USA > Connecticut > Fairfield County > New Canaan > Landmarks of New Canaan > Part 18
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the year 1909. I remarked that after four years of living in European cities my husband and I were sighing for summer in a green world. Mrs. Caffin said she longed for the country, but she did not like to be alone, and her husband would be away until fall writing a book on Spanish art. There was a pause.
"I know a place called Silver Mine," she said. "Solon Borglum, the sculptor, lives there. It is a lovely countryside. Would you consider sharing a house, and expenses, if I could find a place for rent?" Indeed we would. And we did. The house Mrs. Caffin rented was little and white, facing the sheds of a disused mill-Blan- chard's. And just up a turn in the road was the
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saw mill of Fred Buttery. Mr. Buttery tells me our house had been built by Ebenezer Whit- ney who owned a grist mill "back in the coun- try, 1762-1810," and that he owned it at the time.
There in the ancient Whitney house, since torn down, my artist husband and I spent our first summer in Silver Mine. I was under con- tract with Harper's Bazaar, and the Craftsman magazines to write an article a month, April to October. I used to sit out of doors facing the running river, now and then looking up from my writing to gaze across the waters to the steep further bank where beneath over-arching trees were masses of rich green laurel. Solon Borglum owned that land, famous sculptor, kindly neighbor, and so far as I know, the first artist to make Silver Mine known to a wider world of art.
The Buttery Mill was of great interest to us, and we often walked that way for a chat with "Fred" as everyone called him. He was so vig- orous, and jolly, with a lot of personality. To- day he seems equally vigorous, and astonish- ingly young.
His mill has taken on his characteristics. It was built in 1709, the first saw mill on the Silver Mine, with an over-shot water wheel; in con- tinuous operation since that far-off time, it is today doing more business than ever, and equipped with motor power, as well as water power, still in part time use.
It is the last mill remaining of all the eleven that through the two hundred and thirty odd years since its construction have been built on the river bank between the bridge near the home of the noted artist Carl Schmitt, and Can- non Street, Norwalk. It is said to be the oldest mill in continuous operation in the country, and perhaps the most photographed, painted, drawn and lithographed.
All the white chestnut timber used in the construction of the Stanley Lockwood house in East Avenue, New Canaan, 1898-99, was cut and seasoned at the Buttery mill. This house is now the home of Dr. and Mrs. John A. Buccia- relli. Also out of the same mill came the wooden rails that guard each side of the Merritt Park- way from Greenwich to Norwalk.
The studio in our Valley Road home, built 1913-14, was very large. We needed a refec- tory type of table that would be in the right proportion with its width and length. One day in Westport we found a 14 foot long oak beam that had been removed from an ancient house belonging to Ossip Linde, artist. Linde wouldn't take money for it but was delighted to exchange it for one of my husband's sketches.
We had the beam carted to Mr. Buttery's mill in Silver Mine, there it was sawed into planks of suitable thickness, then carted to the newly built garage on our Valley Road prop- erty. There a skillful carpenter constructed a table according to my husband's design. It was carved and finished by D.P.B. himself. It was a continual joy, together with the fireside bench made out of the same great beam. Mr. Buttery, what with renting us our first house and beautifying our second, has had a very real place in our life. This table is now the prop- erty of a niece who lives in Greensboro, N. C. And at this point I shall let Mr. Buttery speak himself. He sent me the following facts a few days ago that will be of great interest to us all. Mr. Buttery's notes:
"The first facts that can be found relating to the old mill at Silver Mine are in the Norwalk Land Records of 1712 when Matthew Scymour sold the mill to James Brown. James Brown appears to have been a man of more than usual ability and influence in the town. He represented the town on several occasions at the General Court in mat- ters of both Church and State.
"In 1741 Brown sold the mill to Jacob St. John, the son of Ebenezer. They both had land in Silver Mine very early. In 1759 St. John began to sell off, one-sixth interest to one neighbor and one-twelfth interest to his son-in-law Ebenezer Crofoot, each proprietor to furnish his own saw and file. The writer wonders where they got files. They cer- tainly could not go over to Silliman's and pick out what they wanted, but no doubt had to send over to London for saws and files.
"In 1777 St. John passed away and his only son, Abraham, inherited the remaining one-quarter in- terest in the mill and the land back of the mill. Abraham in turn sold out to James Selleck, who, along with the other owners, sold out to David St. John who lived over on Sier Hill. Banker and
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money lender, and staunch member of Old St. Paul's, Norwalk, St. John and others joined in a deed to Allen Betts in 1836, a man of sterling in- tegrity.
