The Collins Funeral Home is a full service, family owned and operated funeral facility, serving the families in the greater Norwalk area since 1898. Our Funeral Service is based on Compassion and Respect and we are available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week to respond to you and your loved ones in your hour of need.

In 1898 Andrew J. Collins arrived in South Norwalk and opened a furniture store on North Main Street.

In turn-of-the-century America, furniture stores were the purveyors of caskets. Funeral homes as we know them were few and families of the deceased saw to all the details of a funeral. They ordered the casket, engaged the clergyman and arranged for the plot, headstone, flowers and burial. The wake always took place at the family’s home.

Gradually, furniture stores began to “undertake” funeral arrangements for bereaved families.

The A.J. Collins funeral business opened as a storefront in the A.J. Collins furniture store on North Main Street, as a small part of the operation.

In the 1940’s the South Norwalk funeral business moved to a larger quarters on Flax Hill Road. In 1964, the funeral home on Flax Hill Road was bulldozed away in South Norwalk’s renovation and the company consolidated at the East Avenue Location.

Mr. Collins never married. When he died in 1951, his brother-in-law and long time associate, William M. Skidd succeeded as president. In 1958 the business was passed to Mr. Skidd’s son and daughter-in-law William J. and Jeanette Skidd. In 1970 at the age of 54 William J. Skidd passed away unexpectedly, his wife Jeanette took over as president and managed the funeral home until her retirement in 1999.

Today the Collins Funeral Home, Inc. is owned and operated by first cousins William A. Skidd great nephew of A.J. Collins.