Késsinnimek - Roots - Racines


This Old House

by   Norm Léveillée

In 1971, we purchased an "old house" with which my wife had fallen in love. This year 2006, we are celebrating its 219th year as a home for another family - at the present, our family. The house was raised (like "barn raising") and inhabited in November 1787.

The author of the following poem is unknown. I found a copy of this poem in one of the upstairs room as we were cleaning out "this old house" when we purchased the "Stephen Allen Home" back in 1971.

The man who built this house of mine
Two hundred years ago
With Christian doors of smooth, clear pine
And chestnut timbers, row on row,
Whose oxen hauled the brick and lime,
Who squared the hearth's broad stone,
Could not forsee that Faith and Time
Would someday make it all my own.

Of course he knew that it would stay
Here, on its sturdy sills,
Long after his last Spring should lay
Her fragrant mornings on the hills.
So even if he did not know
Just who its owners were to be,
I'll still maintain that years ago
He planned and built this house for me.

 

On August 11, 1787, Dr. Stephen Allen and his wife Sarah Rhodes purchased 40 acres of land, situated on Sharpstreet, from Thomas Joslin for 90 pounds of silver. A farmhouse with a central chimney, typical of the era, was built in that year. Stephen Allen's farm lands were located on Sharpstreet (Sharpstreet is the historic spelling of today's Sharpe Street), an early and important east-west road between the coastline and western Rhode Island.
The Allens had their "free persons" working the farm.

When Allen, a physician from East Greenwich, located his family in West Greenwich, the inland town itself was only forty-five years old; it was set off in 1741 from its more prosperous coastal neighbor, East Greenwich. West Greenwich was primarily an agricultural town. Its population, always small, was thinly scattered over its 35,000 acres.
In 1755 the population was only 1246; by 1800, the town had grown but slightly to 1757. The population decreased during the second half of the 19th century, well below 1000. The population was listed as slightly over 4000 in 1990 and over 5000 in 2000.

        Owners of this old house



  • Dr. Stephen Allen - 1787
  • George Weaver - 1811
  • William Nichols - 1828
  • Joseph Nichols - 1834
  • Albert Nichols - 1857
  • Rev. Benedict Johnson - 1867
  • William A. Johnson - 1872
  • Stephen H. Capwell - 1874
  • Norman L. Capwell - 1914
  • Charles F. Nye - 1952
  • Rev. Earl H. Tomlin - 1953
  • Normand & Annette Léveillée - 1971

For a complete history with more graphics of the The Stephen Allen Home
which was placed on the National Register of Historic Homes in 1978,
please go to my website at:

The Stephen Allen Home
1787


Index of Articles

 

Késsinnimek - Roots - Racines
Copyright © 2003 & 2004 & 2005 & 2006 Norm Léveillée
© Tous droits réservés
Created 1 Feb 2003