The Stephan Main Homestead
The North Stonington Historical Society's Stephan Main Homestead, with its arts and crafts collection, dye house, gardens and mill sluiceway presents a rarely seen picture of life in the rural Industrial Age
Mill Owner Stephan Main
The Industrial Age is generally thought of as a time when many Americans left their farms and headed for the city to earn wages, becoming small cogs in a big machine. In fact, the Industrial Age started in rural communities with entrepreneurs pooling the talents of weavers and carpenters working at home, small fuling and lumber mill operations that used power from local streams, and wool and wood gathered locally.
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The Main Homestead sits in the center of North Stonington's Historic District - once known as "Milltown". The house belonged to prosperous mill owner Stephan Main and includes an extensive collection of paintings and photographs of rural life, created by Main's grandson, Fredrick Stewart Greene, who also lived here.
Fredrick Stewart Greene at work. Greene left an extensive record of rural life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through his painting and photography, available in our collections.
This 1853 Gale Square piano belonged to local merchant, Dudley Wheeler.
Click here to hear it played.
The Homestead exhibits furniture, handicrafts, cameras, and musical instruments in addition to its genealogical Library, Dye House and Gardens.
