A town at the center of Connecticut, once the Great Swamp Society and then Kensington, where tinsmiths sent the Yankee peddler out across the country, Simeon North made pistols on Spruce Brook and East Berlin built iron bridges for America and beyond.

Hartford County · Record checked October 8, 2026

20,175Population2020 census1
1785Became a townincorporated as Berlin1
10,000Tin in one yearboxes of tin plate made into ware after 18152
1863Civil War monumentKensington's, dedicated before the war ended3
6National Registerplaces on the list today4

Then and now

The same town 157 years apart. Click either map to look closer.

Landowners map of Berlin, Connecticut from 1869 by Baker and Tilden, restored by KNOWOL

1869

The landowners map

By Baker & Tilden

Every plot is marked with the name of the family living there in 1869, with business guides for Berlin, Kensington and East Berlin. Look for Skuttle Meadow Pond, Dudley's Grist Mill, the American Corrugated Iron Company, Blair Manufacturing, the Hartford and Springfield Railroad and Lamentation Mountain.5

See the 1869 printMore about this map
Map of Berlin, Connecticut in 2026, with Kensington, East Berlin, Worthington Ridge and 34 numbered landmarks

2026

Berlin today

By KNOWOL

Shaded hills from Ragged Mountain to Lamentation Mountain, Silver Lake drawn to its true shape, Kensington, East Berlin and Worthington Ridge, and a guide of 34 numbered landmarks with the National Register sites marked.6

See the 2026 printMore about this map

The story of Berlin

Ten thousand boxes of tin

Around 1740 two brothers from Ireland, Edward and William Pattison, began making tinware in Berlin and carried it from farm to farm in baskets. Young men learned the trade, and Berlin's peddlers took it everywhere. Just after the War of 1812, ten thousand boxes of tin plate were made into kitchen ware here in a single year. The bigger shops sent workmen to Montreal, Richmond, Charleston and Albany to make up tin through the winter, and in spring the loaded wagons set out on planned routes. A peddler on a far route might sell his horse and cart at the end and come home after six or eight months with empty hands and full pockets. A century later the old roads were still so full of scrap tin that a fast team made them ring.1278

The man lost on Lamentation Mountain

Lamentation Mountain rises like a cliff on Berlin's southern edge, and its name comes from an old story. Rev. Charles A. Goodrich wrote that a Mr. Chester, one of the first settlers of Wethersfield, went out alone one cloudy afternoon and got lost in the thick forest on the mountain's top. Tradition says he was hunting for a grist mill site and wandered for three days, while his neighbors searched with drums, muskets, tin pans and brass kettles, anything that would make a noise. Not everyone believed it. In 1906 a Berlin man wrote to the local paper asking why a good woodsman hadn't simply followed the river home. The same trap rock ledges gave up agates, which an East Berlin man polished as jewels for ships' compasses.9102

The best bridges were made in East Berlin

The Corrugated Metal Company of East Berlin was in trouble when Samuel C. Wilcox, who had already run a tinware factory, advised it to start building bridges. The Berlin Iron Bridge Company was incorporated in 1870 and began with about twenty men. It made iron highway and railroad bridges, iron roofs and whole iron buildings. By 1900 more than five hundred people worked for it, its work went all over America and to foreign countries, and it did over two million dollars of business a year. That spring it was absorbed by the American Bridge Company. A writer in The Connecticut Magazine that year said good roads depend on good bridges, and the best of all good bridges are made in East Berlin.11121314

Through the years

25 moments from 1659 to today.

