TOLLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY

THE DANIEL BENTON HOMESTEAD

The 1720 Daniel Benton Homestead, the oldest house remaining in Tolland, was the home of Daniel Benton and his descendants from 1720 to 1932.  Six generations lived here and farmed the land.  Owned by Florrie Bishop Bowering, a radio personality and dietician at the University of Connecticut, from 1932 until  1968, it came into the possession of the Tolland Historical Society through the generosity of the next owners, Charles B. Goodstein and William A Shocket, in 1969 and opened as a museum the following year. 

Although minor changes were made to the house, it remains in many ways much the same as it must have been in Daniel Benton's time.  A full cape with an ell, it is painted in the original colors.

The parlor, which reflects the earliest construction, boasts a beautifully paneled fireplace wall, stained and grained to simulate walnut, as is the wide-board feather-edged sheathing on the other three walls.

Recent repairs to both chimneys have returned the five fireplaces to useable condition, and the paneling in the hall (the room to the left of the front door) has been repainted in the original Prussian blue.  The extensive repairs to the center chimney also exposed a much older and larger fireplace  in the keeping room (shown at right during the work) which has been restored.

The cellar, which has another huge fireplace, was used to house Hessian prisoners for eighteen months during the Revolutionary War.

Elisha Benton, a grandson of Daniel I, went off to fight in that war, become a prisoner of the British, and returned home with smallpox.  Jemima Barrows, a young lady he had courted before the war, contracted the disease while nursing him and died soon after.  Because of the fear of contagion associated with this dreaded disease, they were both buried in the yard, and some believe their restless spirits still inhabit the house.

 
CLOSED FOR THE SEASON
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