Watertown History Page by Charlie Crowell

Watertown History Page by Charlie Crowell History of Watertown CT

This clipping from July 5, 1904 tells of the fireworks used to celebrate Independence Day. Fireworks were available in s...
06/30/2025

This clipping from July 5, 1904 tells of the fireworks used to celebrate Independence Day. Fireworks were available in stores everywhere in town.

The cannon mentioned was the real deal. Several people in town owned old cannons and rolled them out for the holiday. They were extremely loud.

The lack of injuries that year is a bit surprising. It seems every year someone received a serious burn or other injury. One year a local boy was blinded, and on at least one occasion, fireworks burned a Watertown house down.

The “Brookside Home” mentioned here was Waterbury’s poor house. It was located on the hill behind present-day Kaynor Tech. See the comments for a look at the place.

Seen here, a Watertown bound bus sits at the Waterbury Green in the 70s. Buses have been around almost since automobiles...
06/30/2025

Seen here, a Watertown bound bus sits at the Waterbury Green in the 70s.

Buses have been around almost since automobiles first showed up in the 1890s, but they weren’t practical and were notoriously unreliable.

By the 1920 however, as trolley lines were being discontinued one by one, buses came into widespread use as replacements.

The last trolley to run in the Waterbury area was one to Watertown in May of 1937. After that, all routes were served by buses, a practice that continues today.

In 1708, a band of Indians attempted to kidnap Joseph Scott. According to legend, he yelled for help and the Indians cou...
06/26/2025

In 1708, a band of Indians attempted to kidnap Joseph Scott. According to legend, he yelled for help and the Indians couldn’t quite him down so the cut his tongue out. He bled to death practically immediately and the Indians left his body in the forest.

This took place in or near the present-day Mattatuck Forest somewhere near the Watertown and Thomaston line.

The townspeople went looking for Scott and eventually found his body but it had been so ravaged by wild animals that they simply covered the remains with rocks.

For generations, the site was known as “Scott’s Grave”. It was even used as a boundery marker on land deeds.

Right by the grave was a large tree on which the story of Scott’s death was carved.

As the tree filled in the lettering, visitors to the site would use a knife and clean out the letters to keep the story legible.

The site became something of a local curiosity and a bridle path was established that ran right by the makeshift grave.

In fact, the story of Scott’s murder was etched into the tree so high that only someone seated on a horse could reach it.

Years passed and in the 1920s, the lumber rights to the land were sold. Every tree of any consequence was cut including, we must assume, the tree bearing the sad tale of Scott’s death.

With the land stripped of trees, the area became overgrown with scrub brush and there was little interest in visiting the once spectacular and awe inspiring forest.

Along the way, the location of Scott’s Grave was lost, but somewhere out there is a pile of rocks marking the final resting place of one of the area’s earliest settlers.

Joseph Scott was born in Hartford in 1656.

This article appeared in the Morning Journal and Courier (New Haven) on September 3, 1891. It was originally from the Waterbury American.

The Reynolds family mentioned here lived in the area that became known as the Reynolds Bridge section of Thomaston.

This unassuming building on Davis Street was once home to P&M, a popular little restaurant/variety store opened by Nick ...
06/25/2025

This unassuming building on Davis Street was once home to P&M, a popular little restaurant/variety store opened by Nick Perotti and Ray Marinelli in 1961.

This was next-door to South School on the corner of Yale Street.

Back when kids could leave the school grounds for lunch, P&M did a healthy lunch business.

The addition to the front of the old house (where the business operated) was constructed before zoning restrictions for such things were in place.

Before P&M, the place was called “Nick’s”.

Nick Menzelle opened that business in September of 1951. Mr. Menzelle, who was well known in Waterbury as the “Sandwich Man of Cherry Street”, specialized in Italian and American sandwiches to take out, as well as to***co, candy, groceries, and school supplies.

This house stood where Crestwood Ford would later build a showroom in 1965. This photo is probably from the 1910s. This ...
06/25/2025

This house stood where Crestwood Ford would later build a showroom in 1965. This photo is probably from the 1910s.

This was the farmhouse of James George Skilton. He was born in Watertown on March 6, 1856. He died in DeLand, Florida on December 10, 1930 at the age of 74. He was buried at the Evergreen Cemetery on North Street. 

Mr. Skilton’s death certificate lists him as a retired farmer.

This property was purchased by Eugene H. Lamphier in 1920. Longtime Watertown Fire Chief Avery Lamphier was born in this house in 1924.

The stone retaining wall seen here was built by the trolley company in 1907 as they widened Main Street. You can see the somewhat overgrown trolley tracks at the base of the wall.

It must have been interesting to look out the front window of the house and see a large, lumbering, squeaking trolley car pass so close by.

Trolleys ran every 15 minutes all the way until midnight.

All of the property owners on this side of Main Street made a nice little profit selling the trolley company a slice of their front-yards at much higher than fair market prices.

Many of us remember the old “rag man” who would drive slowly through the streets yelling “RAGS!”Many housewives accumula...
06/25/2025

Many of us remember the old “rag man” who would drive slowly through the streets yelling “RAGS!”

Many housewives accumulated a bag of old clothes, bed sheets, etc. and would run out to the rag man and sell the unwanted textiles to him.

This clipping from May 13, 1898, tells a slightly different story when “rag-pickers” would show up in search of anything they could sell.

