Browse Items (1035 total)

When Edward Dewey, vice president of National Life Insurance Company, in 1889 decided that he wanted to build a large, ornate Queen Anne-style house across the street from the State House (see “Then & Now,” The Bridge, September 7, 2022), he didn’t…

When the State of Vermont needed to build more office space in the late 1930s, it looked no further than across the street from the State House. That stretch of street was occupied by four residential buildings that would have to be removed to make…

The eastern end of what we now call Memorial Drive was a hub of industrial activity in the late nineteenth century. Winooski Avenue, as it was known, was part of Berlin until 1899 when the area was annexed by Montpelier. It was a dirt road lined…

Is this the same house? It is, but this house at 61 College Street now has a different facade. This was the home of Rooney M. Harvey who represented Topsham in the state legislature and Orange County in the state senate before moving to Montpelier…

This is what mud season looked like at the intersection of State and Elm Streets in 1874! The streets had not yet been paved and planks were placed across the mud to keep pedestrians’ feet somewhat dry. This photograph shows that the south side of…

Today, Northfield Street seems a busy place for a summer home, but in 1850 when aspiring artist Thomas Waterman Wood chose the site for his carpenter Gothic cottage “Athenwood” the street was a country lane overlooking the capital city. The house was…

The Central Vermont Railroad bypassed Montpelier, but for portions of the 19th and 20th centuries a busy spur line connected a
station across the street from the Statehouse to the economic lifeline
of its time. In 1880 the original 1850 station was…

The trustees of the Heaton Hospital constructed a large nurses’ home across the street from the city’s hospital in 1925. The building had 55 bedrooms and common rooms. Eventually a nursing school operated there, enrolling 43 students by 1941. The…

When National Life Insurance Company opened their seventh headquarters building on a hill overlooking Montpelier in 1960 it made a bold statement. They built a sleek, International style building with landscaped grounds, a sweeping driveway, and a…

The brick building at the southwest corner of State and Main (2 State Street), one of the oldest buildings in the downtown, has withstood fires, floods, and changing styles. It was built in circa 1826 by Chester Hubbard and inherited by his son,…

Montpelier businessman Lewis Bartlett Cross, his chauffeur, daughter Carrie, and an unidentified woman pose in a 1911 Cadillac touring car in front of their 39 School Street home. L. Bart, as he was known, was the son of the founder of C.H. Cross &…

After the Newbury Seminary purchased the Sloan U.S. Army General Hospital in Montpelier in 1866, school administrators built a wooden, three-story central dormitory using remnants of the old Civil War hospital. This building was used by a succession…