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The Naugatuck Historical Society P.O
Box 317, 195 Water Street, Naugatuck, Connecticut 06770
USA
203-729-9039 email: |
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BEECHER STREET
Beecher Street is short and charming. It is a one block long street on the west side of town. It runs parallel to North Church Street and is entered from Buckingham or Sherman Streets. The well known Dibble Mansion is located at the south end of the street. This street was named after Daniel Beecher who was born in Woodbridge, about 1762. He lived most of his life in Salem Bridge. Daniel was married four times. His first wife was Abiah Hitchcock who bore him 6 children. His second wife was Electa Beebe who gave birth to 4 children. Clarissa Porter, his third wife, presented him with 6 children. She was the mother of Clarissa Beecher, who would marry Charles Goodyear of Vulcanized Rubber fame. Daniel's fourth wife was Sena Hoadley, the widow of Heil Hoadley or Oxford. Beecher was past 80 by this time. Daniel Beecher owned 200 acres of the best land on the West Side of the Naugatuck River. Here he opened his Stage Hotel, just about at the site of present Church street between Chittenden's Insurance Agency and Naugatuck Valley savings and Loan Co. near the intersection of Water and Church Streets. Beecher used his Yankee ingenuity to make the best of the situation created by stage line traffic from New Haven to Litchfield. On the east bank, Chauncey Lewis owned an Inn, which brought in a goodly sum of money. It became a stopping point for weary travelers as well as for horses who needed a rest or a change. Travelers were provided with food and drink and other conveniences. The coaches then forded the river to the West Side to continue on to the county seat located in Litchfield. It was here that Beecher took advantage of a natural situation. At the point where the northbound coaches came out of the river to enter Straits Turnpke or what is now North Church St. Beecher erected a toll gate to make up for some of the revenue he lost as a business to the Lewis establishment across the river. On the southbound run, Beecher had it made. His Inn offered "out houses" and a refreshing splash from a china or ceramic pitcher and wash basin. These were found in the privacy of an Inn room and were today's equivalent of a restroom. Meals were then served in Beecher's ornately lighted dining room. They could be breakfast, lunch, or dinner, all accompanied by lively conversation of worldly news or local Salem Bridge gossip. If a coach driver preferred to cross the river and make a stagecoach stop at Lewis' Inn, a special toll fee was levied at the toll gate house. Before his death, in 1848, Daniel Beecher gave the land in the center of "Naugatuck" to Salem Bridge. A devout Congregationalist, he gave a piece of "The Green" in 1838 to his church so that a beautiful, white-framed parish church could be built facing "Church Street' and the Town Hall. In March of the same year, he gave the southerly portion to the Episcopalians for the first downtown church of the Parish of St. Michael's. A deed was executed and Beecher decreed that the land between the churches be reserved for use as a public Green. And so it has remained from that time until today.
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