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The Industrial United States 1870-1900


Advertisement with a drawing of a silk spooler and text

L.D. Brown and Son Silk Mill: A Staple in Middletown’s South Farms District

With established factories in Mansfield and Middletown, Lewis Dunham Brown and his son, Henry Lewis Brown, were pioneers in the US silk industry.

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Industrial scene where several men are working at a manufactured gas plant

Early Connecticut Gas Light Companies

The first private gas light companies in Connecticut appeared just before 1850 in New Haven, Hartford, and Bridgeport.

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Print of a factory

Illuminating Connecticut’s Past: The Bradley & Hubbard Legacy

Meriden’s Bradley & Hubbard Manufacturing Company was an industry-leading American manufacturer of kerosene lamps and metal household items.

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A white sign in the foreground with a yellow house in the background

Miss Porter’s School in Farmington

Miss Porter’s School, founded in 1843 in Farmington, is an elite, female, privately funded, 40-acre, educational institution in central Connecticut.

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Lithograph depicting two steamboats crashing into each other with people jumping over the sides into the water. There is text at the bottom.

Disaster on the Sound: The Collision of the Steamboats Stonington and Narragansett

The crash involving the S.S. Stonington and the S.S. Narragansett resulted in the death of dozens, massive destruction, and a media frenzy.

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Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Best remembered for her short story “The Yellow Wallpaper,” this Hartford author’s larger legacy is a life dedicated to women’s issues and social reform.

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Bursting of the Staffordville Reservoir

Bursting of the Staffordville Reservoir – Today in History: March 27

On March 27, 1877, the Staffordville Reservoir Company’s dam burst, flooding the valley for a distance of five miles and causing the loss of two lives.

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Southern New England Telephone Company Operator School

Connecticut’s First Female Telephone Operator – Today in History: March 24

On March 24, 1879, Marjorie Gray became Connecticut’s first female telephone operator.

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Lydia Sherman: The Derby Poisoner

Lydia Sherman confessed to killing three husbands and four children, but it is believed that the total number of her victims may be much higher.

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Black and white profile portrait of a woman looking to the side.

Alice Hamilton: The Nation’s Leading Expert on Industrial Diseases

Dr. Alice Hamilton was a leading authority on industrial diseases and the first female faculty member at Harvard before she retired to Hadlyme, Connecticut.

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Artwork of a ship close to shore with people in rowboats. There is a large flag protruding from the mast of the ship. There is text at the bottom of the image.

Connecticut’s French Connections

From Huguenots to French Canadian mill workers to modern immigration, Connecticut has always been a place shaped, in part, by a steady French influence.

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Large ornate building

Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Captures the Gilded Age in Norwalk

The Lockwood-Mathews Mansion provides a glimpse into the opulence of the Gilded Age when railroad tycoons built summer homes along the New England shoreline.

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Black and white photograph of a group of men sitting or standing in front of a brick building

Southington Cutlery Company: From Silverware to Hardware

Initially known for table cutlery, the Southington Cutlery Company began operations in a two-story brick factory in downtown Southington in 1867.

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The Sea in their Blood: The Portuguese in New London County

Many Portuguese immigrants came to the US as mariners serving aboard ships, some remained to build new lives and communities in Connecticut.

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Patent drawing of an ironing board improvement

Sarah Boone: First Connecticut Black Woman to Receive Patent

In1892, Sarah Boone of New Haven became the first Black woman in Connecticut to be awarded a patent—for an improvement in the use of an ironing board.

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Charles Ethan Porter, Fruit: Apples, Grapes, Peaches, and Pears

Charles Ethan Porter, Portrait of a 19th-Century African American Painter

Charles Ethan Porter was a prolific still life painter in the 19th and early 20th century.

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Dr. Mary Moody sitting on her front porch

Dr. Mary B. Moody Challenges Victorian Mores About Women in Medicine

New Haven resident Dr. Mary Moody the first female graduate of the medical school at the University of Buffalo, and the first female member of the American Association of Anatomists.

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Rocky shore in front of a white lighthouse and several white buildings.

New London Harbor Lighthouse: Connecticut’s First Official Lighthouse

New London Harbor Lighthouse, originally opened in 1761 and rebuilt in 1801, is Connecticut’s oldest surviving and tallest lighthouse.

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Yale Daily News

Oldest College Daily – Today in History: January 28

On January 28, 1878, the first edition of the Yale News proclaimed, “The innovation which we begin by this morning’s issue is justified by the dullness of the times, and by the demand for news among us.”

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City of Hartford, Connecticut

Bird’s-eye Views Offer Idealized Portraits of Progress

Panoramic prints of growing cities and towns became popular in the late 1800s as Connecticut transformed from an agricultural to an industrial state.

