Neighborhood Watch: Wilson Point

Editor's note: Recently Village Creek received a grant to prepare a National Register nomination. We learned that Village Creek Founders were forerunners in obliterating racial and ethnic barriers in the city and that prominent artists left marks there. It prompted us to ask the question for our readers--What are other historic neighborhoods like, up close? So throughout the summer we will continue walking around and talking to people who call them home as well as local historians to discover how these neighborhoods came to be and what makes them special. Come take a walk with us.

Nestled on 150 acres comprising the sandy beaches and rocky promontories of Norwalk's coastline, Wilson Point, a community of 85 or so homes varied in their sizes and architectural styles, remains one of the city's hidden gems.

The Point lies only a short car ride from the bustling bars and clubs of South Norwalk, and that same short car ride can bring a commuter to the transportation hub of the South Norwalk train station, where he or she has quick access to New Haven and New York City.

It's this convenient proximity to the urban centers of the metro area, yet undeniable sense of being off the beaten path -- a "hidden in plain sight" community -- that lends Wilson Point its distinct character.

"You're coming in from the hustle and bustle of outside," explained Jane Ready, a realtor with Prudential Connecticut and a Wilson Point resident.

The first landmark of the Point that lets visitors know they're stepping into a different sort of place is a quaint, pine green guardhouse, which sits off Route 136 on Shagbark Road in the midst of a low point among the neighborhood's rolling hills. From there, woodlands dotted with large maples and tangles of underbrush interspersed with homes -- including the 1749 Isaac Belden farm house - span toward the Point's irregular coastline. (By 1685, Wilson Point was owned by John and Ruhama Belden. In 1971, their grandson Isaac began to raise grain on what was then know as Belden's Neck.)

Narrow roads with minimal traffic lead residents through the quiet areas of the neighborhood. Deer and families of foxes often frequent the patches of land along the more secluded roadways, and more than a few residents have purchased golf carts to make their exploration of 150 sprawling acres easier.

Down by the shore, Wilson Point extends toward Wilson Cove westward and the Village Creek inlet to the east. Less than a mile off the coast of Wilson Point, the verdant land of Tavern Island jags up from Long Island Sound. Motor and sailboats cruise the warm waters, ripe with shellfish, in and around the Norwalk Islands, marking the Point as a community very much centered by the Sound.

"It's a lovely waterfront area," Ready said, "with glimpses of the Norwalk Islands."

"It is post card beautiful," said Alyssa Shapiro, a Wilson Point resident and former board member of the Wilson Point Property Owners Association. With dues costing about $1,400 per year, the association conducts standard services like repair of street signs and road plowing, and goes to great lengths, through clean ups and regular maintenance, to preserve the area's feel of untouched splendor.

"This is the most beautiful placed I have ever lived in," Shapiro said.

And though the neighborhood is home to the Norwalk Yacht Club, a social and seafaring epicenter in the city of Norwalk, Wilson Point has a social calendar all its own.

According to Ready, community Easter egg hunts, a Spring Fling Cocktail Party, beach clean ups, a tennis tournament and happy hour tea and cocktail events occur throughout the year. There is also a beach club, strictly for Wilson Point residents (membership dues run $750 per year), a clubhouse with a changing room and kayak storage, and a dock with mooring access.

Shapiro, who has lived in the community with her husband for the past five years, said she enjoys the peace, quiet and unique face of Wilson Point.

"Houses have been added slowly, so it's not one of those cookie cutter developments," she said.

That same sort of steady development on Wilson Point was evident in the early 20th century. "A Point in Time," a written history of Wilson Point, details the expansion.

As the Wilson Point community began to blossom in the 1920s, excavation unearthed burial grounds of the Naramake tribe dating back to the 1600s. The discovery marked the last remnants of the first known inhabitants of Wilson Point. (According to "A Point in Time," Daniel Patrick bought Wilson Point from the Naramake Indians in 1640.)

In 1929, progress on the point quickened as the Wilson Point Property Owners' Association was incorporated. Property owners were encouraged to sign the association agreement, and the contributed funds went toward repaving roads, snowplowing and dogwood and elm planting -- just like association fees due today.

Norwalk residents felt the stinging effects of the Great Depression through the 1930s. The city of Norwalk alarmed Wilson Pointers by threatening to anchor the ship "George Washington" off the point's coast. The boat's hull served as housing for the unemployed.

Still, even with one of the most dismal economic states in American history, development on Wilson Point refused to be stifled. New homes went up. A man by the name of Douglas Vought razed the Point's old Knob Club and built a new house at the site. A mining engineer named William Lynch bought the London farmhouse. The Nash family moved into a new home in 1934, and on the shoreline near Wilson Point's back gate, the Lyons built a weathered-shingle house overlooking the marshlands. A red brick home, a white brick home, and an English-style home with a two-story vaulted living room all went up. Many of those homes still stand today.

After the brutal kidnapping and slaying of the Lindbergh family's baby, Point residents became increasingly concerned about security. The association hired two men with the last names of Williams and Brundage to keep the peace. Brundage continued his guard duties into the 1940s, and the association eventually constructed a guardhouse that stood as a warning that the Point was policed.

Today, Wilson Point residents pass by the same guardhouse and live in some of the same historical homes.

Prospective residents have their choice of architectural styles; there are contemporary homes, colonials, Tudors and Spanish haciendas, Shapiro said.

Living in a pretty shoreline community in southwestern Connecticut, however, doesn't come cheap.

Prudential Connecticut Realty's least expensive listing on Wilson Point is a $990,000, 3,200 square-foot residence on Hilltop Road, according to Ready. The most expensive listing is a $6,500,000 waterfront property.

Still, Ready, a 26-year Wilson Pointer, said the neighborhood has always enjoyed a mix of residents.

"Over the years, it's been nice to see younger families moving in. There have also been people that have downsized to smaller homes," she said.

Jeanie Miller, who has lived on the Point with her husband Bill since 1974, said the community is a wonderful place to raise children.

"I don't think there is anything like it as a community," she said. "It's a comfortable existence here. You have your privacy without feeling you have to keep up with the Joneses, yet you still have wonderful neighbors."

Miller said the age and professional diversity of the Point's residents, and the safety the area offers for children's activities like bike riding, add to the Point's charm.

"On a few days notice, you can say to your friends, `Come over and have a glass of wine on Sunday evening.' Everybody mingles. There's a very laidback sense of existence, which is great."