News & Updates

Assembly of parachute flare casings

Munitions Assembly Line 1943

Because so many men enlisted in the military during WWII, women were recruited to take their places in the all-important factory jobs that kept the forces abroad supplied.

Read

A Civil War Soldier Engineers an Iconic Career

Horatio Wright commanded troops in Civil War battles fought all over the country, from Virginia to Florida, and out West as far as Ohio.

Read

Governor Trumbull becomes first governor in the nation to qualify for a pilot's license

John H. Trumbull: Connecticut’s “Flying Governor”

In 1926, at the age of 53, Connecticut governor John H. Trumbull received his pilot’s license. Piloting flights to his own appointments, he became known as “The Flying Governor.”

Read

The boiler that fed the machinery at the Fales & Gray Car Works in Hartford exploded

Today in History – Fales & Gray Explosion Underscores Need for a Hartford Hospital

At 2 pm on March 2, 1854, the power of steam incorrectly managed and harnessed wreaked havoc at the railroad-car factory Fales & Gray Car Works in Hartford.

Read

Olin Library and The Debate About Open Space at Wesleyan University

The history of Wesleyan’s library system includes a debate that reveals how values associated with the environment in the early 1900s helped shape the campus’s development.

Read

Rex Brasher, Tree Sparrow and Western Tree Sparrow

Rex Brasher Dies – Today in History: February 29

February 29, 2020 • Arts, Kent

On February 29, 1960, noted wildlife illustrator Rex Brasher died.

Read

Andover Lake: A Lesson in Social Change

While residents of Andover and other nearby towns enjoy the property’s 159 acres, Andover Lake played in challenging racial boundaries during the Civil Rights Era.

Read

Bridgeport: The First Borough

February 26, 2020 • Bridgeport, Politics and Government

Bridgeport, by a special act of the state’s General Assembly in October 1800, became the first borough created in Connecticut.

Read

Colt Revolver display case

The Revolving Gun – Today in History: February 25

On February 25, 1836, Samuel Colt received a patent for a “revolving gun” US patent number 138, later known as 9430X.

Read

Governor Ribicoff

Abraham Ribicoff dies – Today in History: February 22

On February 22, 1998, the first Jewish governor in Connecticut’s history, Abraham Ribicoff, died.

Read

Union Station during the Fire of February 21, 1914

Fire and Ice: A Very Bad Week in 1914

Hartford’s Union Station and Allyn Hall caught fire on two different days in February. Only one still stands today.

Read

Postcard of Charles Island, Milford, CT

A Good Spot and a Healthy Place: A Short History of Charles Island

Before becoming a part of Silver Sands State Park, Milford’s Charles Island served as everything from a luxury resort to the home of a fertilizer factory.

Read

Park Central Hotel disaster

Park Central Hotel Boiler Explosion – Today in History: February 18

In the pre-dawn hours of February 18, 1889, the Park Central Hotel in Hartford was ripped apart by a steam boiler explosion.

Read

Karen Mission Compound at Maulmain

Baptist Missionaries at Work in 19th-Century Burma

Justus Vinton was a missionary and humanitarian dedicated to spreading the Baptist religion around the world.

Read

A Successful Lawyer and Politician Who Never Went to College

Chauncey Fitch Cleveland was a lawyer and politician who served the state of Connecticut and the nation, despite never pursuing a college education.

Read

Bronze Hall of Fame medal of Josiah Willard Gibbs

Josiah Willard Gibbs’s Impact on Modern Science

February 15, 2020 • New Haven, Science

New Haven’s Josiah Willard Gibbs laid the groundwork for the development of physical chemistry as a science.

Read

Meriden town hall during renovation, 1890

Meriden Town Hall Burns Down – Today in History: February 14

February 14, 2020 • Disaster, Meriden

On February 14, 1904, Meriden’s town hall burned to the ground due to a fire that lasted eight hours.

Read

Constitution Plaza Then and Now

Hartford’s first major redevelopment project, Constitution Plaza was built as part of the urban renewal initiatives in the 1950s and ’60s.

Read

The Interstate Highway System Comes to Hartford

February 11, 2020 • Hartford, Transportation

The building of I-84 and I-91 may have increased interstate transportation, but city planners and special interest groups continue to grapple with the legacy of these projects.