  1. 1659Sergeant Richard Beckley buys 300 acres from Chief Tarramuggus and becomes the first settler.1
  2. 1686Captain Richard Seymour leads families from Farmington to settle on Christian Lane.1
  3. 1705The area becomes the Great Swamp Society.1
  4. 1710The first meeting-house goes up at Christian Lane, built with lumber from Samuel Bronson's mill on Mill River.15
  5. 1722The society takes the name Kensington.1
  6. 1740About this year Edward and William Pattison start the first tinware business in the colonies.1
  7. 1772The society splits into Worthington on the east and Kensington on the west.1
  8. 1774The Worthington Meetinghouse is built on the ridge.16
  9. 1776Selah Hart of Kensington is taken prisoner near New York and mourned for months as dead.17
  10. 1785The town is incorporated and named Berlin.1
  11. 1795Simeon North buys an interest in a sawmill on Spruce Brook, the start of his arms factory.18
  12. 1799The town's post office is placed in Worthington, and its name, Berlin, slowly replaces the parish name.19
  13. 1812In the War of 1812, President Madison is said to have visited North's factory to urge more pistols.20
  14. 1815About now ten thousand boxes of tin plate are made into kitchen ware in Berlin in one year.2
  15. 1844Ruth Hart, widow of General Selah Hart, dies in Kensington at 101.21
  16. 1850New Britain separates from Berlin.1
  17. 1856Soon after this winter a freshet carries off the old North pistol factory and its dam.22
  18. 1863Kensington dedicates its Civil War monument, its stone hauled from Portland by oxen.23
  19. 1869Baker & Tilden publish their landowners map of Berlin.5
  20. 1870The Berlin Iron Bridge Company is incorporated in East Berlin and starts with about twenty men.12
  21. 1879Peck, Stow and Wilcox buys the Kensington shops on Mill River.24
  22. 1884Brandegee Hall is built on Worthington Ridge; it later serves as town hall.16
  23. 1900On May 12 the Berlin bridge company is absorbed by the American Bridge Company.14
  24. 1974The Worthington Meetinghouse ends two centuries of continuous public use.1
  25. 2016The old Berlin station burns on December 21.1

Places to see

The numbers match the landmark guide printed on the 2026 map.

  • 6Berlin Post OfficeBerlin. One of Franklin's 75 post offices.
  • 9Ezekiel Kelsey HouseBeckley Road. Saltbox house of about 1760.
  • 13Berlin-Peck Memorial LibraryArthur B. Powers complex. Town library beside the community center.Visit their website
  • 14Lamentation Mountain State ParkSouth, near Silver Lake. The mountain with the lost-man legend.Visit their website
  • 15Ragged Mountain Memorial PreserveNorthwest. Trap rock ridge on the town's edge.
  • 19Berlin StationKensington. Amtrak and Hartford Line trains stop here.
  • 23East Berlin LibraryEast Berlin. The far east side's library.
  • 26Henry Hooker HouseHigh Road, Kensington. Built about 1769, remodeled later.
  • 31Kensington Soldier's MonumentKensington. Civil War memorial dedicated in 1863.
  • 32Worthington Ridge Historic DistrictWorthington Ridge. The old town center and meetinghouse.

On the National Register

All 6 places in Berlin on the National Register of Historic Places that still stand today, oldest first, and why each one matters.4

  • Ezekiel Kelsey House

    Built about 1760 · Listed 1977 · 429 Beckley Road

    A well-kept saltbox with a big central chimney, an overhanging second story and fine period paneling in the front parlor. Ezekiel Kelsey, born in Wethersfield in 1713, probably built it and gave it to his son Asahel in 1768.25

  • Henry Hooker House

    Built about 1769 · Listed 1978 · 111 High Road, Kensington

    Built by Elijah Hooker and modernized in the mid-1800s by Henry Hooker, a successful carriage maker, who took out the big central chimney for a fashionable central hall. It shows how later generations reworked an early house.26

  • Worthington Ridge Historic District

    Listed 1989 · Worthington Ridge from Mill Street to Sunset Lane

    The historic town center, along a stretch of the old Boston Post Road. It holds the 1774 meetinghouse at 723 Worthington Ridge, the 1850 Congregational church and Brandegee Hall of 1884, town hall from 1906 to 1974, and its oldest house dates to about 1720.16

