The Streeter House, at 15 Gregg St., as is looked last year when it was condemned by the town’s Health Officer.

WILTON – A piece of history was reduced to a pile of trash and rubble on Oct. 6. An excavator demolished the house at 15 Gregg St., once the home of longtime educator Florence Rideout.

The house was condemned by Health Officer over a year ago, because of its deteriorating condition. By the time all of the legalities had been covered, part of the roof had collapsed and it was considered unsafe to enter.

The house, which dated to the late 1800s, was moved to the site in 1908 to make room for the library.

It was originally part of another building.

Florence Rideout purchased the building in 1950 and lived there with her sister, Ruth. She owned the building until 1989, and died in a nursing home in 1991.

On Oct. 6, the house once owned by longtime teacher and principal Florence Rideout was reduced to a pile of rubble.

Rideout was a Wilton native, and grew up on the family farm on Abbott Hill. She was a graduate of Keene Normal School and began her teaching career at a one-room school in Lyndeborough in 1920. In 1921, she moved to the school on Abbott Hill. She also taught at the one-room school in Wilton Center.

She spent her entire career in the Wilton schools, retiring in 1966 as the principal of the school that now bears her name. The name was officially changed to honor her in 1992.

Many residents came by to express both shock and sadness as they remembered the former owner.

Tom Schultz recalled his boyhood in the house next door.

“I was over here a lot,” he said. “She was like another grandmother. I mowed her lawn and shoveled her walks.”

The property is currently owned by the bank, which held the mortgage.

The future of the lot, located behind the town library, has not been determined.