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Eleven men standing on the deck of a ship

Africans in Search of the American Dream: Cape Verdean Whalers and Sealers

Cape Verdeans formed parts of whaling and sealing crews leaving Connecticut since the early 19th century, sometimes even rising to positions of authority.

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Black and white image of a stove

The Stamford Foundry Company Made Notable Stoves

When it ceased operations in the mid-1950s after over 120 years, The Stamford Foundry Company was the oldest known stove works in America.

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Map detail of an island

The “Welcoming Beacon” of Sheffield Island Lighthouse

Sheffield Island, is home to one of Connecticut’s historic lighthouses—a stone structure with a celebrated past dating back two hundred years.

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Yankee Ingenuity: Curtis Veeder, a Mechanical Genius and Shrewd Businessman

Curtis Veeder patented a bicycle seat he sold to the Pope Company, and later invented a cyclometer for measuring distances traveled by bicycles.

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Newspaper clipping titled "For Orphans of Cuba"

Children of the Reconcentrados: Caroline Selden’s Cuban School

During the Cuban War of Independence, Caroline Selden opened a school for Cuban children in Brooklyn, NY and Old Saybrook, CT.

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Envelope of the Briggs Manufacturing Company

Briggs Manufacturing Drives Voluntown’s 19th-Century Cotton Economy

The Briggs Manufacturing Company was the premier employer in Voluntown, Connecticut, throughout the latter half of the 19th century.

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Drawing of a town common with a church on the right side, a building in the center and a couple buildings on the left. There are a few trees and a few people

Lee’s Academy: An Icon of Education for 200 Years

For over two hundred years, Lee’s Academy has been a staple of education in Madison, Connecticut.

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A worker cutting ivory

Ivory Cutting: The Rise and Decline of a Connecticut Industry

At one time, manufacturing facilities in the town of Deep River and village of Ivoryton in Essex processed up to 90 percent of the ivory imported into the US.

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Impressionist painting of shaded trees next to a pond

Julian Alden Weir: The “Heart” of American Impressionism

From Windham to Branchville, peaceful Connecticut locales provided Julian Alden Weir the inspiration to create hundreds of paintings and become one of America’s leading Impressionists.

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1893-94 Duryea

Frank Duryea Drives the First Automobile in Connecticut

In 1893, Frank Duryea, along with his brother, built one of the first cars in the country to have an internal combustion engine.

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Drawing of a man's profile turned to the left. He has a long beard and is wearing glasses.

Arbor Day’s Roots in Connecticut – Who Knew?

Connecticut’s Reverend Birdsey Grant Northrop popularized Arbor Day celebrations in schools across the country.

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Black and white photo of a large brick and wood house. The house is asymmetrical and has many gables. There are large trees surrounding the house.

George Griffin: “Devoted Friend” to Samuel Clemens

Mark Twain wrote The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and used his “good-natured” and “devoted” servant, George Griffin, as a likely model for one of literature’s most memorable figures—Jim, the runaway enslaved man.

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Eleanor: The Maltese Port painting by Vincenzo D'Esposito

The Slaters Go Round the World

In 1894, a well-to-do Norwich family set sail from New London on a ship outfitted with Persian rugs, oil paintings, a library, and 75 cases of champagne.

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To show an image of Mary Townsend Seymour

Mary Townsend Seymour: Hartford’s Organizer, Activist, and Suffragist

Mary Townsend Seymour was a leading organizer, civil rights activist, suffragist, and so much more in Hartford during the early 20th century.

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Inventor Charles F. Ritchel

Charles Ritchel and the Dirigible

An entrepreneur’s design for a lighter-than-air vehicle takes flight in the late 1800s and inspires a new state industry.

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View of Wadsworth Street in 1877

The Lives of Addie Brown and Rebecca Primus Told Through their Loving Letters

Addie Brown and Rebecca Primus were two free Black women whose lives intersected in Hartford, Connecticut in the 19th century. Letters written between them imply their relationship was more than friendship.

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Image showing the expanse of the Bigelow-Hartford Carpet mills

First Connecticut Carpet Mills Emerge in Simsbury and Enfield

In the 1820s, the first two notable carpetmakers emerged in the north central part of Connecticut—the Tariff Manufacturing Company and the Thompsonville Carpet Manufacturing Company.

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Souvenir Book of the Hippodrome to show the connection to theater world

Hartford’s Charles Dillingham Discovered Broadway Stars

After growing up in Hartford, Charles Dillingham explored numerous career paths including newspaper publishing, politics, and—most famously—theatrical managing and producing.

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Jewett City, Conn, bird’s-eye map by Lucien R. Burleigh

Map – Bird’s-eye View of Jewett City, 1889

During the late 19th and early 20th centuries panoramic maps, also known as bird’s-eye views, were used to depict many of Connecticut’s town and cities.

