John Coddington House    -    circa  1730 

     The Coddington House stands today as a two story, gambrel-roofed building with two interior chimneys.  The house was enlarged and altered in the mid-18th century and restored by NRF to reflect those changes rather than the original version of the house as it stood in 1730.

     The house has several interesting features of which the roof and the doorway are perhaps the most noteworthy.  Rather than the steep roof line typically found in 18th century Newport, the gambrel roof of the Coddington House is quite broad.  The doorway was copied by NRF from the Ayrault House shell-hooded doorway at the Newport Historical Society.  NRF made this decision based on records indicating that in 1737 John Stevens made a doorway for Coddington based on the Ayrault House doorway.

      The Coddington House underwent several early changes.  The 1730 building was smaller and probably had a center chimney.  The shell doorway was likely a part of a 1737 enlargement. The house received significant changes to the interior as well as the addition of a window bay on the west end during the Greek revival period (1820 to 1850).  The first floor rooms were redone rather elegantly in the Greek style, which was maintained during the restoration by NRF.  The second and third floors reflect 18th century details.

      About 1900, the house was raised to make way for commercial space at ground level.  This was a common practice in Newport and many 18th and early 19th century buildings are still "up in the air" today.  One is on the next corner from the Coddington House, north on Thames Street, and another is at the next corner, east on Marlborough Street.

      The Coddington House first sat on top of a grocery store.  The house’s last commercial use before being lowered by NRF was as a furniture store. The lowering process was somewhat complex.  The house was raised slightly and blocked while the commercial walls were demolished.  The house was then lowered and rolled back into the yard while a cellar hole was dug and concrete walls poured.  Finally, the house was rolled forward over the new cellar to its street-level position so long ago abandoned.

      The practice of raising buildings may have come about in part because of the frugal nature of island people and the need to adapt to changing times. Many houses were moved from one spot to another within Newport from the 18th century on.  The tradition of moving houses developed out of the difficulty and expense in obtaining materials for new structures when perfectly sound buildings were perhaps just in the wrong place at the wrong time – a problem “easily” solved by simply relocating the building.

     The John Coddington House is on its original site.  The house was purchased by NRF in 1971 and restored in 1973-74.