Bridgeport Downtown South Historic District well as McLevy Hall, the former city hall and county courthouse. Bridgeport Downtown South Historic District The Bridgeport Downtown South Historic District is a historic district in Bridgeport, Connecticut that was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1987. The district is roughly bordered on the east by Main and Middle Streets, on the north by Elm Street, the west by Broad Street, and the south by Cesar Batalla Way. It includes 50 contributing buildings and 12 non-contributing buildings. The district includes one building, 149-165 State Street, designed by architect Cass Gilbert. Other notable buildings include the separately-listed
History of Bridgeport, Connecticut of deindustrialization and declining population, though it overtook Hartford as the state's most populous city by 1980. Much of the land that became Bridgeport was originally occupied by the Pequonnock Indians of the Paugussett nation. One village consisted of about five or six hundred inhabitants in approximately 150 lodgings. Other than Black Rock and Parts of Brooklawn which were originally part of the township of Fairfield, Bridgeport was originally a part of the township of Stratford. The first English settlement on the west bank of the mouth of the Pequonnock River was made in about 1665 and was called Pequonnock.