Hillhouse Avenue is a street in New Haven, Connecticut, famous for its many nineteenth century mansions, including the president's house at Yale University. Both Charles Dickens and Mark Twain have described it as "the most beautiful street in America." Much of the avenue is included in the Hillhouse Avenue Historic District, which extends to include houses on adjacent streets.
History
The avenue is named for James Hillhouse , innovator in land use in New Haven, who began the program of tree planting that gave New Haven its nickname, The Elm City, and who laid out the Trumbull Plan for Yale College and the Grove Street Cemetery. Hillhouse Avenue was initially called Temple Avenue, and was staked out, wide, by Hillhouse employee, and later Yale president, Jeremiah Day, in 1792. The avenue ran from the Green at Temple Street to a hilltop location where James Abraham Hillhouse built the family mansion, Highwood, in 1828. The houses along the wide avenue were set back with room for trees creating a park-like effect. The elms which once shaded the street were lost to Dutch Elm disease, but mature oak trees have largely taken their place. The avenue was privately owned until 1862. Because of the nature of the street, its lots, and its orientation to the nine-square-grid of New Haven, Hillhouse Avenue is sometimes considered to be the first suburb in the United States. The Hillhouse mansion was razed in 1942 in accordance with a directive in the will of James Abraham Hillhouse's daughter, Isaphene. In time, Hillhouse Avenue came to be divided into an upper, residential area, and a lower portion for public buildings and the Farmington Canal. It is now just two blocks long, running from Grove to Sachem. The upper portion of the avenue, along with the adjacent blocks, was designated the Hillhouse Avenue Historic District on the National Register of Historic Places in 1985.
Buildings
Yale now owns all of the properties on Hillhouse Avenue except for St. Mary's Church and its parish house. Many of the mansions of the upper area have been converted for use by the economics department, Cowles Foundation, School of Management, and other academic departments, and have been completely restored. Lower Hillhouse primarily includes university buildings, a number of them formerly part of the Sheffield Scientific School. There are several houses designed by architects Ithiel Town, Henry Austin and Alexander Jackson Davis. The area at the end of the avenue where Hillhouse's mansion stood is now part of the Science Hill section of Yale's campus. Notable buildings on Hillhouse Avenue that are included in the historic district are:
Mary Prichard House, 1836. This Greek revival design by Alexander Jackson Davis includes a two-story Corinthian porch with white columns. It is also known as the Provost's House and has been used to house Yale administration.
Henry Farnam House, Russell Sturgis, 1871. Redesigned with Victorian features removed in 1934. It has been the home of Yale's presidents since 1937.
John Pitkin Norton House, 1849. Tuscan/Italian Villa on Hillhouse Avenue designed by Henry Austin.
Charles Henry Farnam House, J. Cleaveland Cady, 1884. Queen Anne style.
Skinner House, Town and Davis, 1832. Landmark Greek Revival.
Graves-Gilman House, 1866. Victorian Italian Villa. Home of Sheffield professor, Daniel Coit Gilman. Converted into apartments for married Yale students. George H. W. Bush lived here while he was a student and his son lived here until the age of two. Now used by the Yale Department of Economics.
Abigail Whelpey House, 1826. The oldest house standing on Hillhouse. This Federal structure was altered in the 1860s with a mansard roof and dormer windows by Noah Porter, later President of Yale. The house, now known as Allwin Hall, has served as a residence for Yale administrators.
Buildings on lower Hillhouse Avenue, outside of the historic district, include:
Cloister Hall, 1888. Brownstone building originally served the Book and Snake fraternity of the Sheffield School.
Kirtland Hall, Dunham Laboratory, Mason Laboratory, Leet Oliver Memorial Hall. Yale University buildings originally part of the Sheffield Scientific School.
St. Mary's Church and parish house.
Sheffield-Town Mansion. Ithiel Town, 1836. Additions for Joseph Earl Sheffield by Henry Austin in 1859. Razed in 1957.
a second William Lyon Phelps House, 1914, at 114 Whitney Avenue, designed by J. Frederick Kelly, "one of New Haven's finest Colonial Revival-style structures"
