Nichols Farms is a historic area within the town of Trumbull, Connecticut. The Nichols Farms Historic District, which encompasses part of the area, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Originally the area was entirely a part of the Stratford (settled in 1639) and was governed by Stratford for eighty six years before a separate village was organized. Hence, all of Nichols Farms early public records are intermingled with and identified as Stratford records. The area is located in the Nichols section of Trumbull, Connecticut in New England. The Nichols section, named for the family who maintained a farm in its center, was first organized as the village of Unity in 1725. The village of Unity (later called North Stratford) continued for seventy two years before the privileges of a town were granted in 1797.

The Nichols Farms Historic District was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on September 20 1987, with reference number 87001392, and included 104 acres (0.42 km²), 81 contributing buildings, one contributing site and one contributing object. The buildings listed on the registry are located close to the green with addresses of Center Road, 1681-1944 Huntington Turnpike, 5-34 Priscilla Place and 30-172 Shelton Road. The 81 buildings are mostly private residences situated on two main roads in a village setting and represent all of the periods of Connecticut domestic architecture from the early 18th century to the present.

A historic district or heritage district is a section of a city which contains older buildings considered valuable for historical or architectural reasons. In some countries, historic districts receive legal protection from development.

Historic districts may or may not also be the center of the city. They may be coterminous with the commercial district, administrative district, or arts district, or separate from all of these.

The United States has specific legislation identifying and giving protection to designated historic districts.

Lillian Diana Gish (October 14, 1893 – February 27, 1993) was an American stage, screen and television actress whose film acting career spanned 75 years, from 1912 to 1987. She was called "The First Lady of American Cinema".

She was a prominent film star of the 1910s and 1920s, particularly associated with the films of director D.W. Griffith, including her leading role in Griffith's seminal Birth of a Nation (1915). Her sound-era film appearances were sporadic, but included memorable roles in the controversial western Duel in the Sun (1946) and the offbeat thriller Night of the Hunter (1955). She did considerable television work from the early 1950s into the 1980s, and closed her career playing, for the first time, opposite Bette Davis in the 1987 film The Whales of August.

The American Film Institute (AFI) named Gish 17th among the greatest female stars of all time. She was awarded an Honorary Academy Award in 1971, and in 1984 she received an AFI Life Achievement Award.

Richard Semler "Dick" Barthelmess (May 9, 1895 – August 17, 1963) was an Oscar-nominated silent film star.

Barthelmess was educated at Hudson River Military Academy at Nyack and Trinity College at Hartford, Connecticut. His father died when he was a baby and his mother, Caroline Harris, was a stage actress, so he worked in theatres in his early days, between schooling, doing "walk-ons". This led to acting in college, doing amateur productions. Russian actress Alla Nazimova, a friend of the family, had been taught English by Barthelmess's mother.

Nazimova in return convinced Barthelmess to try acting professionally and he made his first film appearance in 1916 in the serial Gloria's Romance as an extra. At this time he also appeared as a supporting player in several films starring Marguerite Clark. His next role, in War Brides opposite Alla Nazimova, attracted the attention of legendary director D. W. Griffith, who offered him several important roles, finally casting him opposite Lillian Gish in Broken Blossoms (1919) and Way Down East (1920).

Donald Crisp (born George William Crisp, 27 July 1882 – 25 May 1974) was an English film actor. He was also an early producer, director and screenwriter of films. He won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1942 for his performance in How Green Was My Valley.

Donald Crisp was born in Bow, London, at the family home in Bow (historically known as Stratford-atte-Bow) on 27 July 1882. Some sources say he was born in Aberfeldy, Perthshire, Scotland in 1880, but U.S. Census records indicate the London birthplace and date are correct. He was one of eight children (four boys and four girls) born to James and Elizabeth Crisp. He was educated at the University of Oxford and allegedly at Eton College, though the Eton archivist denies this.

Crisp, who always claimed to be of Scottish descent, served as a trooper in the 10th Hussars in the Boer War. This experience, among other things, allowed him to cross paths with a young Winston Churchill just at the start of Churchill's long political career. According to family memories, Crisp's brother-in-law James Needham provided him with the fare to travel to America in 1906.