  • Simeon North Factory Site

    Listed 1990 · Address restricted

    The site of Simeon North's arms factory, where he worked under the first federal contract for firearms with interchangeable parts. Part of the mill foundation still stands below the dam, and digs in the 1980s found more than 900 artifacts, including pistol springs and triggers.18

  • Kensington Soldier's Monument

    Built 1863 · Listed 2013 · 312 Percival Avenue, Kensington

    A 20-foot brownstone obelisk in front of the Kensington Congregational Church, dedicated on July 28, 1863. It is one of the oldest Civil War memorials in the country and the first in Connecticut, designed by Nelson Augustus Moore.3

  • Hubbard Park

    Listed 1997 · West Main Street, Meriden, with parts in Berlin

    About 1,800 acres in the Hanging Hills, given by Walter Hubbard of Bradley and Hubbard, with Mirror Lake and Castle Craig on East Peak. Most of the park is in Meriden, and portions reach into Berlin and Southington.27

In their words

“The best of all good bridges are made in East Berlin.”

The Connecticut Magazine, 190013

“A team driven swiftly over the roads to-day will bring forth a resonant silvery ring.”

History of Berlin, Connecticut, 1916, on the scrap tin in the old roads8

“The people of Kensington are justly proud of it, since it was the first monument to the soldiers of the Civil war erected in the country.”

The Connecticut Magazine, 190023

Nearby towns

Sources

  1. Berlin, Connecticut, Wikipedia
  2. The Memorial History of Hartford County, Connecticut, 1633-1884 (1886), on Berlin's tin and trades, Internet Archive
  3. Kensington Soldier's Monument, Wikipedia
  4. National Register of Historic Places listings in Hartford County, Connecticut, Wikipedia
  5. Landowners map of Berlin, CT from 1869, restored by KNOWOL
  6. Map of Berlin, Connecticut in 2026, KNOWOL (USGS elevation, Census Bureau roads)
  7. History of Connecticut in monographic form (1925), on the tin peddlers, Internet Archive
  8. History of Berlin, Connecticut (1916), on the early industries, Internet Archive
  9. History of Berlin, Connecticut (1916), on Mount Lamentation, Internet Archive
  10. History of Berlin, Connecticut (1916), on the search for Mr. Chester, Internet Archive
  11. Genealogical and family history of the state of Connecticut (1911), on Samuel C. Wilcox, Internet Archive
  12. History of New Britain, with sketches of Farmington and Berlin (1889), on the Berlin Iron Bridge Company, Internet Archive
  13. The Connecticut Magazine (1900), on the Berlin Iron Bridge Company, Internet Archive
  14. Genealogical and family history of the state of Connecticut (1911), on Frank L. Wilcox, Internet Archive
  15. History of New Britain, with sketches of Farmington and Berlin (1889), on the Bronson mill, Internet Archive
  16. Worthington Ridge Historic District, Wikipedia
  17. Chapter sketches, Connecticut Daughters of the American Revolution; patron saints (1901), on Ruth Hart, Internet Archive
  18. Simeon North Factory Site, Wikipedia
  19. The story of New Britain, Connecticut (1925), on the Berlin post office, Internet Archive
  20. History of Berlin, Connecticut (1916), on the North pistols, Internet Archive
  21. Chapter sketches, Connecticut Daughters of the American Revolution; patron saints (1901), on Ruth Hart's last years, Internet Archive
  22. Genealogical and Family History of the State of Connecticut (1911), on Reuben North, Internet Archive
  23. The Connecticut Magazine (1900), on the Kensington monument, Internet Archive
  24. The Memorial History of Hartford County, Connecticut, 1633-1884 (1886), on Kensington's mills, Internet Archive
  25. Ezekiel Kelsey House, Wikipedia
  26. Henry Hooker House, Wikipedia
  27. Hubbard Park (Meriden, Connecticut), Wikipedia