Preservation Group Lists Threatened Places

By Diane Scarponi

Associated Press

It has been a tough year for many of Connecticut’s most threatened historic places.

In July, fire destroyed the Trumbull Iron Works in Stonington, and last month, demolition crews ripped out a piece of art known as the “Ghost Parking Lot” at a Hamden shopping center.

Other cities are going ahead with plans to demolish buildings that the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation thinks should be saved.

The group this year has issued a new list of threatened places and is calling for a better system to fund and preserve historic museums, factory buildings, and houses.

Currently, most historic houses and museums get aid from the state and from their own fund-raisers and charities.

The system is unfair and inefficient, leading some museums to thrive, while others close and or suffer from long-deferred maintenance, said Christopher Wigren, deputy director of the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation.

“So much depends on political connections. Some projects get more money than they needed, and others did not get money that they seriously need,” Mr Wigren said.

A bill that would have set up a historic preservation fund died in the legislature because there was no money to fund it.

During a special session in August, the legislature restored some funding for four state-owned historical museums and revamped the Connecticut Historical Commission into the Historic Preservation Council, which is now part of the Connecticut Commission on Arts, Tourism, Culture, History and Film.

This group will have direct access to the legislature’s most important committees.

Sen Gary LeBeau, who sponsored the bill for the preservation fund, said the new commission should provide a list of historic places that most need the state’s aid.

Politics may still play some role, he said, but he believes the legislature can get behind the cause to preserve the most needy historical sites, as well as sites that would attract tourists.

“Why people will come here is because of our history, so it’s important to save as many of these historic properties are possible,” said Mr LeBeau, D-East Hartford, the co-chairman of the Commerce Committee.

In the meantime, the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation has hired two researchers to respond to concerns about threatened historic sites.

The researchers can better identify places that need help and can help line up support to save threatened places.

Among the historic houses on this year’s list of threatened places is the Seth Wetmore House in Middletown. The house, built in 1746, is in danger because of a state plan to widen Route 66, and because its private owner is elderly.

Part of the house already has been saved: the painted parlor, considered a treasure of American decorative arts, was removed in 1988 to the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford.

Another historic house, the Wyllys Russell House and barn in Branford, is slated for demolition to make way for a new condominium complex. The 1820 house is part of Branford’s Canoe Brook Historic District.

A commercial building in New Haven is under similar pressure. The building at 11 Orange Street is a remnant of the industrial past of New Haven’s Ninth Square Historic District.

The district has been redeveloped into a vibrant neighborhood, and developers want to build condominiums on the site.

“By itself, it’s not an important building, but if you lose enough buildings like that in a district, then the district begins to lose its importance,” Mr Wigren said.

Industrial buildings that made the list include the Art Deco former Remington Rand Laboratory in Norwalk. Norwalk Community College has moved out of the building, and its future is uncertain.

Another structure with an unknown fate is a former Goodyear Rubber Co. building in Naugatuck, known as Building 25. The building, owned by the city, is deteriorating as city leaders, preservationists, and a developer debate its future, the trust said.

In Litchfield and Bristol, the preservation debate centers around how to adapt historic places to modern use.

Litchfield residents have been debating whether to alter or raze Litchfield High School, built from 1954 to 1958 and designed by Marcel Breuer.

In Bristol, additions to Memorial Boulevard have drawn criticism. The road was designed as a memorial to soldiers of World War I, but new plantings and a gazebo are not in keeping with the rest of the memorial, the trust said.

The group said the debate highlights the issue of how communities can add to their greens, war memorials, and other public places –– especially in light of September 11, 2001 and the Gulf Wars –– while keeping true to their areas’ original character.

Even though the state restored funding for the Prudence Crandall House in Canterbury, the Old New-Gate Prison in East Granby, the Henry Whitfield Museum in Guilford, and the Sloane-Stanley Museum in Kent, they are still threatened, the preservation group said.

Other historic houses, run by nonprofit groups and local historical commissions, also remain threatened with survival, including the Pardee-Morris House in New Haven and the Monte Cristo Cottage in New London, which was the boyhood home of playwright Eugene O’Neill, the group said.