardware company, which was once | located on Elm street, moved to New | Haven where it has developed into u featuring plants in the world MT.
 North owned the corner where the pharmacy now stands and Sargent wanted to buy it for a factory site. Because the erection of a factory would hurt the view from his home MT. North refused to sell and shortly thereafter the concern moved. The Isaac N. Lee house on Main street is another old homestead de- picted. That house formerly stood where St. Mary's rectory now stands
 and later was moved across the street
 onto Winter street where it still
 stands, just back of McEnroe's block.
 The Humphrey house, now the Park hotel, is likewise pictured and al- though a new front has been put onto
 the old structure, much of the origi- nal material is still in the present
 building.
 On the north side of Park street, where the P. &o F. Corbin boiler house
 now stands, were several houses, one
 of which was the T. w. Stanley place. Later Professor Tuck who preceded
 Professor Peck as principal of the
 High school, lived there. When this
 property was sold, the late Robert J.
 Vance and Charles Lydell purchased
 
 Stanley house is still standing on Ber-
 lin avenue near the corner of Lilac
 street and is a wreck. One of the other houaes is the Lydall homestead
 on Maple street.
 The old New Britain Knitting com
 pany factory of which John B. Tal-
 colt, father of George A. Talcott, was the head and which later became the Corbin Motor Vehicle corporation plant on Elm street is pictured So is the old Russell & Erwin Finishing shop which stood where the new con- crete shop now is, as we'll as several other old factories which have been razCd in recent years.
 One particularly interesting picture is the original Normal school, later the High school. This building stood where the present Grammar school is and was originally built in 1850 as a town hall. It was a dispute over this building that caused the final break between Berlin and New Britain. At that time New Britain was a part of Berlin and was growing rapidly. Vexed because this section got the new town hall, Berlin petitioned to be set aside and the petition was granted. AL though 1t was built as the town hall II was never used as such and when the first state Normal school was au- thorized it was brought to New Brit ain. Because there was no other place for it, it was instituted in this building which was used as a school up to about twenty years ago.
 The home of Frederick T. Stanley, the first mayor of New Britain, on Washington street is depicted much as it looks today. Today this old Stanley house is Miss Nagle's sanitar- ium.
 During the civil war the old North Conversational church was hot bed of Unionism and stood at the corner of Main and East Main streets, where the Burritt school now is, according to the map. Here meetings were held during the war and it was here that some of the first volunteers enlisted in the cause of the north. It was also from this church that Bounty Agent Caldwell started with Charles Gilbert on the night he was murdered. Gilbert was convicted of his murder and died ! at Wethersfield prison only about a year ago, having served a life sen tenCe.
 The borough map shows the lOca- 1 ton of men long since passed away ] who had much to do with building up i the city. Most of these old homes are : gone now, but some still exist as the | G. M. Landers homestead on East i Main street for instance. Such eXcep- l tiOns are few however,
 As far back as 1851 the map rec ords the fact that the district north i of the railroad tracks was to be the Irish settlement for the names of +loo Haftey, Kelly, Cassidy, etc. Some of | hn lime I1,ic cL