Read

Arthur Miller

Arthur Miller dies – Today in History: February 10

February 10, 2020 • Literature, Roxbury

On February 10, 2005, the award-winning American playwright Arthur Asher Miller died at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut, of congestive heart failure.

Read

Mr. and Mrs. Charles Stratton

Charles Stratton and Lavinia Warren Wed – Today in History: February 10

He was rich, handsome and famous, she was considered a great beauty and their wedding was front page news around the nation.

Read

Illustration of Hebron by John Warner Barber

Changing Sentiments on Slavery in Colonial Hebron

Residents of Hebron rescued local enslaved people Lowis and Cesar Peters, and their children, from South Carolina slave traders.

Read

North and South: The Legacy of Eli Whitney

After studying to become a lawyer, Eli Whitney actually helped further American industrial production methods through his numerous clever inventions.

Read

Armory Fire

Colt Armory Burns – Today in History: February 4

On February 4, 1864, most of Colt’s East Armory, located in Hartford, burned to the ground.

Read

A 1947 Movie Details the Unsolved Murder of a Bridgeport Priest

An unusual murder of a Bridgeport, Connecticut, priest in 1924 inspired the movie, Boomerang!, which debuted at the Cannes Film Festival in 1947.

Read

Racial Change Map displaying the Non-White Population in 1970

How Real Estate Practices Influenced the Hartford Region’s Demographic Makeup

February 3, 2020 • Bloomfield, Everyday Life, Law, Hartford

Persistent segregation is the historic legacy of steering and blockbusting, two discriminatory tactics that played a role in shaping suburban neighborhoods.

Read

February 2, 1902, a fire broke out at Reid & Hughes dry goods store in Waterbury

Six Cities Respond to 1902 Waterbury Fire – Who Knew?

A fire, which swept through Waterbury on a stormy February evening in 1902, would become the worst in its recorded history up to that point.

Read

Portrait of James Mars

1850s Equal Rights Activist James Mars

James Mars became one of the most prominent African Americans in the region, and a leader of Hartford’s African American community.

Read

Hartford Times – Voices of Change

1960’s photographs from The Hartford Times offer a look back at a decade of protest that focused local and national attention on the civil rights of African Americans, the war in Vietnam, and the inequalities facing women.

Read

A Journal of Captain Cook’s Last Voyage to the Pacific Ocean by John Ledyard

First General Copyright Law – Today in History: January 29

In 1783, Connecticut became the first state to pass a general colonial copyright law, entitled “An Act for the Encouragement of Literature and Genius.”

Read

The Boardman Building, New Haven

First Commercial Telephone Exchange – Today in History: January 28

On January 28, 1878, the Boardman Building became the site of the world’s first commercial telephone exchange, the District Telephone Company of New Haven.

Read

HMS Resolution and Discovery in Tahiti

John Ledyard, Connecticut’s Most Famous Traveler

January 27, 2020 • Exploration and Discovery, Groton

This intrepid voyager, one of the most adventurous figures in Connecticut’s long history, would have made a great fictional character had he not been real.

Read

Total eclipse by Frederick E. Turner, Willimantic, January 24, 1925

The Astronomical Event of the Century

Church bells chimed and factory whistles blew and automobiles, trains, and trolleys throughout the state came to a standstill.

Read

John Fitch's steamboat model

John Fitch Born – Today in History: January 21

On January 21, 1743, John Fitch, an inventor and pioneer in steamboat construction, was born in Windsor–a settlement in the British colony of Connecticut.

Read

Attributed to Osbert Burr Loomis, Nancy Toney, oil on canvas

Nancy Toney’s Lifetime in Slavery

January 19, 2020 • Slavery and Abolition, Windsor, Women

From scant evidence, including a portrait, gravestone, census data, and will, a partial image of a Connecticut life lived in slavery emerges.

Read

View of the Hartford Civic Center roof, which collapsed on January 18, 1978

Almost a Tragedy: The Collapse of the Hartford Civic Center

In the early morning of January 18, 1978, the roof of the sports coliseum collapsed onto 10,000 empty stadium seats.

