One of Connecticut’s greatest immigrant success stories began today in 1919 when Russian-born Igor Sikorsky first arrived on American shores. While Sikorsky is best known as the inventor of the world’s first practical helicopter and the founder of the Sikorsky Aircraft manufacturing company headquartered in Stratford, he first made a name for himself as a…
Tag: march
March 29: Catholic Immigrants CT Unite to Protect & Support Each Other & the United States
Late-19th century Connecticut was marked by growing hostility toward a massive recent influx of Catholic immigrants from Europe, dangerous working conditions in factories that left many families fatherless, and a marked increase in the formation of fraternal benefit societies. In response to these societal pressures, Father Michael J. McGivney, the 29-year-old Irish immigrant and…
March 25: The First American Bishop Led a Politically Problematic Faith
At a meeting held in Woodbury, Connecticut on March 25, 1783, 10 clergymen concerned with providing for the future of the Episcopal Church named Samuel Seabury to be the first bishop of the new United States of America. Seabury was born near New London on November 30, 1729 and had lived in Connecticut for…
March 24: Joel Barlow, The Poet and Diplomat Who Died Far From Home
Joel Barlow, American poet and one of Connecticut’s most ambitious — albeit not always successful — learned men of the late-18th century, was born today in 1754 in the western Connecticut town of Redding. As a member of the Yale class of 1778, the bright young man found himself surrounded by an impressive crowd of…
March 22: Seeing Connecticut in a Completely Different Light
Today in 1816, master American artist and internationally acclaimed landscape painter John Frederick Kensett was born in Cheshire, Connecticut to Thomas Kensett, an English-born engraver, and Elizabeth Daggett Kensett, his Connecticut-born wife. Displaying an early aptitude for art, John was working in his father’s engraving studio by age 12, honing his keen eye for…
March 21: Taxpayers Roll Against Bailout Bonuses
In March 2009, politicians and citizens on both sides of the political aisle became irate after learning that Wilton-based financial giant AIG – which had just received more than $200 billion in taxpayer-funded federal bailouts after posting the largest single-quarter loss in U.S. corporate history – was planning to give nearly $220 million…
March 19: A Second Chance For A Fallen Star
When 32-year-old Joseph Ganim became mayor of Bridgeport in 1991, he had the distinction of being the youngest mayor in the city’s history. At the time, there were few politicians who even wanted the job. Connecticut’s largest city had just filed for bankruptcy and was the only municipality in the state to have its…
March 18: A Rising Star Falls Twice On the Same Date
The day after St. Patrick’s Day was anything but a lucky one for John G. Rowland, who found himself on the wrong end of the law on March 18, 2005, and then again 10 years later on March 18, 2015. Once considered one of Connecticut’s best and brightest politicians, Rowland first won elected office…
March 14: Eli Whitney Patents the Machine That Would Lead to Civil War
Today in 1794, Eli Whitney, one of Connecticut’s most influential inventors, received a patent for the cotton gin, a machine that revolutionized cotton production by optimizing the laborious task of cleaning seeds from raw cotton bolls. Born in Massachusetts in 1765, Eli had exhibited both interest in, and talent at, manufacturing early in life,…
March 13: A City, State, & Country Divided: The New Haven Black Panther Trials
Today in 1970, the stage was set for one of the most polarizing trials of the modern Civil Rights era. Bobby Seale, national chairman of the militant black power organization Black Panthers, arrived in Connecticut to stand trial for allegedly ordering the murder of a New Haven man killed 10 months earlier. The Black…
March 10: Actor, Socialite, Editor, Playwright, Filmmaker, War Correspondent, Ambassador, & Connecticut’s 1st Congresswoman
Connecticut’s first congresswoman, Clare Boothe Luce, was one of the most professionally accomplished women of her time. Ann Clare Boothe was born on March 10, 1903. Her parents encouraged her early love of music and the performing arts. After acting in a few minor theater roles as a young adult, she married New York…
March 8: A Fearful and Spreading Disease? Or A Vampire Attack?
Today in 1845, 24-year-old Lemuel Ray died in Jewett City, a borough in the rural Eastern Connecticut town of Griswold. The young man, one of several children born to the Ray family, had died from tuberculosis, a disease then commonly known as “consumption” because of the way its victims would lose weight and become…