Today in 1878, right after hearing the famed evangelist Dwight Moody preach that “repentance is grabbing your bag and coat and getting out of the wrong train and onto the right one”, a group of revival-attending passengers in Hartford boarded a specially-ordered train that took them to one of Connecticut’s deadliest train disasters. When…
Tag: disasters
January 13: Charles Nelson Reilly, Actor and Hartford Circus Fire Survivor
Born on this day in 1931, Charles Nelson Reilly was a Tony Award-winning actor, comedian, and beloved TV personality who was best known for his appearances as a campy character actor on countless game shows, sitcoms, and movies in the 1960s through the 1980s. Later in life, he focused more on directing and voice…
December 4: The Great East Thompson Train Wreck
Today in 1891, one of the largest train disasters in American history — and the only one to involve four different trains — occurred outside of the small town of East Thompson. Located in the extreme northeast corner of the state, nestled right against the Massachusetts and Rhode Island borders, the tracks in East…
October 25: The Final Voyage of the Bounty
The HMS Bounty is undoubtedly one of the most famous and storied sailing vessels in history, capturing the world’s imagination ever since the original British ship was the site of a famous mutiny against Captain William Bligh in 1789 in the South Pacific. Even though the original HMS Bounty was destroyed in 1790, a…
July 6: The Hartford Circus Fire
What began as an innocent day at the circus ended in one of the worst fire disasters in U.S. history, on this day in 1944. In early July of that year, the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus had set up one of their largest “Big Top” tents in a field in Hartford’s…
June 28: The Mianus River Bridge Over I-95 Collapses
Early in the morning of June 28th, 1983, at around 1:30 am, a 100-foot span of Interstate 95 in Greenwich collapsed into the Mianus River in one of the most infamous American bridge disasters of the 20th century. Three people died and three more were seriously injured as a car and two tractor-trailers careened…
April 23: Connecticut’s Worst Construction Disaster: L’Ambience Plaza
In early 1987, excitement was building in Bridgeport for “L’Ambience Plaza,” a new luxury apartment complex slated to open later that year on the corner of Washington Avenue and Coleman Street. Those dreams of downtown revitalization were suddenly dashed, however, in the afternoon hours of April 23. At 1:36pm, construction crews had just hoisted…