Red Houses

 Why red?  It was common in colonial days, a mixture of red ochre, milk products and perhaps linseed oil.   It is still popular today, on a wide range of houses, from true antique colonials to newish houses.

A simple older (but not antique) red farmhouse.

Maybe a red house from the turn of the 20th century?

This might not be a red house.  More like an outbuilding, perhaps used as a studio?

Red so dark it is almost brown.

Kind of an old red house.

I suspect this red house has an 18th century house underneath its later additions.

Mark Twain Memorial Library

 Samuel Clemens (the author Mark Twain) lived his last two years in Stormfield, an Italian villa built for him in 1908 in Redding, a town on Ridgefield's eastern border.  He died there in April 1910. 

(Stormfield was listed for sale two weeks ago for nearly $5 million, but it is on a large property and down a long driveway, so I was not able to photograph it.) 

Two months after Twain died, his daughter Clara donated Twain's personal library in Stormfield to the directors of a library to be built in Redding.  In 1911 the Mark Twain Memorial Library was opened. 

 A year later Andrew Carnegie endowed it with a fund sufficient to support it.

I support renewable energy, but I'm not excited about solar panels on the roof of a historic building.

Many Twain sayings are written high on the library's walls.  

At the end of the reading room:  "When in doubt, tell the truth."

"Now and then we had a hope that if we lived and were good, God would permit us to be pirates."

Generator

 This area is heavily wooded.  Major storms inevitably take down old trees.  In turn they trees take down power lines.  Many houses here have standby generators to protect against power outages.

A generator is not especially beautiful.  One artistic homeowner built a stylish cage to give it some class.

Stumps

When did it become a thing to decorate rotting tree stumps?

Wisdom

 

A resident of Millstone Farm, Wilton, Connecticut.

Kurt Waldheim

 Kurt Waldheim was Secretary-General of the United Nations from 1972 to 1981.  He wanted a country getaway and found it in a house he rented down the street from my new Ridgefield home.  After his term at the U.N., Waldheim returned to Austria and was elected President in 1986. 

 Before the election and throughout his term, Waldheim was accused of participating in Nazi war crimes when he served as an Army officer in World War II.  An Austrian investigation concluded that Waldheim had not personally participated in war crimes, but an American investigation concluded that he had.  Waldheim was banned from re-entering the United States.

Colorful Victorian Houses

 I like well-painted multi-colored Victorian-era houses.

This one is just steps away from Ridgefield's main street.  Very, very convenient and walkable.  And it became available for new buyers on Monday.  I looked at the photos online.  The interior has been nicely modernized and there is a lovely patio behind the house, with an outside kitchen.  Love it.

This house is also close to Ridgefield's downtown, but it is on a busy street and I imagine the traffic and noise are headaches.  I'm not a fan of the fake shutters and the window air conditioners.

This house is across the New York state line in South Salem.  

All three of these houses have big, open porches, another thing that I like.

And this drool-worthy Italianate house on Ridgefield's Main Street  is above and set back enough from the street that I imagine the traffic noise isn't bad.  I like the open porch on one side and the enclosed porch on the other side.  It has not been on the market in the time I have been looking at Ridgefield properties, but at an earlier time of my life I would have been keeping an eye on it.