Read

Tariffville Train Wreck

The Tariffville Disaster – Today in History: January 15

On January 14, 1878, at about 10:00 p.m., a span of the Tariffville Bridge gave way, plunging a Connecticut Western Railroad train into the Farmington River.

Read

Detail of the W.A. Slater's Jewett City Cotton Mills in the foreground from Jewett City, Conn, bird’s-eye map by Lucien R. Burleigh

The Industrial Revolution Comes to Jewett City

The site of earlier mills, Jewett City seemed well-suited to the Tibbets’ textile enterprise: the Jewett City Cotton Manufacturing Company.

Read

Detail of A New and Correct Map of the United States by Abel Buell

An Uncommonly Ingenious Mechanic: Abel Buell of Connecticut

This Yankee jack-of-all-trades, Abel Buell, created the first map of the new United States to be printed and published in America.

Read

Hotchkiss & Sons Artillery Projectiles

Connecticut Arms the Union

By the Civil War’s end, Connecticut had supplied 43% of the total of all rifle muskets, breech loading rifles and carbines, and revolvers bought by the War Department.

Read

Panoramic view of Bushnell Park, Hartford

Land Purchase Becomes Bushnell Park – Today in History: January 5

On January 5, 1854, Hartford voters approved spending over $100,000 in public funds for land that would become a municipal park.

Read

Manumission document for slave Bristow, from Thomas Hart Hooker, Hartford

Gradual Emancipation Reflected the Struggle of Some to Envision Black Freedom

Connecticut enacted gradual emancipation in 1784 but the abolition of slavery would not occur until 1848.

Read

Detail from the broadside an "Address to Miss Phillis Wheatly" composed by Jupiter Hammon

Hartford Publishes the First Literary Work by an African American – Who Knew?

Jupiter Hammon, who endured life-long enslavement, became the first African American writer to be published in America when his 88-line poem, “An Evening Thought: Salvation by Christ with Penitential Cries”, was published.

Read

John Warner Barber, South view Bethlehem

The Reverend Joseph Bellamy Makes Bethlehem a Holy Place

December 22, 2019 • Bethlehem, Cheshire, Belief

The Reverend Joseph Bellamy was a dynamic preacher, author, and educator during the 18th century and a long-time resident of Bethlehem, Connecticut.

Read

Sleeping Giant, Mount Carmel, Hamden

A Volcanic Giant Sleeps in Hamden

November 29, 2019 • Belief, Environment, Native Americans, Hamden

The unique ridge that runs east-west just six miles north of New Haven is known as “Sleeping Giant” for its resemblance (from a distance) to a recumbent person.

Read

Broadside announcing changes to Mansfield's Poor-House

Connecticut Poor Law Aimed to Care for the Needy

Connecticut instituted a Poor Law in the 17th century to comply with a directive from the British government that the colony ensure for the care of the poor within its borders

Read

Charles McLean Andrews and Evangeline Walker Andrews

Charles McLean Andrews was one of the most distinguished historians of his time, generally recognized as the master of American colonial history.

Read

Hopkins Street Center once known as the Pearl St. Neighborhood House

A Woman Who Developed Tolerance: Leila T. Alexander

November 18, 2019 • War and Defense, Waterbury, Women, World War II

As a member of the War Council, Leila T. Alexander served on several Council committees including education, employment, advisory, social service, and welfare.

Read

Detail of Map exhibiting the route of the Norwich & Worcester Railroad

Iron and Water: The Norwich & Worcester Railroad Story

November 16, 2019 • Norwich, Transportation

Connecticut’s early railroad history had at its core the goal of linking New York City and Boston through a hybrid system of steamboats and trains.

Read

Paul Robeson by Gordon Parks, 1942

“Negroes Who Stand Up and Fight Back” – Paul Robeson in Hartford

November 15, 2019 • Arts, Enfield, Hartford, Social Movements, Work

Called the “greatest mobilization of police in the city’s history,” the event that brought law enforcement out in force to Keney Park was not a riot, not a strike, but a concert by this singer-actor and activist.

Read

More Articles

 

Sign Up For Email Updates

Oops! We could not locate your form.