Sightseeing At Home

This afternoon Rachel and I visited the Lockwood-Mathews mansion here in Norwalk. I grew up in Darien, which is one town west of Norwalk, and I've spent most of my adult life living in Norwalk, but this was my first tour of the mansion. I'd been there once before for an antiques show, but we were only inside two rooms, which were crammed with dealers' booths.

Our tour guide turned out to be one of Rachel's former middle school teachers, so there was some catching up along with the tour. The second floor was closed due to things being moved around in preparation for more restoration work. Instead, we were given a tour of the basement where we saw the bowling alley and some of the original fencing that surrounded the 30 acre estate.

We learned a lot of interesting history. The mansion predates those in Newport by 10-15 years. Most of the builders, carvers, stonemasons, etc. came from Europe. primarily Italy, to work on the mansion and then returned home. Most of them. Some remained, and Norwalk's Italian-American community predated the influx of Italian immigrants by more than 20 years. The entire building, including the interior work was done on site. After the City of Norwalk bought the property for a municipal park, the mansion was used as an office building and storage, which was in many ways responsible for the preservation of many details. When the government of Norwalk decided it needed a city hall, it planned to tear down the mansion and build the new city hall on the site. Preservationists were able to save the mansion not because of it's historic importance, but because it was in a municipal park, and a government building could not be built in the park.

Our guide told us stories about how the museum has acquired original furnishings and artwork over the years. Some of the artwork came from descendants of the Lockwood and Mathews families. Furniture occasionally comes up at auction, and is purchased. One desk returned to the mansion when a woman noted the woodwork around the library fireplace and remembered a desk in her husband's office. She told him about the woodwork, and he replied that he'd bought the desk from the city during a tag sale of mansion's contents.

One of the interesting things for me was to see the difference between the restored drawing room and the room next to it which had been conserved (the grime from 140 years was cleaned using rubber erasers!). A small card room off the drawing room sits directly below the prayer room on the second floor.

Other places in Norwalk I have yet to visit include the Mill Hill Complex of three historic buildings and a burial ground, the Norwalk Museum in what was the South Norwalk City Hall, the Sheffield Island Lighthouse, and the SONO Switch Tower Museum. Expand the radius, and Fairfield County has a variety of historic homes, museums, and things to do.

Sometimes when you want something to do on a weekend afternoon, you don't have to go very far.

Peace,
Jeff