"The writer well remembers him. Another pillar of St. Paul's Church. Betts kept the mill until about 1859, when he went down to Newtown Avenue, built up the old mill on Cannon Street and sold large amounts of wood, ship timbers, etc., in New York. Betts sold out to Blanchard who ran the fur dying shop just above the old saw mill, but Blan- chard never ran the saw mill. He sold out to John and Augustus Platt. The Platts in 1866 sold to the Butterys, the present owners.
"Some of the old account books are available; in 1866 chestnut timber was selling at $25 per thou-
sand feet. Fire wood at $2.50 a load. Hard wood at $3.50 a load. A day's work with a team of horses brought $4. Chestnut timber brought one cent a foot; oak timber one and a half cents a foot for logs delivered to the mill. These were shipped to New York, and the business seems to have had a hard time to make both ends meet for many years.
"About 50 years ago the circular saw came in and revolutionized the milling industry. The cir- cular saw along with electricity, in connection with water power (when we have it), makes delivery of material more certain. New blood and strength still keep the old mill running chewing up the logs, good, bad and indifferent, we hope for many years to come.
"(Signed) FRED W. BUTTERY."
THE MARVIN-FINDLAY HOUSE "Extown Farm"
ARBA B. MARVIN, Author
KENDRIC RUKER, Artist
[January 8, 1948]
This little story about the house pictured on the following page is written backwards-from a happy present to a sad past.
This is "Extown Farm," the present home of David and Harriett Findlay and their three auburn-haired children. It is on Laurel Road at the southern end of Kellogg's East Ridge.
At milking time, there are shouts, snow balls and laughter as the two Jersey heifers are driven into the clean, warm, well lighted base- ment of the big red barn. The three dogs bark as if to help, the white turkeys gobble as they strut slowly back and forth on the woven-wire floor of their small pen; down the rocky slope toward ye "Gret Brooke" you hear the squeals of a half-grown pig. He knows that after Eddie
has had time to put the milk through the sepa- rator he can expect a malted milk all his own.
Even though they have but 18 acres to work with, the Findlays have a complete farm with orchards, old and new, berries, grapes, a vege- table garden, a cutting garden, an upper ter- race, a middle terrace, a lower terrace, a lot of hens and other pets. That about sums it up, except for the barrel of salt pork in the cellar and the rows and rows of canned peaches, pears, plums, apricots, quince and cherries that line the shelves of the store room-all home grown and all home processed.
I don't pretend that David makes his living at farming. He goes and comes to and from the big city the same as many of us. The Town of
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The Marvin-Findlay House-"Extown Farm"
New Canaan did not succeed in working this farm at a profit even when it included the en- tire ridge of 92 acres, with no taxes to pay. So don't blame David and Harriett if they go else- where for a "cash crop."
The name "Extown Farm" was coined late in 1928 to express tersely the general idea that this had been town property, but was so no longer. Title passed from the town to a new owner on December 15, 1928. On the following day, the work of remodeling began. The late George S. Chappell was the architect and Clin- ton Cruikshank the builder. Both did well, each in his own way. I should know, for I was the new owner.
For seven long years the town fathers had been lying in ambush waiting patiently for some city slicker foolish enough to pay $45,000 cash for 90 acres of bare, wind-swept ridge, with a set of worn-out buildings on a narrow dirt road that was impassable for weeks at a . time. And then I came along with a courageous wife, three growing children and an over- whelming desire to be off the beaten path. I wanted a place where spotted dogs could bark and ponies clatter without a thought of the neighbors; a place where, after dark, things would quiet down and a tired man could get some sleep; a place where, on a long weekend, a man could wear what he pleased and could
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take his city guests into the woods to see things they had never noticed before. That is what I wanted. That is what I got.
At that time, the only other house on Laurel Road, from end to end ( almost two miles ), was the one occupied by Dan'l Wood and his fam- ily, on the site subsequently improved by the Lairds.
The name Laurel Road dates back something more than 40 years and no doubt was origi- nated by the late Mr. and Mrs. E. D. W. Lang- ley who then lived on North Wilton Road, where the Hawkins family now lives.