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Advertisement for Phillips' Milk of Magnesia in the Washington DC Evening Star, 1945

Phillips’ Milk of Magnesia Originated in Stamford

In 1873, Charles H. Phillips patented Milk of Magnesia and his company produced the popular antacid and laxative in Stamford, Connecticut, until 1976.

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Advertising leaflet for the "Cal" Pistol, J. & E. Stevens Co., Cromwell

Cromwell’s Iron Men Made Toys for Boys and Girls

The J & E Stevens Company eventually became the largest manufacturer of cast-iron toys in the country.

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Gold Hall circa 1900, a men's dormitory named in honor of UConn trustee T. S. Gold. The building burned down in 1914

The First University of Connecticut Trustees

When the University of Connecticut started life as the Storrs Agricultural School in 1881, Governor Hobart Bigelow appointed its first eight trustees—all with agricultural backgrounds.

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Man wearing a hat with card stating "Bread or Revolution"

How the Wobblies Won Free Speech

Denied the right to free assembly in public spaces, Connecticut workers joined in a larger national movement of civil disobedience.

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The Chinese Educational Mission Building in Hartford, 1887

Yung Wing’s Dream: The Chinese Educational Mission, 1872-1881

In all, 120 Chinese students came to live and study in New England. When they returned home, they served as diplomats, engineers, naval officers, physicians, educators, administrators, and magistrates.

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German American workers from the buff room

Late 19th-Century Immigration in Connecticut

Immigration to Connecticut in the second half of the 19th century proceeded much as it had in earlier decades.

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Andover Creamery, 1889

Andover’s Award-Winning Creamery

Started in 1886 by town residents, the Andover Creamery Corporation typified cooperative agricultural enterprises of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

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Hubbell’s Pull-Chain Electrical Light Socket – Today in History: August 11

On August 11, 1896, Bridgeport inventor and industrialist Harvey Hubbell patented a socket for incandescent lamps.

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The Danbury Hatters

References to the hat making industry abound in Danbury and continue to shape much of the city’s identity today.

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Winter: Connecticut Valley by Dwight William Tryon

An Artist’s Life in Hartford: The Early Career of Dwight Tryon

Hartford native Dwight Tryon enjoyed a long, successful career as a landscape painter and teacher with studios in New York City and Massachusetts.

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Detail from the map GoodSpeeds Landing

W. J. Squire’s Gill Net Manufactory in East Haddam

In the early 1870s, Wilbur J. Squire (1837-1890) built his factory for the manufacture of gill nets in East Haddam.

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Elevated view of Storrs Agricultural College

The Yale-Storrs Controversy

In the late 1800s, under pressure from frustrated farmers, the Connecticut General Assembly voted to transfer land-grant status and revenue from Yale to the Storrs Agricultural School (UConn).

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The City of Hartford steamboat after collision with railroad bridge

Steamboat Accident – Today in History: March 29

On March 29, 1876, the steamboat City of Hartford hit the Air Line Railroad Bridge on the Connecticut River at Middletown.

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St. Anthony Comstock, the Village nuisance

Connecticut and the Comstock Law

Connecticut passed its own state law in 1879 that carried the anti-contraception movement further than any other state in the country.

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Advertisement for the Horton Mfg. Co.

The Telescoping Fishing Rod – Today in History: March 8

On March 8, 1887, Everett Horton, a Bristol mechanic, patented a fishing rod of telescoping steel tubes.

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Case Paper Mill, circa 1925

Andover Looks Good on Paper

In 1889, Fred Case built a paper mill on the Hop River in Andover.

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Lounsbury Elected Governor – Today in History: January 4

On January 4th 1899, George Edward Lounsbury was elected the 58th Governor of Connecticut, for which he served roughly three years.

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Improved Centrifugal Governor

Portland Improves the Steam Engine

Thomas R. Pickering, an engineer, ran a factory power plant in the mid-1800s and made improvements.

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Silkworms, Cheney Brothers, Manchester

Connecticut’s Mulberry Craze

Connecticut, especially Windham and Tolland Counties, was the epicenter of US raw-silk production in the mid-19th century.

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Intertwining Family Businesses

Emory Johnson, a farmer from Chatham, Connecticut, moved to East Haddam and operated one of the area’s most successful businesses of the late 19th century.

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Detail from a New York Times article August 11, 1886

The Shoe Box Murder Mystery

On August 8, 1886, Edward Terrill and his dog uncovered what appeared to be a box of a dozen shoes that had recently fallen from a cart.

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Monument to Capewell, the inventor of the famous horseshoe nail

Horseshoe Nail Capital of the World – Who Knew?

In the late 19th century, George Capewell formed the Capewell Horse Nail Company, which mass produced horseshoe nails.

