90 Main Street - Joshua Bowen Brewer House

1865 Italianate Victorian Style

With a broad hipped roof, generous overhanging eaves, tall windows and a wraparound veranda porch, this home exhibits many classic elements of the Italianate Victorian style.

This structure, in its present form, is depicted on the 1855 Smith’s Map of Hartford County, as the residence of Joshua Bowen Brewer, a native of Westfield, MA. Based on the architectural style of the building, it seems likely that Brewer constructed it in the early 1850s. He purchased from James and Augustus Cowles one acre with buildings thereon, bounded “N by Benjamin Horsford, E by Russell Humphrey, S by Virgil C Goodwin, and W by highway, formerly occupied by Ephraim Fuller” (FLR 48-507) on 4/23/1844. Brewer then mortgaged it to Dan H Goodwin (FLR 52-229) on 2/27/1851 and then to his father-in-law, Samuel Payne, on 11/20/1852, perhaps around the time he built the current structure (or expanded the earlier structure) He was reputedly a casemaker for the clock making industry in Unionville in the 1830s, and also may have operated a cabinetry business in Unionville with Lambert Hitchcock from 1844. In that connection, Brewer and Amasa Sherman (“A.S.”) Mills mortgaged the fixtures and machinery used in the cabinetry business then in the Estate of Lambert Hitchcock in leased premises from James Cowles (FLR 52-456) on 5/20/1852 and acquired the same by quitclaim from Cowles on 7/11/1854 (FLR 54-7). On 2/13/1861 (FLR 54-448), Edward Milo Mills, brother of A.S. Mills, purchased this land with buildings from Joshua Brewer. Of interest, the A.S. Mills residence is depicted on the 1855 Smith’s Map of Hartford County as fronting on the west side of Lovely Street, abutting the rear of 90 Main Street; Mills mortgaged this property of 4 acres with buildings with Joshua Brewer on 11/4/1856 (FLR 55-137), receiving clear title back 9/9/1858 (FLR 54-307).

In the same 2/23/1861 transaction, Edward M Mills also purchased Brewer’s holdings in the A.S. Mills furniture manufacturing company, the successor firm utilizing the fixtures and machinery from the Estate of Lambert Hitchcock. Edward M Mills sold the property to his fiancée, Angeline Zelinda Hill, daughter of Albert Hill of Unionville, in 1862, marrying her 10Jan1863. Upon Amasa Sherman Mills’ death in 1866 (buried in Hillside Cemetery), Edward acquired the rest of A.S. Mills Furniture Manufacturing Company, incorporating the business as the Union Cabinet Company in June of 1873. He then declared bankruptcy three months later and was forced to sell all of his personal property. The Union Cabinet Company went out of business in 1881 and was sold to the Union Nut Company. The 90 Main Street house was retained by the Mills family until it was sold in 1909 to Edward Teller Thompson, a native of Avon and owner of Thompson’s store on South Main and Water Sts. Thompson sold “staples and fancy groceries.”

Robert King Vibert purchased the home in 1930. Vibert was married to Marjorie Monteith. He was a veteran of the Spanish-American war and represented Unionville businesses in the Panama Canal Zone. Marjorie Monteith’s father, Henry Ruthven Monteith, was the principal of Unionville High School from 1879 to 1899. Monteith Drive is named after him. He later taught several languages and mathematics at Connecticut Agricultural College, the precursor to UCONN. Marjorie Vibert attended the college and was the captain of the women’s basketball team. According to Jon Vibert, Marjorie was captain when the team had its first undefeated season. The Vibert family continues to own the property.