Mr. and Mrs. Langley then owned the wooded rocky section near Pauley's corner where, then as now, the old, old laurel bushes put on a big show in springtime. The Langleys loved their laurel and took good care of it.
This digression has permitted Chappell and Cruikshank to make the pictured house ready for occupancy. We moved in, spotted dogs and all, on July 3, 1929. Electricity and telephone had been run in from Canoe Hill Road at Rock School corner, a distance of about a mile. A town road-grader had been through to smooth down the grass-covered ridge between the wheel tracks, an artesian well had been drilled, almost to China ( or so it seemed to me ). There was hay in the mow, cows in the sunny base- ment of the big barn, and horses in the box stalls. All was well.
All continued well until those same three growing children stopped growing and scat- tered. Then it became apparent that Goodwife- Bep and I did not really need seven bedrooms and three baths in the main house plus five bed- rooms and two baths over the garage. We rat- tled around in that much space.
That is how the Findlays got the chance to buy the place and to let their three children whistle and shout, or just jump up and down and scream for the sheer joy of living on a back road.
Laurel Road is much better now. The WPA went through there circa 1937-slowly of course-nevertheless doing a good job. They widened the traveled way to 23 feet, put in a Tilford base where needed, put a foot of gravel on that and oiled the gravel well. 'Tis a safe,
comfortable road now, except that at the north- ern end it is as crooked as the blacksnake that we once saw up that way.
Thus from December, 1928, to the present, this has been a house of peace and plenty. Long may it so continue.
Having shaped the house into the form you see in the picture, I feel privileged to tear it down again at least part way. I hope David and Harriett will not mind. The house faces south and I shall start my hypothetical destruc- tion at the left or western end of the building. Here is how:
Take away the salt-box structure where the dormer window shows, i.e. the three children's bedrooms upstairs, the kitchen, pantry and laundry downstairs, and the coal bins in the cellar. All of that dates from 1929.
At the western end of what remains and up to the nearest chimney, lower the roof until you have a story and a half instead of two stories. Put two low-ceiling bedrooms there with a nar- row winding stair leading to the ground floor. Push in the front wall of that wing to give a shallow porch, as at the other end of the house. At the extreme right hand or eastern end of the house, tear off the one story addition and throw it away. That was the jail. In 1929 the barred windows were replaced with casement win- dows, the wrought iron ring in the floor was put aside as a souvenir (a little gruesome perhaps, but of some historic interest ), the nail-studded oak doors were carted down for storage in the hay mow and the leg irons and their chains dis- appeared entirely. No one has been able to think of a happy way to use those doors. They are about three inches thick and each has a peekhole about a foot square with wrought iron bars through which a prisoner could look at the fire on the hearth at the far or western side of the main room. That is how he kept warm, if he did. I forgot to say, there were two cells to this jail, each with its own eastern window and its own oak door. [ED. NOTE-This "jail" was apparently a disciplinary room for inmates of the farm who misbehaved.]
If you have followed me, you will now have before you a two story house with a chimney at each end; and beyond each chimney you
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will have a one and one-half story addition or wing with a narrow recessed porch, the whole structure being entirely symmetrical.
Now, if you will put a heavy partition straight through the house mid-way between the chimneys to divide it into two equal parts, each with its own chimney and its own kitchen, with a winding stair leading from the kitchen to two bedrooms under the low roof and also giving access to a large bedroom or dormitory about fourteen feet wide running straight through from south to north with two windows at each end. I forgot to say that on the second floor one could not get through this central par- tition. There was no door. Even on the first floor there was only one door and that a small one. The whole arrangement was like a water- tight bulkhead on a ship. Please do not ask me why. I do not as yet know. When I find out I shall tell you. Clearly this was a two family house long before its purchase by the town.
The two story part, that is to say from chim- ney to chimney, measures 28 feet from east to west and 26 feet from north to south.
It is framed like a barn with the hand-hewn oak and chestnut timbers held together with wooden pegs. The upright timbers, measuring about 6x8, extend up all the way from the foun- dation to the roof. Where a modern builder would use 2×4 studding of soft wood and some- what undersize, this house has 3x4 studding of full size. These are rough sawn. The sheathing and roof boards are of hard wood, mostly oak, a full inch thick, and with bark still clinging to their untrimmed edges. They are held in place with black wrought iron nails.
