Turning onto Lynwood Place, one will immediately notice the peace and quiet of the small residential street. The noise and bustle of downtown New Haven and Yale University’s central campus area pleasantly dies down by the time you reach #28, built in 1877 and located halfway between where Lynwood Pl. abuts Elm St. and Edgewood Avenue. A passerby can easily identify this building by its white porch with subtle ornate designs that contrasts starkly with the dark red brick walls and black front door. 28 Lynwood Place has been home to many different people since its construction almost a century and a half ago, but more recently has housed members of Yale’s greatest folk music singing group, Tangled Up in Blue (“TUiB”), and The Purple Crayon, a student improvisation comedy group.[i] Anyone walking past would be lucky to hear the sound of a guitar, fiddle, or banjo and the accompanying soulful voices harmonizing together with echoing laughter within the walls of their upstairs apartment. Other activity on Lynwood Pl. may be attributed to the nearby Chabad building, or to the two fraternity houses that characteristically liven up the street’s quiet ambiance on Friday and Saturday nights.

[i] Cosgrove, Martha, “Questions About Living at 28,” Interview by Alison Nordell, February 23, 2018, transcript, New Haven, CT.

1886 – No named property owner or tenant[i]

1911 – Property owned by J. Strecker[ii]

1994-1996 – Property owned by Unknown[iii]

1996-2016* – Property owned by Randall K. Murdock[iv]

2016-present** – Property owned by 28 Lynwood LLC[v]

*Since 2011, paying tenants of #28 Lynwood Pl. have included members of Yale student groups such as The Exit Players, Tangled Up in Blue, the Dukes Men, and The Purple Crayon.

**TUiB residents have owned the third floor unit since 2013.

[i] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 21), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1886, (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[ii] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 54), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1901.

[iii] “New Haven, CT”, Vision Government Solutions, Last Updated 2016, (Accessed February 21, 2018.)

[iv] Ibid.

[v] Ibid.

An interesting feature of the Sanborn Maps is that evidence of the building’s porches changes over time. Although the front porch, which makes 28 Lynwood Place so identifiable and welcoming, is clearly shown in the 1886 map, it disappears altogether from the records until 1973.[i]^{,[ii],[iii],[iv],[v]} It is clear from observing the building as it exists today that the front door (which is the main entryway for all three separate units inside) is raised at least three feet off of ground level and requires the five steps leading up to the porch to be able to enter inside. One hypothesis is that the original porch experienced damage from weather or another external disaster such as a fire that would challenge its wooden structure but not affect the solid brick of the main house. After awhile, perhaps not until the property owner was one with sufficient financial resources, the porch was rebuilt and the suitable entrance was restored.

[i] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 21), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1886 (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[ii] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 54), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1901 (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[iii] New Haven Sanborn Map 1911, Digital Atlas of New Haven, (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[iv] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 5), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1924 (Accessed February 18, 2018.)

[v] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 4), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1973 (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

Built as a multi-family home in 1877, 28 Lynwood Pl. has housed many different tenants since its construction. The individual tenants’ names are not publicly available, but included below are a few of the different property owners to give a sense of the continuity of the building as a residential space over time. Sanborn Maps from 1886 and 1901 named no single owner of the building, implying perhaps that many different families owned property rights to their respective units within the dwelling.[i] Then, in 1911, it is shown that Mr. J. Strecker owned 28 Lynwood Place.[ii] His name did not appear on any other buildings along Lynwood Pl. or in the surrounding streets, suggesting that he was the sole private owner of #28, but again, because the building is a multi-unit dwelling, it is probable that Mr. Strecker was either the first official tenant, or a long-term landlord of the property.

More recently, 28 Lynwood has been home to members of TUiB, a Yale student-run folk music band and A Cappella group for as long as member Martha Cosgrove (Yale College, ’16) can remember.[iii] She has fond memories from living there. She lived on the third floor with two other friends and recalls having equal access to the second floor porch in the back and the backyard. They were common spaces for all residents living within the separate units to share with each other. “If someone was throwing a party in the backyard,” she remembers, “we’d all be invited anyway. We were all friends…[and] everyone would use every living room space.”[iv] Before Martha started at Yale in the fall of 2012 and joined TUiB, #28 Lynwood Pl. was home to members of The Exit Players, an improvisation comedy group on campus.[v] People in The Purple Crayon, another student comedy group at Yale, began moving in once TUiB singers started living there, so #28 Lynwood really became a shared space of song and laughter for those who dwelled within.

[i] New Haven, Connecticut Insurance Maps, Vol. 2 (p. 21), Sanborn Map and Publishing Co., 1886 (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[ii] New Haven Sanborn Map 1911, Digital Atlas of New Haven, (Accessed February 17, 2018.)

[iii] Cosgrove, Martha, “Questions About Living at 28,” Interview by Alison Nordell, February 23, 2018, transcript, New Haven, CT.

[iv] Ibid.

[v] Ibid.

Lynwood Place is a small residential side street connecting Elm Street to Edgewood Avenue, located near the border between Dwight and Downtown neighborhoods, and well outside the hustle and bustle of the city’s urban center. The one-way road has parking for cars on the left side and wide concrete sidewalks along either side, within which stand a six or seven old trees that have had their branches cut away to create space for the phone and electricity wires that run along the right side. #28 resides halfway down the street between two similarly sized multi-family dwellings—one of which has been the Yale Lightweight Crew Team house for many years—and across from a Pike Intl. apartment complex that combined two previously separate lots. Most of the buildings are brick with white or black gables, fenestration and details, but the Pike buildings also have elements of Tudor style, which differentiate them from the rest of Lynwood’s buildings.