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New Canaan Now & Then: Lone Tree Farm

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‘Now & Then’ is sponsored by Brown Harris Stevens Realtors Joanne Santulli, Karen Ceraso, Bettina Hegel and Schuyler Morris. The property known as “Lone Tree Farm,” consisting of 45 acres, was purchased from Eliphalet and Sarah St. John in 1830 by Charlotte and Hiram Brown. 

The St. Johns made their residence farther north on Canoe Hill Road near Ferris Hill and when the property was sold to the Browns the deed indicated the only building on the property was a barn. It is assumed that the Browns built the original home measured 18-by-14-feet.

Now & Then

New Canaan Now & Then: The Zumbach’s Building

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‘New Canaan Now & Then’ is sponsored by Brown Harris Stevens Realtors Joanne Santulli, Karen Ceraso, Bettina Hegel and Schuyler Morris. In 1967 the building at the corner of Pine and Grove was listed as owned by Railroad Avenue Corporation and then New Canaan Development. 

It remained under this ownership until July 1988 when the owners were listed as New Canaan Lumber Company. The corner was home to a few businesses prior to Zumbach’s and Pine Street Concessions.  Pine Grove Wines was operated by Charles Homer and is pictured in the same location as Zumbachs in the photo above. Mr. Homer, a Stamford native, was a plumber for 20 years prior to owning the wine store and was a volunteer fireman in Stamford. He sold the business to Robert and Aurelia McKenna in 1986, and died at the age of 62 in Florida on Dec.

Now & Then

New Canaan Now & Then: The James House

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‘New Canaan Now & Then’ is sponsored by Brown Harris Stevens Realtors Joanne Santulli, Karen Ceraso, Bettina Hegel and Schuyler Morris. The “James House” on Frogtown Road was built in 1965 and designed by an unknown architect. 

The original house was one story with a basement structure and had a square footprint with wood decks wrapping around the south and east sides. The house currently has a complicated roofline with a gable roof and deep eaves. Wood decks are found on the first floor. The current two car garage was incorporated into the footprint of the original house.

Now & Then

New Canaan Now & Then: The Matthew Fitch House

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‘New Canaan Now & Then’ is sponsored by Brown Harris Stevens Realtors Joanne Santulli, Karen Ceraso, Bettina Hegel and Schuyler Morris. The Matthew Fitch House was built in 1737. Mr. Mathew Fitch was the son of John II and Lydia Fitch, who were among the 24 founders of the Church in Canaan Parish. 

Matthew was born in May 1708 and married Jemima St. John, the daughter of Eber St. John.

Town Living

9-6-6-Story: The Many Changes of New Canaan’s Exchanges

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New Canaanites today see residents on cellphones everywhere, driving up Ponus Ridge or walking along the sidewalks of Elm and Main. For people such as Cookie King, née Van Beck—who lived in New Canaan from the 1930’s to the 1960’s and whose family lived in New Canaan until 1995—that’s about as impersonal as the way individual cell numbers are assigned: Between IP technology and mobile provider pool applications, there’s no rhyme or reason to a New Canaan “extension.” “We still have a landline and won’t give it up,” King told NewCanaanite.com “Have phone on the wall with a dial on it too.”

Many New Canaanites remember the days even before “966” was the town’s main designated exchange, and a look at our local telephone history tells the story of those three digits, long associated with the Next Station to Heaven. The first telephones in New Canaan were installed in 1881, as four businesses in the then-small town—Henry B. Rogers & Co., Hoyt’s Nurseries, Monroe’s drug store and Johnson’s carriage works—were part of the Norwalk exchange. After the turn of the century, New Canaan’s population began growing rapidly—as did the number of phones in town.