The laths used to hold the plaster are hand split chestnut. The plaster is quite thick, is saturated with cowhair and very, very hard. The shingles used on the outside walls of the house are probably not very old. The shingled roof was new in 1929 and we had trouble in getting shingle nails that were stiff enough to penetrate the seasoned oak roof boards. An ordinary steel shingle nail would simply fold up.
After all this imaginary destruction, you have before you the house that Matthew Kel- logg sold to the Town of New Canaan, Janu-
ary 2, 1852, together with 82 acres of land, be the same more or less, this "being the farm for- merly owned by Matthias St. John dec'd and Jesse St. John dec'd and has a highway run- ning through the same." The consideration was $3,300.
But all was not well. There was not enough firewood on the place hence at the Town Meet- ing of December 12, 1857:
"Voted That the Selectmen be authorized to purchase sufficient wood land for the use of the Alms House."
And so on January 30, 1858 (Book 14, page 37), the selectmen bought from Chauncey B. Hoyt and Hulda Hoyt (his wife) of City of Henry, Ill., six acres more or less "at a place called Kellogg's Ridge." The consideration was $350 and the land was the flat wet meadow lying between the ridge and Laurel Road; I mean the place that gets flooded when the boys at St. Luke's School put flash boards on the dam near the school's driveway in order to have better skating on Mrs. Isabel D. Lee's pond. The acreage is nearer eight than six.
This, I think, is the same Chauncey B. Hoyt who gave the Town of New Canaan a good drubbing on a tax matter some five years ear- lier. But that is a story all by itself.
Now to get back on the ridge where the footing is dry and the view unsurpassed in all New Canaan, we call attention to a deed ( Book C, page 22) dated September 19, 1778 whereby Joseph Everet and Richard Everet, jr., both of Norwalk, for the consideration of £525 con- veyed to Matthias St. John of Norwalk, 48 acres "situate at Kellogg's Ridge, so called."
We found other and earlier deeds to this and adjoining tracts all referring to Kellogg's Ridge, and some so early that the Matthew Kellogg of 1852 could not have been in the picture at all.
As is usual under such circumstances, I tramped down to Stephen B. Hoyt's green- house and put to him these simple questions: Why is the Poor Farm hill called Kellogg's Ridge and where does the East part come in? Did Kellogg have a West Ridge? Steve kept on cutting snapdragons for a while and then answered, "I have often wondered about that
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myself. That it is called Kellogg's East Ridge and has been so called from colonial times there can be no doubt, but when you ask me why, I am forced to admit that I do not know."
So I wrote in my note book "nobody knows" and went back to my work.
It was largely by accident that I stumbled on the answer. In the archives of the Historical Society are abstracts of many Colonial deeds gleaned from the Land Records at Norwalk and at Stamford. The answer was in the Nor- walk records but not easily recognizable as such.
As you know, the New Canaan "Colonial Records" were made up about ten years ago by copying from the Norwalk and Stamford rec- ords such deeds as the WPA workers could identify as pertinent to those parts of Norwalk and of Stamford that were carved out in 1731 to form Canaan Parish, later (1801) to become the Town of New Canaan. Here was a deed they missed and here is the story.
It was in 1709, when much of the land held in common by the colonists was being par- celled out to individuals (mostly heirs of the colonists ) that Kellogg's Ridge came into ex- istence as such. Title passed by grant, not through a sale. On November 10, 1709, there was granted by the town and recorded to Jo- seph Kellogg twenty and one-half acres iden- tified as the "Land layed out November 10, 1709, upon a hill, west of Huckleberry Hills, on ye west side of ye west branch of Norwalk River" (Norwalk Land Records Book 4, Page 75). This parcel was bounded on all sides by common land. Huckleberry Hills are where they have always been and "ye west branch" is none other than our celebrated friend the Silver Mine River. With no point of reference closer than Canoe Hill and that a mile or more to the south, how apt was the language used in the grant.
Earlier in the year this same Joseph Kellogg had been granted by the "Towne of Norwalk (Book 4, P. 75) "thirty acres of land lying northwest from Canoe Hill over a brook that runs into Five Mile River, bounded all round by common land."
This larger parcel obviously lies within or
near the westerly portion of the New Canaan Country Club. It is not on a ridge. It is in a valley.
Thus to the Kellogg family, their parcel of twenty and one-half acres on a hill overlooking ye West Branch was in truth their East Ridge. Over a period of a few years, say a hundred or so, it gradually took on the name of Kellogg's East Ridge, and, as gradually, the neighbors forgot why. (N.C. Colonial Rec. Book C, pages 117, 422 and N.C. Land Records Book 2, p. 430, 431, 730, and Book 3, p. 455).