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Flying Machine patent

Flying High with Early Dirigible

In what would later be described as “the first flight of a man-carrying dirigible in America,” aeronaut Mark Quinlan piloted a machine designed and patented by Charles F. Ritchel.

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Soldiers' and Sailors' Memorial Arch, Hartford

The Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch, Hartford

Situated in Bushnell Park, the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch honors the more than 4,000 Hartford men who fought for the Union during the Civil War.

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The Innumerable Accolades Afforded Dr. William H. Welch

Trained at Yale, William Welch was a native of Norfolk, Connecticut, and one of the most celebrated physicians of his time.

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Offices of HELCO at 266 Pearl Street, Hartford

Let There Be Light: An Early History of the Hartford Electric Light Company

As cities switched from gas lamps to electric lighting, one observer noted that Hartford was “far in the lead of any other city in the world in the use of electricity for light and power per capita.”

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Connecticut’s First Municipal Electric Utility

The first municipal electric plant in Connecticut began operating in the City of South Norwalk in 1892 to provide low-cost electricity.

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Leatherman Dies – Today in History: March 20

On March 20, 1889, the Old Leatherman, so called for the clothing that he fashioned for himself, is thought to have died.

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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.

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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.

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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.

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Meriden Britannia Company, West Main Street, Meriden

Meriden’s Silver Lining

Despite large numbers of local industries going out of business by the start of the Civil War, Horace and Dennis Wilcox, helped establish a lucrative silver industry in Meriden.

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P. T. Barnum Dies – Today in History: April 7

On April 7, 1891, the showman and entertainer, P. T. (Phineas Taylor) Barnum died in Bridgeport.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Making Self-Government Work, 1888-1905

Connecticut’s ancient system of town-based representation ensured the continuation of small town values and perspectives.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Searching for the Common Good, 1888-1905

Stimulated by immigration and industrialization, Connecticut cities expanded rapidly

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Significant Events & Developments, 1888-1905

Connecticut saw its population of immigrants from southern and eastern Europe swell in the last decades of the 19th century.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Making Self-Government Work, 1866-1887

The late 1800s witnessed significant challenges to Connecticut’s voting and taxation laws.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Searching for the Common Good, 1866-1887

In 1873, the legislature began to look more closely at the problems of Connecticut’s workers.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: Significant Events & Developments, 1866-1887

After the Civil War, arms manufacturing kept Connecticut industries busy, but an economic depression in the 1870s drastically changed things.

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An Orderly & Decent Government: The Rise of the Factory, 1866-1887

In the years following the Civil War, Connecticut’s transformation to an urban, industrial state intensified.

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Middletown, Main Street

Video – When Disaster Struck: King Blizzard

The CPTV Original, When Disaster Struck Connecticut, provides an in-depth look at the four major natural disasters that befell Connecticut between 1888 and 1955.

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Blizzard of 1888 - Hartford, corner of Main Street and State Street

Blizzard of 1888 Devastates State

An unexpected and deadly March storm, stretching from Washington, DC, to the Canadian border, buried Connecticut in as much as 50 inches of snow.

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Video – Free-for-all Race at Charter Oak Park

A crowd of some 25,000 to 30,000 people turned out to see John R. Gentry compete for a $6,000 purse.

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Bridgeport, Conn., 1882

A Bird’s-eye View of Bridgeport

The lower perspective of this 1882 example is somewhat atypical of most of the bird’s-eye views of the era, but its emphasis on industrial accomplishment is a hallmark of the genre.

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Bird's-eye map of Moosup, Conn. Uniondale and Almyville,

A Bird’s-eye View of Moosup

This depiction of a Quinebaug Valley town and its satellite communities—Uniondale and Almyville—records an idealized view of the 19th-century textile boom.

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Dedication of the New State Capitol, 1876

New State Capitol 1878

By the 1870s, the State’s practice of having dual capitols in Hartford and New Haven was considered awkward and ineffective.

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New Haven Harbor, US Coast Survey, 1872

Three Young Engineers: Charting New Haven

When the United States Coast Survey set out to compile detailed charts of New Haven Harbor in the 1870s, they hired recent graduates of Yale’s Sheffield Scientific School as assistants.

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The Hartford Wheel Club, Hartford

The League of American Wheelmen and Hartford’s Albert Pope Champion the Good Roads Movement

How the 19th-century cycling craze led to improved roads and paved the way for future federal highway construction.

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View of Winsted, Conn,1877

Bird’s-eye Views of Winsted

As bird’s-eye view maps declined in popularity during the early 20th century, artists incorporated technical advances in hopes of reversing the trend.

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View of East Haddam. Connecticut. And Goodspeed's Landing

A Bird’s-eye View of East Haddam

In 1880, East Haddam was already a popular tourist destination and, despite its small size, boasted two steamboat landings to accommodate visitors.

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