Hicks-Stearns Family Museum
 | |
  Location within Connecticut | |
| Established | 1978 (house built in 1788) |
|---|---|
| Location | 42 Tolland Green Tolland, Connecticut 06084 USA |
| Coordinates | 41°52′17″N 72°22′05″W / 41.871419°N 72.368123°W |
| Type | Historic house museum |
| Collections | Family heirlooms |
| Website | www |
The Hicks-Stearns Family Museum is a Victorian historic house museum located on the town green in Tolland, Connecticut. The house was built in 1788, when it served as a tavern. It was occupied by the Hicks family from 1845 until 1970.[1] Along with the Old Tolland County Jail and Museum, the Tolland County Courthouse, and the Daniel Benton Homestead, the Hicks-Stearns Family Museum is one of Tolland's four major landmarks.[2]
House
[edit]The Hicks-Stearns family house is a transition home, featuring a colonial-era kitchen and a Victorian-era parlor and furnishings.[1] Collections include family heirlooms, cloth tea balls, Victrola, and faux bamboo furniture.[3]
The house's original owner was Benoni Shepard, a Congregationalist deacon and Tolland's first postmaster.[4]
The museum hosts tours, concerts, and holiday programs from May through December.[5]
Hicks family
[edit]The house's most prominent resident was Ratcliffe Hicks (1843-1906), eldest son of Charles Hicks, a successful merchant from Providence, Rhode Island, and Maria Stearns. Ratcliffe was a Brown University graduate (1864), successful lawyer and industrialist (president of the Canfield Rubber Works in Bridgeport), and Connecticut state legislator.[6] Ratcliffe renovated and expanded the family house with many Victorian elements, adding a front porch and a distinctive three-story tower.[7]
When Ratcliffe Hicks died in 1906, his will established a trust (worth a quarter of his estate) to start a school of agriculture and forestry in Connecticut. The school opened in 1941 as part of the University of Connecticut. UConn's Ratcliffe Hicks School of Agriculture and the Ratcliffe Hicks Building & Arena are named after him.[8]
Dedicated in 1951, UConn's Elizabeth Hicks Residence Hall is a women's dormitory named after Ratcliffe's daughter, painter and philanthropist Elizabeth Hicks (1884-1974).[9] Elizabeth willed the Tolland family home to a nonprofit trust to convert into a museum.[5]
References
[edit]- ^ a b Walker, Patricia Chambers; Graham, Thomas (2000). Directory of Historic House Museums in the United States. Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-0-7425-0344-1.
- ^ McWilliams, Kathleen (2014-08-18). "Tolland Plans Its 300th Anniversary Celebration". New York Daily News. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
- ^ American Association for State and Local History (2002). Directory of Historical Organizations in the United States and Canada. Rowman Altamira. ISBN 978-0-7591-0002-2.
- ^ Waldo, Loren Pinckney (1861). The Early History of Tolland: An Address Delivered Before the Tolland County Historical Society, at Tolland Conn., on the 22d Day of August and the 27th Day of September, 1861. Press of Case, Lockwood. pp. 103–104.
- ^ a b "Hicks-Stearns Family Museum, Tolland". cityseeker. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
- ^ Benedict, George Grenville; Burton, Richard (1898). Men of Progress: Biographical Sketches and Portraits of Leaders in Business and Professional Life in and of the State of Connecticut. New England magazine. pp. 199–200.
- ^ "Lojeri Productions: Hicks-Stearns Clip". www.lojeriproductions.org. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
- ^ "Ratcliffe Hicks School of Agriculture: Then & Now" (PDF). University of Connecticut. 2016.
- ^ Roy, Mark J. (1998-04-13). "East Campus residence hall namesakes' ties bridge the years". UConn Advance. Archived from the original on 2016-05-01. Retrieved 2020-05-27.
External links
[edit]- Hicks-Stearns Family Museum - official Facebook page