Interesting Facts About Greenwich
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#1 One of Greenwich’s most noteworthy private homes is an homage to Versailles, a replica of Le Petit Trianon. Called Northway, it’s a striking white Neoclassical mansion on 12 acres on North Street.
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#2 In April 1902, Ernest Thompson Seton visited the Cos Cob School to invite students who had vandalized his nearby estate to camp. This was the start of the League of the Woodcraft Indians or “Seton’s Indians,” one of the forerunners of the Boy Scouts of America. Seton was an author and wildlife artist as well as the father of author Anya Seton.
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#3 One of the founders of Greenwich was a colorful woman named Elizabeth Winthrop Feake. In 1640 her husband Robert Feake and Daniel Patrick purchased what became a part of Greenwich for “25 Coates.” The deed states that “Elizabeth Neck”—now known as Greenwich Point—was Elizabeth Feake’s “Perticaler purchase.” The oldest house in Greenwich was erected in 1645 by the Feakes and stands today near the entrance to Elizabeth’s beloved Greenwich Point Park.
#4 There's a house on Round Hill Road in Greenwich that was built by a free black man in 1845, was the home and inspiration for the influential American Impressionist artist (and member of the Cos Cob art colony) John Henry Twachtman, and 75 years later inspired homeowner Jim Henson.
#5 President George H. W. Bush attended Greenwich Country Day School and met his wife Barbara at a Round Hill Club Christmas dance. His father, Prescott Bush, served as moderator of the Representative Town Meeting in Greenwich. The family home was a 1903 Victorian house on Grove Lane.
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#6 The Griffith E. Harris Golf Course (“The Griff”) is an 18-hole, par 71 public course designed by the renowned Robert Trent Jones, Sr. On 159 acres on King Street, it opened on July 17, 1965 and was originally called the Bruce Memorial Golf Course for local philanthropist Robert M. Bruce. It was renamed in 1999 for First Selectman Griffith E. Harris who was instrumental in designating the land and raising the funds to make the golf course possible.
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#7 One of America's foremost landscape architects, Frederick Law Olmsted, was from Hartford and designed many green spaces in Connecticut including Khakum Wood in Greenwich.