Home for the Holidays in Thomaston 2025

The 2025 Home for the Holidays 399 Main Street was part of a larger lot owned by Captain Oliver Jordan. He sold the entire six-acre tract of land to his brother Captain Ephraim Jordan, who lived in a farmhouse built on the lot in the late 18th century. Ephraim Jordan sold a portion to the west of his house to his nephew, Captain George Jordan in 1851, who immediately began constructing his house on this site. His diary records the frame was blown down in a squall of wind and had to be started over the following year. The house was perhaps built by Nathan Redlon, who built many houses in Thomaston during this time period. That same year, a house on the mall was constructed by James Overlock that looks very similar in style.

It is not known whether Overlock was consulted for this house or perhaps contributed to the construction in some way. Several houses in early Thomaston were designed by the builder who built them. James Overlock was such a builder and it would seem his style and designs were often imitated due to the pleasing proportions and creative flair for detail.

The house is built in the Greek Revival style. It has a steeply-pitched roof and is placed gable-end-to-street with attached el projecting from the rear. Greek Revival elements are incorporated into the imposing three-story structure featuring pilasters that are designed to replicate columns appearing as widened cornerboards. The pilasters support a wide cornice running to the peak of the gable and horizontally along the lower edge of the roofline. Symmetry was always important and it is not known whether the center blank window on the second floor was ever used or if it was simply installed to complete the overall design. Another Overlock house on Main Street has a similar window that remains shuttered.

Capt. George Jordan married Betsey B. Masters and they had two children, Octavia M. Jordan in 1850 and Newell B. Jordan in 1853. He was master of several local vessels from Warren and Thomaston and THS has one of his ship’s journals from 1846 in their collection. He sold his current ship in Cuxhaven and upon returning to America was lost in the wooden-hulled transatlantic side-wheeler Pacific along with 200 passengers and crew when it faltered on a voyage from Liverpool to NYC in 1856. In 1991 wreckage was located in the Irish Sea off the coast of Wales and identified as possibly that of the SS Pacific. His cenotaph with a ship carving is in Section 2 of the Thomaston Village Cemetery.

His widow, Betsy, who had two children under the age of 6, remarried Captain James Watts, who was also recently widowed. They had a son together named after Captain James.

Octavia Jordan sailed with her mother and stepfather aboard the barque Martha A. McNeil in 1872 and were in collision with another steamer which struck their vessel but all were spared. James retired in poor health that year after too long continuance of the sea and died within five years at age 62.

Octavia married Clarence A. Leighton of Portland and the 1880 Census lists Betsey at age 51, living with her son James Watts, 17, son Capt. Newell Jordan, 27, daughter Octavia Leighton, 30, and her son Edward Leighton, 1. One day the following summer Octavia was visiting with guests from Rockland who had arrived by horse and carriage and all went into the house for a visit. As they were leaving the house about to board the carriage, one Frank Dubay, a French convict at the prison, was attempting an escape. He jumped into the carriage, applied the whip and quickly sped away. Warden Bean harnessed a horse and took chase up toward Oyster River bridge, joining the postmaster who was already in hot pursuit. The prisoner was forced to leave the team and headed off on a dead run into the woods. The horse and carriage were returned but the prisoner was never heard from again, having successfully shaving 11 months off his sentence.

After Octavia’s death, her son Edward, sold the house in 1936 --then known as the Leighton House—for $4500 to the State of Maine as quarters for the Prison Warden and his family. After 73 years in the possession of the State of Maine it was sold into private ownership in 2009.