There is more than one county in Connecticut
Each of America’s 50 states holds a share of differences from its neighbor and these differences are what makes each state special, such as Hawaii’s geography being great for a tropical holiday, while Colorado’s geography is great for skiing and hiking, while Pennsylvania had its importance in the American fight for independence in housing the temporary American capital while Wyoming had its importance in, uhh, does anyone know? As Matt Weiland says, “the crowning achievement of the Federal Writers’ Project was the creation [American Guide Series]” and this State by State: a Panoramic Portrait of America (2008) is a modern version of the state guides written because of the Federal Writers’ Project. The Federal Writers’ Project is what the modern, stay-at-home American in the 1940s could use to travel around America, as when, in the 60s, John Steinbeck and his dog Charley served a similar need.
During the Great Depression, the Federal Writers’ Project was put in place to jumpstart the failed American economy by giving people jobs. The American Guide Series was created and featured detailed guides collected from authors, some notable, such as Steinbeck and Eudora Welty. State by State: a Panoramic Portrait of America is one such guide created by Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey, whose essays are written by famed authors, journalists, comic strip editors, reporters, some examples being Jacki Lyden, Paul Greenberg, Anthony Doerr, Tara Bray Smith, and William T. Vollmann. This collection features 50 famous authors and their interactions with each state, whether they were born there, or had their childhood memories there, or went on a memorable trip there.
Rick Moody is an author working as a professor in Brown University. He wrote many famed works such as The Ice Storm and Garden State, all reflective of his youth spent in the Northeast region of America, with The Ice Storm set in New Canaan, a town that he spent his high school years in. In State by State, Moody is the author tasked with writing about Connecticut, known as the Nutmeg state or Constitution State. Mr. Moody lived in Fairfield County during his youth, and his essay takes the reader for a tour up the scenic Merritt Parkway, a turnpike that is found exclusively within Fairfield County that he holds high esteem for. However, despite the true beauties of this turnpike, Moody’s essay is littered with flashbacks to his youth that I find disgusting, such as the fact that kids in the 50s, 60s and 70s often took drugs, consumed a lot of cigarettes and thought highly of sex. My only assumption was that back in the 50s, 60s and 70s, people smoked cigarettes as a sort of harmless pleasure until the Surgeon General discovered a correlation between people who smoke and people who get lung cancer. Lung cancer was once a very rare form of cancer and smoking greatly increased the number of lung cancer patients. In 1969, the Feds passed a law issuing all cigarette boxes to be required to display a warning label. This is an important, almost essential action of responsible governance, which is what I esteem about Connecticut’s role in early American history: innovative governance.
Connecticut was founded in 1636 as a Puritan colony, stemming from a repression of the English anti-Anglican faithful, which resulted in certain English Separatists called Puritans (led by William Bradford) to defect from the motherland in an awe-inspiring effort, after being brutally suppressed by the Church of England. These Separatists fled Britain to the Netherlands, and had to make efforts to save money and prepare to conscript a ship, worthy and hardy enough to make the great voyage. Then they had to travel back to Plymouth, England after almost a decade to board the Mayflower. The Separatists landed in modern-day Cape Cod, November 11, 1620, and founded the Colony of Plymouth. Years later, the Pilgrims founded the Colony of Connecticut after the English defeated the Dutch in the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665-1667) and a large part of modern-day Connecticut, New Jersey and New York were given to Britain. The formation of Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1629 still did not satisfy, and a band of settlers, led by the Reverend Thomas Hooker, trudged south of the mighty Connecticut River and settled in modern-day Hartford, and in 1635, Connecticut split and formed its own colony.
The Reverend Thomas Hooker was a clergyman born in Leicestershire in 1586, in England. He studied at Dixie Grammar School. Hooker eventually studied at Queens’ College in Cambridge and Emmanuel College. Hooker was renowned for being an excellent speaker and became a lecturer. However, Hooker was also a Puritan sympathizer which resulted in his persecution by the English Church and the English Government. He fled to Rotterdam in the Netherlands, considering a position in a group that wanted to reform the English Church, but decided to immigrate to Massachusetts Bay, arriving onboard the Griffin at Plymouth Colony on September 3, 1633. Hooker left Massachusetts and founded a settlement in Hartford. When Connecticut County was founded, Hooker became active in politics.
