“The Village of Pretty Houses”

George Washington, who traveled through town in 1780 and 1781, is said to have called Farmington “the village of pretty houses.” And when the French army, commanded by the Comte de Rochambeau, camped in town in 1781, an officer wrote, “This town contains some of the handsomest houses and best people in America.”

Many of the homes built from the mid-eighteenth century to the mid-nineteenth century can be seen today in a walk down Farmington village’s Main Street. The houses, built by the town’s founding families, have survived modernization and development in part because the railroad and trolley passed the town by. Sarah Porter, who founded Miss Porter’s School, saw to it in the late 1800s that no railroad or trolley tracks ran in front of her school. Many of the historic buildings on Main Street are now part of the school.