Among other things, they were “clothesline thieves” and would steal all the hanging, drying clothes they could get their hands on.

Generally, being junk dealers, they would steal anything not nailed down. They would go on porches and enter barns and sheds and help themselves to whatever was within reach.

Back then, local law enforcement was limited to a part-time constable who worked on an “as needed” basis. He also worked another full-time job and wasn’t easy to find or readily available.

So the rag-pickers had free rein. Most often the housewives had to deal with them alone as their husbands were either at work or out in the fields.

Here’s yet another lost mystery Oakville home. I posted this 15 years ago and no one recognized it. All we know is that ...
06/23/2025

Here’s yet another lost mystery Oakville home. I posted this 15 years ago and no one recognized it. All we know is that it stands (or stood) in Oakville.

As mentioned in a couple previous posts, “Oakville” back then unofficially included the Newton Heights area of Waterbury up behind the Pin Shop. So, this house could be located up there.

The sidewalk is on the right so this would be a side view. You can also see the front of the next house down the street.

On December 6, 1941, this Oakville man tragically ended his life by hanging. Such occurrences were rare back then, and a...
06/23/2025

On December 6, 1941, this Oakville man tragically ended his life by hanging. Such occurrences were rare back then, and as you see, the media wasn’t as discreet about suicides as they are today.

Alexander Korda had lived in town almost 30 years.

(WATERBURY DEMOCRAT, December 8, 1941)

Here’s an early view of the old South District Schoolhouse (left) and the All Saint’s Church (right) on Main Street in O...
06/21/2025

Here’s an early view of the old South District Schoolhouse (left) and the All Saint’s Church (right) on Main Street in Oakville.

As far back as the 1850s, a one-room schoolhouse stood where the church is. It became so dilapidated that a new schoolhouse was built next-door to the left.

The old dilapidated schoolhouse was then used by the YMCA and by the All Saints Church with occasional repairs. Eventually the church acquired the property. The dilapidated school was removed in 1888* and the church seen here was built.

Meanwhile, the one-room school on the left became overcrowded and was expanded to two room as seen here.

In 1909, South School on Davis Street was built and the little wooden two-room school was no longer needed.

In 1960, the chuch seen here was replaced by a new church structure, the one still in use today.

(Town Times Nov. 17, 1960)
"The beautiful new All Saints Episcopal Church adds a new measure of beauty to Oakville's Main Street. The Nave of the Church with its attractive ceramic-tiled front was constructed by the Carl G. Peterson Construction Co. of Naugatuck. The brick-faced structure replaces the old wooden church which served the parish since the last century. Workman are currently completing work on the interior of the Nave and parish hopes to dedicate the church before Christmas.”

The former two-room schoolhouse eventually would home to the Owl & the Pussycat pre-school.

——————————————-

*The original dilapidated old one-room schoolhouse from the 19th century was move up Main Street to the rear and right of the former gas station (440 Main Street) where it was used as John Kennedy’s blacksmith shop. It later served many different purposes including an auto body shop. It was located right on the edge of Steele Brook. It was demolished sometime in the 1990s.

An unidentified house from an early postcard.Labeled only "Oakville Conn.", does anyone recognize it?I posted this back ...
06/19/2025

An unidentified house from an early postcard.
Labeled only "Oakville Conn.", does anyone recognize it?

I posted this back in 2010 and nobody figured it out.

It's probably still out there somewhere. My guess is it’s up on Newton Heights, up behind the Pin Shop, the neighborhood sort of between Bunker Hill and Oakville.

If it is, it’s technically in Waterbury but people who lived in Newton Heights considered themselves Oakvillians.

They shopped in Oakville, went to church in Oakville, went to the movies in Oakville, and many worked in Oakville.

Consequently, old postcards from Newton Heights are always labeled "Oakville".

This is the lonely grave of five year old Darius S. Griswold who drowned on July 9, 1826 when he fell in a well. This he...
06/18/2025

This is the lonely grave of five year old Darius S. Griswold who drowned on July 9, 1826 when he fell in a well.

This headstone is located in the Old Burial Grounds on Main Street. The stone is unusual because it states the cause of death, “killed by falling into a well”.

The boy was the child of Rev. Darius Oliver Griswold (1788-1841).

Two years earlier in February 1824, another son, William, accidentally shot and killed his sister Sarah, while playing with a loaded gun. That tragedy took place in Ballston Spa, a village in Saratoga County, New York.

The Rev. Griswold was originally connected to the Presbyterian Church of Saratoga Springs, NY., but in 1822, he resigned the position stating that he could not live on what he was being paid. He then came to Watertown where he stayed until 1833 when his old church in Saratoga Springs had agreed to pay him more.

Rev. Griswold and his wife Abigail, were buried in Greenridge Cemetery, Saratoga Springs, New York, 125 miles away from Watertown and Darius, Jr.

In July 1859, the Post Office Department decided to reduce the mail service to Watertown from daily to three days a week...
06/18/2025

In July 1859, the Post Office Department decided to reduce the mail service to Watertown from daily to three days a week. Local citizens were not pleased and decided to pay for the other three days out of their own pockets, thus continuing daily service.

At the time, the mail arrived in town by stagecoach. Later, after 1870, the trains were used.

Seen here is the present Watertown Post Office at 30 Woodruff Avenue. This site opened in 1970.

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Watertown, CT
06795

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