Connecticut Colony was formed by the unification of New London, Springfield, Windsor and Hartford Counties. Connecticut increased in size after the English defeated the Dutch in the Second Anglo-Dutch War (1665-1667). The Reverend Hooker went on to participate in writing the Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, which many regard as the very first written constitution in the New World. Guess what Connecticut’s nickname is? Wow, you’re right – its the Constitution State!
The Colony of Connecticut eventually collected more colonies. New Haven Colony was added, and then Fairfield County was bought from New York. In 1640, grain became scarce and resulted in the settlers having to buy corn from the natives. The natives refused to sell the corn at what the settlers called reasonable prices. Eventually, the leaders of the trade deal bickered with each other, leading William Pychnon to feel resentment towards the Colony of Connecticut, who was unable to supply the people of Springfield with food. Eventually, Springfield broke away, leading to a small conflict between Springfield and Connecticut’s emerging counties. Finally, in 1642, Massachusetts Bay Colony got involved and drew a border, incorporating Springfield as its own. Connecticut, being (at the time) economically reliant on Boston, did not lift a finger against the new border.
One of Connecticut’s most significant contributions to the American government was Roger Sherman’s proposing the rules, in 1787, for the two bodies that made Congress: a larger, more powerful two-man-per-state body called the Senate and a less influential body based on population called the House of Representatives. This compromise was a mixture of the Virginia Plan (representatives for a single population-based body) and the Delaware Plan (senators for a single two-man-per-state body). This piece of history is what I see as the pride of Connecticut – its history means more to me than what happens with the dissipated children living within the state. The history of Connecticut is something that Moody skips over, which is a complete shame, as Connecticut has a long history and had great importance in the development of America as a nation.
The name Connecticut comes from an Algonquian word meaning “long tidal river”. This is because one of the most obvious features of Connecticut is a long river that goes from Canada all the way to the Long Island Sound. The Connecticut River is an important feature of the Northeast as the river provides fertile soil for growing crops and houses many people by its banks. The city (and capital of Connecticut) of Hartford is located by this river. Historically, the fertile soil surrounding the Connecticut River saw tension between Connecticut Colony and Massachusetts Bay Colony, resulting in Massachusetts’ 1642 seizure of Springfield from Connecticut Colony.
Connecticut, for me, is a small state that has many good things, such strong industries, beautiful cities, good agriculture and great railroads. It is located in the Northeast, a place where the climate is not warm enough to produce crops like cotton, necessitating strong industries to maintain a healthy economy. However, the soil is fertile enough to support mass amounts of agriculture (only producing these crops: apples, oats, barley, wheat and broadleaf tobacco). Many people commute to New York City for work as it is quite close and provides far more job opportunities for a growing population. Therefore, the railroad company Metro North’s New Haven Line is one of the nation’s busiest railroad lines, trailing not far behind other railway companies like New Jersey Transit and the Long Island Railroad, which operate commuter trains to New York City as well. The amount of wealthy businessmen living in Connecticut makes Fairfield County, the county I live in, boast one of the highest GDP per capita in the state and even in the nation, especially as it contains many very wealthy towns, with Greenwich, New Canaan and Darien being chief examples. Something that vexes me about Moody’s essay is that he sheds such a negative light on New Canaan and Darien. He describes the schools as if one must get Post Traumatic Stress Disorder after they leave the education systems in these two towns. Although I know nothing about growing up in New Canaan, growing up in Darien has been fun and easy, knowing that walking the hallways is always peaceful, knowing that there is no major illicit drug activity in the school, knowing that the other students often feel uncomfortable talking about sex or any related activities, knowing that you will always have support if you’re feeling weak on a subject.
However, Darien is not perfect. Like with every school, there are activities that lead one to question the integrity of the school. During the Darien High School midterm exams of 2020, there came a scandal where the answers were leaked out and many students read the answers. The teachers found out about this and refused to release the exam scores for history. In the end, all the students of my grade had to re-take their exams. There is also the issue of parties. Since Darien is a very competitive town in terms of sports, the teams like to celebrate. As a result, someone could bring alcohol and lead to what could have been a small party with just a sports team to a massive one featuring underage drinking and even trading cannabis. Speaking of drugs, there has been a surge of vaping found in the school, with teens puffing on odd electronic devices. The teachers are yet to catch a student vaping, but the evidence usually lays in the vape devices floating in the toilets, generating an odd smell.
