History sleuths find fur-trading post

KENT — A recently uncovered pelt room at Seven Hearths, an imposing, pre-Revolutionary house that served as a fur-trading post and general store centuries ago when Kent was a vast wilderness, is now the recipient of a prestigious state preservation award.

“I’ve never heard of such a thing,” said Christopher Wigren, deputy director of Preservation Connecticut, when asked how the 12-foot by 16-foot fur-trading post in Kent compares to others like it around the state.

Wigren’s group announced in early April that the Kent Historical Society (KHS), which owns and operates Seven Hearths as a house museum, will be among the honorees at its 2022 Connecticut Preservation Awards ceremony on May 4 in New Haven.

The nonprofit statewide organization recognizes honorees annually for their outstanding achievements in revitalizing, protecting and nourishing Connecticut’s significant buildings, landscapes and communities.

“What the Kent Historical Society has done through this pelt room is cast a light on a slice of 19th-century economy and lifestyle that you don’t hear much about,” said Wigren. “Clearly, all the nails and markings are still in the building, where animal furs were sorted, traded and stored.”

Marge Smith, KHS curator and archivist, credits the find to meticulous notes kept by the previous homeowner, artist George Laurence Nelson, that hinted of a former pelt room covered up on the second floor by Sheetrock when he built a bathroom and new set of wood stairs to the attic. The restoration effort, she said, “was really the result of a lot of sleuthing.”

Smith also credits the community for its support in funding the project, spearheaded by preservationists Jeffrey Morgan and Roger Gonzales, both of whom are longtime KHS trustees. Work on the preservation project began in 2014 and progressed over the next five years.

‘It was the frontier’

The first homesteads in Kent were established in 1738, with the greatest concentration of them situated between the Berry farm at North Kent and the foot of Cobble Hill at today’s Route 341. Seven Hearths was one of the largest homesteads of its time, built in 1751 by the Beebe family as a combination home and general store/fur-trading post. 

“At the time, this was the biggest building in the area,” said Gonzales. “This is where the first division lots were. The center of Kent, as we know it now, did not exist.”

Noted Smith, “The Schaghticokes were just across the river there, this was kind of the edge. It was the frontier.”

Animal pelts came from members of the tribe looking to trade them for provisions like cloth, firearms, metal tools and ammunition. Even the farmers, said Gonzales, contributed to the trade by killing fur-bearing predators that threatened their livestock.

Boroscope found ‘mink,’ and the process began

In 2009, KHS was awarded a grant from the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation to do an Historic Structures Report of Seven Hearths. Hudson Valley Preservation was hired to inspect its condition and seek clues about its history. 

When Nelson bought the house in 1919, there was no indoor plumbing. The artist wrote in his memoir, “New Life for Old Timber,” that the upstairs was “mostly unfinished storage space including a fur-trading post connected with the store by a second back stairs. One could see the names of mink and fox and other skins marked in blue chalk on the beams. Large painted letters indicated bought and sold sections. In part of this space our bathroom took shape.”

With those clues, according to the museum’s curator, “The first thing we asked Hudson Valley Preservation to do was to take a peek above the ceiling for evidence of the beams. Mason Lord spotted the word ‘mink’ right away with his boroscope, and so we made the decision to remove the bathroom and interpret the space as an early fur-trading post.”

Peeling away layers

On the second floor, above what was formerly the general store, is the fur-trading place, where pelts of mink, muskrats, rabbits, beavers, bears and other animals were brought by local trappers for credit in the general store or butcher shop, located in the cellar. The names of some pelts and initials of traders are still visible centuries later, having been chalked on the beams and walls.

On a recent weekend visit, daylight from the room’s one window cast a warm glow on its rustic wood interior. Lush pelts, many donated by the community, hung suspended by the original wrought -iron nails or assembled on tables and chairs. A beefy beaver pelt suspended on a large stretcher was propped against a far wall.

Pelt stretchers made from old shipping crates and marked with the words “Woodrow CT” were among the many donations by families of local trappers that helped bring the original pelt room to life. “People are giving us these things to put in this space” that had been collecting dust in their attics for decades, said the KHS curator.

Morgan’s sleuthing led to the identification of faint, chalked messages on the wallboards, beams and ceiling: the words “mink,” and the initials “R & CW,” which the restoration specialist suspects stood for Cornelius Waldron, who was likely a trapper at the time. 

When early morning light washes the walls just right, other clues emerge: scratched credit marks, “C//////” are faint, but visible, as is the venerable old Kent name of “Root” on a horizontal board. Mr. Root painted his name in black paint and added, “Kent, Conn.”

Smith explained that when the box around the stairs was removed, they discovered the word “BOUGHT” in red letters on the beam above. Once pelts had been bought, they may have been hung from that beam, from nails on the wall or more likely piled nearby on the floor.

The chalk mark that had stymied the restorationists for quite a while was the word “BAR” on the ceiling, which turned out to be the early spelling of bear, which were abundant in the 18th century. “We were discovering things all the time,” said Gonzales. 

A happy accident?

Although Seven Hearths was in dilapidated condition in 1919 when Nelson purchased it, the home was still unspoiled by drastic changes. Over the decades, the artist brought his beloved residence back to life, documenting the process, and his observations, along the way. Upon his death in 1978, he bequeathed Seven Hearths to KHS.

Were it not for Nelson’s clues about the home’s original bones and features, the pelt room may never have seen the light of day, say those involved in the restoration.

“Signs of it just managed to be preserved … probably by accident after being covered up during a remodel,” said Wigren. “The artist turned that area into a bathroom but wrote of what he saw in those words chalked on the beams, and someone went and looked for and managed to find them.”