So far as we are advised, this Joseph Kel- logg of Norwalk, never lived in Canaan Parish. His children did, as did those of his brother, Samuel.
Joseph Kellogg died before January 21, 1721, when his estate was distributed to his widow, Mary; sons, Joseph, David and Benjamin; daughters, Elizabeth, Sarah, Rachel and Han- nah. Another distribution took place after the death of Hannah, November 15, 1737.
But suppose the widow, Mary, did get the use for life of 67 acres on the East Ridge, and assuming that then as now the ridge was shaped like one of Mr. Polzer's rye loaves set on a north-south axis and tilted slightly toward the south, how was Mary, her heirs, legal rep- resentatives or assigns to get up on the smooth rounded tillable top of the loaf with a yoke of oxen. No approach from the east because of the granite cliffs along the river. None from the north because of the deep ravine known as Blackman's Cut. Possibly from the south along the easterly edge of Dr. Williams' property, but it is a long, rough haul from Canoe Hill Road. But from the west there is no trouble at all. Drive your yoke of stags up Route 123 and then turn east across the southern edge of John Doty's lawn, then down through Mrs. Doty's arboretum keeping north of the swim- ming pool that Mr. Crane built. The trail is clear enough when the leaves are off the bushes. Then with a whoop and a holler and a rattling of chains you cross ye Great Brooke where someone has dumped a lot of cobbles to make a ford. You land right in the night pasture of "Extown Farm."
I think this is where we came in.
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Edwin Eleman 1948
LOCKWOOD-MACRAE HOUSE
MRS. DOROTHY M. BURNHAM, Author
EDWIN EBERMAN, Artist
[January 15, 1948]
On the south side of Canoe Hill Road just west of Laurel Road, stands an ancient house; white, dignified, situated comfortably back from the
road, and framed in noble trees that reflect its age. It is the home of Mr. and Mrs. Elliott Macrae. The New Canaan Lockwoods, who
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cradled five generations in the house on Canoe Hill, were substantial conservative people whose industry and frugality husbanded their patrimony and whose sound principles were a factor in this town and our institutions for onc hundred and fifty years. There are only a few families in any community in this country where the continuity of heritage exceeds that of the Lockwoods. And, in this particular fam- ily, their close associations with the Congrega- tional Church; their honorable records in the French and Indian wars; in the Revolutionary and Civil Wars; their contributions to their own town as selectmen and representatives and their close association with Yale College make their family history of real significance to New Canaan and in Connecticut.
When the "Arbella," under the command of Captain Peter Milbourne, arrived at the New England Plantation at Salem, June 22, 1630 she carried a distinguished group of new colonists. Lady Arbella Johnson was on board with her husband, Isaac Johnson, and Sir Richard Sal- tonstall and his three sons; also, the Reverend George Phillips and his lady, William Cod- dington, afterwards Governor of Rhode Island and Thomas Dudley, deputy Governor of Mas- sachusetts Colony were listed with many oth- ers, including Governor Winthrop himself and two of his sons. The sixteenth name was Lock- wood, and a month later Governor Winthrop, in a letter to England, mentioned Lockwood being with him-this could have been either Edmond or Robert, but by the fall of 1634, both brothers were in Watertown.
In the spring of 1635, Robert was appointed executor of his brother Edmond's estate by a court order. There is a long and interesting genealogy of the English Lockwood family and considerable evidence of Norman origin in high estates, but in actual record we only have the Lockwood name on the Arbella list and the notation that "although some of the passengers were from the west of England, the greatest number came from about London."
Robert Lockwood was certainly a man of en- ergy and ability and he quickly established a home in Watertown with "a house, and lot of fifteen acres." That was where six of his ten
children were born. However, in 1646, he and his family pioneered to the settlement in Fair- field, Connecticut and there he died in 1658, leaving a considerable cstate appraised at £467.35. His widow, Susan, is mentioned in the New Haven Colonial Records as giving evi- dence on the execution of Goodwife Knapp, who was condemned as a witch.
One of Robert's children, his fourth son, Ephraim born in Watertown, is recorded as one of the twenty owners of property as it was parceled out at the establishment of the settle- ment at Norwalk in the 1600s. He, also, was a man of industry and the records show that he was active in this new community.
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