Celebrating Newtown’s First Town Center

By Shannon Hicks

Four private homes and two gardens were opened to the public on Saturday, July 8, for Newtown Historical Society’s Annual Historic Homes & Gardens Tour. This year’s event focused on the Hanover district of Newtown, the northern section of town which historians have called one of the first centers of town when it was established in the early 18th century.

The pristine 1710 John Glover Homestead, a house built by the man who served as Newtown’s first town clerk (1712-13), which has been the home of Bob and Mae Schmidle since 1964; the circa 1790 Hanover District Schoolhouse, now the home of the Taylor family; a circa 1890 farmhouse, and its immense vegetable gardens and gorgeous outbuildings, the home of Bill and Cheryl Edelen; and a circa 1840 saltbox that was formerly a blacksmith shop and was recently purchased by a young couple, Sung and Michelle Pak, were all open for six hours of walk-through tours Saturday.

Also open were the gardens of noted author and lecturer Sydney Eddison, on the grounds of the home she and husband Martin share on the edge of state forest property, and the gardens of master gardener Maureen McLachlan, outside the home she shares with husband Richard.

“This area was a hub, a center of activity when it was first established by the Glovers and others who moved into this area,” Mae Schmidle said Saturday afternoon.

Thanks to its proximity to Lake Lillinonah, which was very flat and shallow before Shepaug Dam was put in, north Newtown was an important location for travelers. Those traveling north towards New Milford or Vermont went right through the Hanover area. To get east, towards Southbury or Boston, the low water at Hanover was the premium point of crossing.

“This area was the original center of town,” Mrs Schmidle said. Blacksmith shops were also popular thanks to the river; once crossings were made, horses could be reshod on the Newtown side almost immediately. The Schmidles and the Paks have found numerous reminders of the previous use of their property; in the four months they have lived in their historic home, the Paks have already dug up a half dozen old horseshoes on their property. The relics were displayed on a deck railing for visitors to examine Saturday afternoon.

The significance of the Hanover region continues. The Edelen home on Old Echo Valley Road is believed to have been a stop along the famous Underground Railroad, and the author Michael Creighton once spent a summer at the property when it was owned by an uncle of his during the 1960s, during which time the author wrote his best-selling book, The Andromeda Strain. Earlier this year, the historic interior of the old farmhouse was filmed for part of a movie that will air on Bravo in October.