Rick Moody does a great job at describing the Merritt Parkway for its beauties compared to other highways around America and it is hard not to see why. The Merritt Parkway has subtle undulating stretches, is not a long straight road with occasional curves, and utilizes a barrier of natural terrain rather than a barrier of boring old concrete. This sets it apart as a local beauty from other highways, especially neighboring I-95. Because of the amount of commuters, I-95 in Connecticut is known locally as the highway that has traffic jams all the time. In addition to giving us insight about the beautiful road, he also does an excellent job at providing the reader with the historical background of the parkway, doing a good job at painting a strong mental image through detailed description of the parkway: “Exit 28, among the first of several exits in Greenwich (where the Merritt begins), takes you off the parkway at Round Hill Road. That’s the street on which you will find, nestled among the estates, the legendary Round Hill Club, golfing destination of choice in Fairfield County and a summer spot for relaxation for the affluent of Greenwich when they’re not summering on Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard”. This description of the many attractions near the Merritt Parkway can make anyone see that Greenwich is a very affluent town (one of the wealthiest in America). That is because the high housing prices in New York and the low income tax rates for the wealthy in Connecticut have attracted many business executives to Connecticut as a place of residence.
However, the beauty of the Merritt Parkway can not live up to just how much Moody overlooks important locations in Fairfield County. Moody ends up praising Greenwich only for its affluence. He travels up the turnpike and skims over Stamford, which is a very important city that holds a lot of industry, history, people and jobs. He then turns to the towns of Darien and New Canaan and fills the reader in with a nice talk about his childhood years. One fact that I learned about Moody’s view of Darien was that he viewed school life in Darien as something completely foreign. In characterizing his experience at Darien’s schools, he remarks: “For example: Jewish kids! I didn’t even know what Jewish meant”. Moody then goes on to a ramble about these two Jewish kids who taught him all he needed to know about sex. After he leaves Darien, he goes to New Canaan, where he just calls it “the worst years of [his] life”. This is because of how the children of Saxe Junior High use the homophobic word “fag” to tag anything they didn’t like, such as “being bad at gym”, “being good at school, especially in subjects like English and Math”, or simply being “bad at shop”. If there was anything that I would find slanderous to the two towns New Canaan and Darien, in my experience, it would be that they are monolithic or homophobic, respectively, which is obviously something that no longer happens nowadays, either because of how much the teachers have forced the students to be accepting to people of all genders/races, or because of the amount of immigrants that have come to the Northeast to study in its many Ivy League schools, most of which are regarded as top in the world.
There’s one other missing portion to Moody’s essay that is very significant. Moody does not mention any other county other than the one he grew up in, and apart from the Merritt Parkway, there are no major geographical features mentioned. Connecticut has eight counties: Fairfield County, Tolland County, Middlesex County, New London County, Litchfield County, Windham County, Hartford County and New Haven County, and each holds a significance to Connecticut’s development. Some counties even hold significance in the development of America as a nation.
New Haven County houses the largest city in Connecticut and was once an independent colony until it was absorbed into Connecticut. New Haven County’s seat is … can you guess? New Haven. New Haven is a port city, the second most populous in Connecticut. It was a growing city that almost reached the potential of New Amsterdam (New York City) and Boston, but disaster struck. In 1646, New Haven loaded a ship full of their local goods, filled to the brim, ready for a long journey to Great Britain. However, the ship never made it to Britain, denying the city money needed to increase its size. Despite this, a major early landmark in Connecticut’s education system was the founding of Yale College. Yale was created in 1701, providing Connecticut with a school to educate clergy and civil leaders. However, this has since changed as Yale expanded into the many other arts. The Congregational church (which was the dominant religion in the United Kingdom and all its overseas dominions) dominated religious life in the colony and, by extension, town affairs in many parts. New Haven was important in the Industrial Revolution, as it was the place where Eli Whitney patented his cotton gin. Samuel Colt patented his namesake revolver in the same factory that Whitney had made the Cotton gin. The Colt Revolver featured a 6-cylinder barrel that fired 6 bullets without reloading (all other guns could only hold 1 before needing to reload), and was used by the American Cavalry in the Mexican-American War (1846-48). This industrialization would eventually lead to the creation of the Gatling gun, predecessor of the modern day machine gun. New Haven’s long history and technological advances were extremely important in the development of America as a nation and are unheard of in Moody’s narrative of Connecticut.
