Lavinia Parmly House, Bridgeport, Connecticut:
In 1890, architect George Longstaff devised the largest house in Bridgeport at 219 Park Avenue. He created a Shingle Style mansion with Queen Anne and Richardson Romanesque overtones for the Parmly family as their country house. When Lavania Parmly died in 1894, her grandson, Parmly S. Clapp inherited her estate – then worth $2,000,000.
The property was purchased by Allen W. Paige, whose widow, Elizabeth, donated it to the University of Bridgeport in 1950. The Gilded Age mansion still belongs to the University of Bridgeport – who own a number of parcels in the Marina Park Historic District. Nowadays, the Parmly House goes by the name Cortright Hall after E. Everett Cortright, who founded the first junior college in New England which later became the University of Bridgeport.
Features of the Parmly House/Cortright Hall include a brownstone base on the first floor and ornate wood detailing throughout the exterior. The property boasts 1 1/2-story carriage barn of a similar carved design. The Parmly House, together with P.T. Barnum’s “Marina”(demolished), the Bryant House and Greynook is an example of a Shavian manor-house popularized by architect R. Norman Shaw.
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