Hartford Courant reports that Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company is preparing to re-locate to Asylum Hill

It is probable that Chase, Morrison & Company, which was arranging the purchases of the properties, had authorized the Courant to publish this story.

1. Connecticut Mutual bought four properties on the block

• From Irving Katz, for $40,000
• From Perrone & Ferrigno, for $45,000
• From Isaac J. Steane, for $40,000
• From S. L. Ward, for $95,000

2. The company acquired an option to by the property of George K. Welch from Katherine Welch for $25,000 on February 9, 1924.
3. The board of directors unanimously voted that a new office building would be necessary for the company in the near future.

1. Negotiations were currently underway to purchase the property of the Business and Professional Women’s Club, at the corner of Garden and Myrtle Streets.
2. Chase, Morrison & Company anticipated that all negotiations would be successfully completed by the end of the week.

The Courant will report on July 18, 1924, that Connecticut Mutual had purchased 46-48 Collins Street as the site for a future heating plant.

According to the article, the “life insurance business is growing to the surprise even of veterans in the work and the demands of the company for further space for its own uses would necessitate many and expensive changes, extending with the discovery soon that there was not enough room in the who building.”

1. “The Connecticut Mutual does not intend to build at once, but plans to begin about April 1, 1925.”
2. “The present stately building, on the northwest corner of Main and Pearl streets, is better fitted for general office uses than for a modern life insurance company. … The assumption is now that the building will eventually be refitted for offices. It occupies at least as important a site as there is in the city.”

1. The block bounded by Garden, Myrtle, and Collins Street had eight properties.
2. Collins Street extended eastward past its intersection with Garden Street before bending southward to meet Myrtle Street.
3. The price for the five properties already purchased, $245,000, would be equivalent to $4,581,915.50 in 2025.
4. The property bought from S. L. Ward was the largest property on the block. Ward had planned to build apartment houses on it and “had spent considerable money on the plans for their construction."
5. There were two other properties on the block that the company was not immediately interested in buying:

• The former home of James L. Howard, now occupied by this three daughters, Alice, Edith, and Mary, and well as Alice’s husband E. B. Bennett.
• The current home of Charles Hopkins Clark and Matilda Root Clark.

6. The board of directors of Connecticut Mutual consisted of

• Charles E. Chase
• Charles Cheney
• Charles Hopkins Clark
• Francis R. Cooley
• R. C. Corson
• Jacob H. Greene
• James L. Loomis
• Edward Milligan
• Henry S. Robinson
• Lucius F. Robinson
• Meigs H. Whaples
• Herbert H. White

Unattributed.  “Conn. Mutual, to build east of Hartford Fire, buys huge $25,000 tract,” Hartford Courant, February 11, 1924, page 1.