Fifteenth in a series on Brandon’s historic buildings
By JAMES PECK
Brandon has more than its share of historic old houses going back to the 1800s. But the oldest one still here today is most likely the Farrington House at 39 Pearl Street, built in 1799.
Brandon’s earliest settlement was on Hawk Hill, behind what is now Otter Valley High School. By the late 1700s, however, the town center had moved to the area on the west side of the Neshobe River, which attracted settlement for the potential waterpower from the upper and lower falls.
Jacob Farrington
In 1786, 57-year-old Captain Jacob Farrington, a Revolutionary War veteran from Connecticut, bought 120 prime acres on Brandon’s west side. He built a log cabin near where the railroad overpass on Champlain Street is today, later called Farrington Crossing. The cabin was burned by Native Americans and a small frame house was erected there where Jacob, his wife Abigail, and their three grown children moved.
Daughter Thirza married Gideon Horton in 1788 and moved to Hubbardton, while son Edward, who had taken possession of the property, sold it to son Daniel for 500 pounds in 1796.
On the first US Census taken in Brandon in 1791, Jacob Farrington appears as the head of house with his wife and son also enumerated. The three Farringtons were among the 637 recorded inhabitants of the town.
House Built
In 1799, another early settler, Judge Hiram Horton, brother-in-law of Jacob Farrington’s daughter Thirza, enlisted the help of John Conant in building the two-story mansion in the Federal style at what is now 39 Pearl Street. Conan was a carpenter/joiner and had only recently come to town and bought up the much of the land along what became Conant Square and the mills along the Neshobe.
Horton’s brother Gideon owned the land by the new house and all the land on the west side of what is now Pearl Street.
In his later memoirs, Conant mentions his work in building the house, even before he built his own house in 1802 at what is now 19 Conant Square (now Nifty Thrifty). “My first joiner work was to finish a house for Judge Horton, the same now owned by Franklin Farrington.” It is said that Conant himself etched the “1799” still visible today on the triangular pediment over the front door today.
Conant would build many more residences and other buildings, including the Baptist Church and parsonage, a brick store (now the Town Offices), and the Seminary building on SeminaryHill (burned down in 1959, when it was being used as the Graded School).
Daniel Farrington
Gideon Horton sold the house along with 54 acres to Daniel Pomeroy in 1801. In 1809, Pomeroy sold the house and eight acres to Daniel Farrington for $1,500. The house would be in the Farrington family for the next 133 years until 1942. The land abutted his father’s homestead. Jacob died shortly after, but they kept the original Champlain Street homestead farm until 1886. (No remnant of that house is there today.)
Daniel Farrington was 35 and had married Abigail Drury in 1796 and they and their five children lived in the new house on what was called Farrington Street (changed to Pearl Street around 1850).
Daniel joined the Brandon militia in 1808 and soon was promoted to lieutenant. That year he was sent with 18 men to capture a smuggling vessel, the “Black Snake,” on the Winooski River near Burlington. Several of his men were killed and he was severely wounded three times by musket shots. He recovered and stayed in the militia, rising to captain and retiring on his Brandon farm after the War of 1812 ended in 1813.
From the History of Brandon (1761-1961): “In politics, he was a Democrat until the Civil War started in 1861, when he became a Republican. He voted in this town 71 consecutive years. He cast his first presidential vote for Jefferson, and his last for Lincoln.”
Captain Daniel applied for a disability pension in 1832. After supplying affidavits from doctors and his commanding officer, he finally received a pension of $8.50 a month for the rest of his life. He died in 1865 at 92.
Franklin & Frederick Farrington
Daniel’s son Franklin was bequeathed the house and many acres of farmland stretching up to Champlain Street on both sides of the tracks. In 1886, Franklin sold the original homestead farm and 100 acres on Champlain Street, but kept the house and the lands around 39 Pearl Street
In the 1881 Brandon directory, 75-year-old Franklin is listed as owning 300 acres off Pearl Street and his only son, 30-year-old Frederick Horton Farrington, had an additional 350 acres in town. Fred Farrington raised prize Merino sheep, which he bred and shipped in flocks to many other states and to Australia (the first shipped there, starting their wool industry). He also raised and bred Morgan horses.
Fred Farrington was very prominent in Brandon politics, serving as both town rep and State Senator, and town moderator over 30 years. For more than half a century, he was a leader in Rutland and Addison County Banks and was President of the Brandon investment Company. He was very influential in the Brandon Community, at the library, Congregational Church, Mason Lodge, Brandon Country Club and Chamber of Commerce. Like his grandfather and father, Fred never missed a town meeting, for over 70 years and together they attended and voted at every meeting from 1794 through 1941.
Underground Railroad Stop?
Although there is no definitive evidence, legend has it, as handed down by word of mouth, that the house was a stop on the Underground Railroad, which sheltered escaped slaves prior to and during the Civil War. There was supposedly a hiding place behind a false fireplace, accessible by a closet and tunnels where slaves could hide. In 1995, the town included the house on its Underground Railroad Tour.
Caretaker House
In 1922, Fred had a tenant house built in the southwestern part of the farm, now 51 Pearl Street. It would be used by caretaker and chauffeur Charlie Hall until 1941. It was sold to Clifford Hack, and his son Avery and family would live there until 2016. The house was auctioned that year, completely renovated in 2024, and recently sold.
