Since the early twentieth century, the two-story, timber-framed house built for the Reverend Jedediah Dewey has been considered the oldest house in Vermont and no house of an earlier date has been definitively proven. Although much remodeled, the house's simple gabled form, massive central chimney, and simple three-bay front are consistent with an eighteenth-century date and with other early two-story houses. The gable-end overhang also indicates the mid-eighteenth century and perhaps indicates exterior end-girt joinery and a Connecticut master builder. Dewey was pastor to the Congregationalists of Bennington, Separatists who held stricter standards for church election and organized and settled the Town of Bennington in 1761. In Vermont lore, Dewey was a renowned Patriot who preached that residents should take up arms before the Battle of Bennington.