The first county founded in Connecticut was Hartford County, founded initially as a city along the Connecticut River. The city of Hartford is among the oldest in America, founded by Reverend Thomas Hooker (mentioned above) and a bunch of settlers who did not enjoy life in Massachusetts. In 1814, the Federalists, who supported George Washington and John Adams, discussed New England’s possible secession from the United States. Hartford the city, was the place where leading figures of the abolitionist movement and women’s suffrage movement rose. The abolitionist movement was founded in 1833, with major speakers like Frederick Douglass, and the Connecticut Women’s Suffrage Association, although not as prominent as Seneca Falls Convention, helped ratify the 19th amendment, which enabled women to work the same jobs as men.
Middlesex County was created in 1785 (after the formation of Connecticut as a state) from portions of New London, Windham and Hartford County and is part of the region known as Greater Hartford. The county sports multiple geographical landmarks that contrast it from its industrial neighbors. The county boasts two protected wildlife reserves. An attraction located in Essex for tourists is the Connecticut River Museum, a former steamboat dock that educates the people about maritime science and environment conservation. The museum features a full replica of Turtle, the first American submarine. The submarine looks like a wooden wine barrel with a rudimentary periscope; there’s a hand-powered propellor for locomotion and a rudder for steering. It also has a mine stored in a small, detachable structure outside the main barrel.
Litchfield County is a county that is part of the New York City metropolitan area, like Fairfield County. It was created by a contract which annexed land from the counties of Hartford, New Haven and Fairfield. The county includes the city of Torrington, which holds historical significance. Torrington is located by the banks of the fast-moving Naugatuck River; Frederick Wolcott built a textile mill capable of high-powered action there in 1813. As a result, Israel Coe and Erastus Hodges created two brass mills, booming Torrington’s brass industry. In 1849, the Naugatuck railroad opened, destroying the isolation the town had faced previously, which was absorbed into the booming New Haven Railroad. In 1923, Torrington became a city. Litchfield County, home of the river-powered textile mill, became a key player in the American Industrial Revolution.
New London County was one of the counties that aided in the founding of Connecticut Colony. It was dominated by a tribe of natives called the Pequot before the English colonized the land. Today, the Pequot tribes remain in New London, living alongside the immigrants. New London houses the port city of New London and the port village of Mystic, both home to many attractions. New London was considered a key deepwater port during the American Revolution. It was attacked by Benedict Arnold as an attempt to prevent George Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau from attacking Yorktown. Later, during the War of 1812, the coast off of New London was the location of an attempted torpedo attack on the HMS Ramillies, which the captain retaliated to, by threatening to burn every town near the coast. Eventually, the port was used for submarines during World War I. Mystic, on the other hand, was a village founded on the bank of the Mystic River. Due to being built near a river, Mystic was primarily supported by agriculture. However, Mystic’s biggest industry has been its tourism industry, with attractions such as the Mystic Aquarium and Mystic Seaport being among the most popular.
Tolland County is a county located to the east of Hartford County. Tolland County is small, rural with its largest town (Vernon) with a population of less than thirty thousand people. The county houses the New England Civil War Museum in Rockville (now incorporated in Vernon). Inside the New England Civil War Museum is a collection of several hundred items from the Civil War, containing artifacts like sabres, drums, weapons, etc. The museum also contains a library that holds 1000 volumes of works written during the Civil War. There were five reunions (between 1892-1920) held in the Grand Army of the Republic Hall, located within the museum. They were all reunions of Union divisions that fought during the Civil War. This museum is an attraction that holds great historic importance in letting people relive the Civil War and see the weapons used by soldiers back in the day. Although small, this museum is the biggest point of attraction in Tolland County.
Windham County is the most northeastern county in Connecticut. The land was purchased by John Winthrop, founder of Massachusetts Bay, from the Narragansetts, a tribe of Native Americans, in 1635. Eventually, the land was broken up between Massachusetts Bay Colony and Connecticut Colony, and was formed out of Hartford and New London Colonies, and in 1749, Connecticut annexed a part of Worcester County from Massachusetts and added it to Windham County. However, Windham County would lose towns to its neighboring counties as Middlesex County was carved using land from Windham and towns were gradually given away.
All eight counties were important to Connecticut, and some being crucial in America’s development as a whole. Moody’s essay on Connecticut in State by State puts more emphasis on his nostalgic trip down the Merritt Parkway, and into the depravities of his youth, rather than providing an in-depth analysis over Connecticut’s history. To him, having a history of greater 300 years is apparently inferior compared to his childhood memories all located within a small section of Fairfield County, but to be fair, perhaps he didn’t consider that audience would be Connecticut teens like myself.