Fire & Poem
In 1924, the Farrington house narrowly escaped burning down when a furnace fire started in the basement, but thanks to the Dunmore Hose company and its new truck, the fire was quickly extinguished with little damage to the upper floors.
In 1926, Fred’s oldest son Franklin, a 5th-generation Farrington, lovingly penned a poem about Brandon that concluded:
“Six score and more of years, now flown,
Have rested easily
Upon a home
Now mellow grown
With age and dignity.
It stands far down a village street,
Where I was born and bred:
Toward it I turn with eager feet
For it is our Homestead.”
When Fred Farrington died in 1941 at age 89, his obituary read in part: “In the passing of Frederick Farrington, Brandon loses one of those grand old men in whom the spirit and character of Vermonters was strong. His genial smile and greeting were ever ready for his many friends – as one recently said, ‘Every time I talk with him, I feel a better man.’”
The Kembertons
In 1942, the house and property on Pearl Street was sold by Fred’s son Franklin to a rich Romanian immigrant from New York City named Harry Phillip Kemberton. Harry and his wife Cecelia lived on Park Avenue in New York and bought the Brandon house for a summer home.
Among other pursuits, Harry Kemberton published the Social Directory for NYC, which listed prominent members of high society and their lineage. Ceceilia was head of the prestigious Barmore School for girls in the city.
Adele Dammann and her nurse
The Kembertons only lived there a few months for two summers, then sold it in 1943 to another rich NYC lady acquaintance named Adele Barmore McCullough Dammann, who was an heir to the Knickerbocker Ice fortune. She had lived in Paris for 30 years until 1938.
“Madame Adele,” as she was called, was 86 and somehow decided Brandon would be good for her failing health. In fact, it wasn’t, and she died in 1949.
Mme. Damman left her house to her nurse, 61-year-old Augusta Geprags, a recent graduate from the nursing school at Mary Fletcher Hospital in Burlington. She would own the house for the next 28 years. In 1958, she decided to turn the house into a tourist home called the Farrington House, and she ran it as such until 1975, when she was 87.
In 1977, Augusta Geprags died and left the property to her younger sisters, Dora and Helen, who promptly sold it to Charles and Barbara Jakiela.
The Jakielas
Charlie Jakiela married his second wife, Nancy Dean, in 1984 and they lived at 39 Pearl for the next 16 years. Charlie was very involved with Brandon as a Selectman and chair of the Planning Commission for many years. Nancy had grown up on the historic Dean Farm not far away on Union Street. Nancy loves the history of the house and contributed much information for this article.
Nancy found many historic items in the house, including old watercolor paintings of the barns, a painting by famous French artist Mme. Andree Lenique de Francheville (who had visited Mme. Damman a few times), a wedding dress owned by Augusta Geprags, a ceremonial Odd Fellows sword, and a Farrington House stamp (accompanying this article).
Charlie and Nancy restored the house over the years and, in 1999, local architect Martin Harris assisted them in replacing the major beams supporting the second floor due to leakage. And one wall was completely removed before it was shored up. Harris wrote it up in an architecture magazine with the title “This House Should Not Be Standing.”
In 2000, the Jakielas had the lands surveyed and subdivided into two lots. They sold the house and 2.4-acre lot to Adam Tinkoff the same year and moved to Nancy’s house at the south end of Union Street, once a part of the Dean Farm where Nancy grew up.
The Jakielas kept the other 5-acre lot (now owned by Courtney Satz.)
The Zollmans
In 2003, Tinkoff sold 39 Pearl to Rob and Alyssa Zollman from Philadelphia. They moved in with their three young children, Gena, Sam, and Marley, ages 12, 10, and 7, respectively.
Rob Zollman is a talented drummer and percussionist, and he had founded and run a music learning center in Philadelphia. In 2005, he started a music center at 39 Pearl and in rented space at 27 Center Street. He also taught music at Otter Valley and other local schools.
Alyssa Zollman had a degree in restaurant management and ran a gourmet food store in Philadelphia. In Brandon, her company Moon & Stars Baking joined a cooperative store, Sabine’s Market, in the Leary block, in 2004. Alyssa was also an animal hobbyist and the three Zollman kids grew up on the hobby farm created on the former Farrington farmstead.
In 2013, the Zollmans moved out and in 2016, the new owner renovated the house, razed the old barn, and sold the property to the current owners, Chelsea and Michael Howe.
The Howes moved into the house in September of 2016 along with their three young children: Jackson, 8, Lucy, 6, and Noah, 1. The kids have grown up in the house, attending Brandon schools. Michael is the Otter Valley baseball coach and Jackson a star pitcher on the team. Chelsea is co-owner of and a wedding planner at Wild Fern Boutique.
The family loves the history of the oldest house in town and according to Chelsea, “Our backyard is a kids’ paradise and we are fortunate to have amazing memories here.”
When they arrived, they found a box with a treasure trove of photos and documents that had been handed down by each successive owner. There were also watercolor paintings and old photos of the house framed on the walls.
Today
The Farrington House is now 226 years old, older than any in Brandon. The 1799 inscription is still proudly displayed above the front door.
