Josiah Bronson House

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Josiah Bronson House
MiddleburyCT JosiahBronsonHouse.jpg
Josiah Bronson House is located in Connecticut
Josiah Bronson House
LocationBreakneck Hill Rd., Middlebury, Connecticut
Coordinates41°32′51″N 73°7′29″W / 41.54750°N 73.12472°W / 41.54750; -73.12472Coordinates: 41°32′51″N 73°7′29″W / 41.54750°N 73.12472°W / 41.54750; -73.12472
Area3 acres (1.2 ha)
Builtc. 1738 (1738)
Architectural styleGeorgian
NRHP reference No.82004356[1]
Added to NRHPFebruary 25, 1982

The Josiah Bronson House is a historic house on Breakneck Hill Road in Middlebury, Connecticut. Built about 1738, it is one of the town's few surviving 18th-century houses, and a good example of residential architecture from that period. The house was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1982.[1]

Description and history[]

The Josiah Bronson House is located northeast of the village center of Middlebury, in a rural-suburban setting on the north side of Breakneck Hill Road. It is a 2+1⁄2-story wood-frame structure, with a gabled roof, central chimney, and clapboarded exterior. Its main facade is five bays wide, with a symmetrical arrangement of windows around its main entrance. The entrance is unusually wide, with flanking sidelight windows; it was at one time sheltered by a wide portico. The house is only one room deep, suggesting that it was originally built with a leanto section in the rear. Sometime in the 19th century, the leanto was probably removed and replaced by the present two-story kitchen. The interior retains a significant amount of original woodwork, as altered about 1800 to add some Federal details. To the rear of the house there are two barns, of 19th-century or earlier construction.[2]

The house was probably built about 1738 by Josiah Bronson, whose family was among the first to settle the Breakneck Hill area.[2] The French Army commandeered by the Marquis de Lafayette[3] is known to have camped in the area during the American Revolutionary War in 1781 and 1782, due in part to the notoriously steep hill.[2]

See also[]

References[]

  1. ^ a b "National Register Information System". National Register of Historic Places. National Park Service. March 13, 2009.
  2. ^ a b c "NRHP nomination for Josiah Bronson House". National Park Service. Retrieved 2018-07-08.
  3. ^ "History of ancient Woodbury, Connecticut, from the first Indian deed in 1659 to 1854 ... including the present towns of Washington, Southbury, Bethlem, Roxbury, and a part of Oxford and Middlebury". quod.lib.umich.edu. Retrieved 2016-01-15.
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