Thanks to Connecticut inventor and innovator George Coy, the city of New Haven can lay claim to a number of “firsts” related to the early development of the telephone. Within two years after Alexander Graham Bell first patented the revolutionary communication device, Coy and his company had implemented a number of innovations — like…
Tag: popular culture
February 12: England’s Most Famous Detective Was Born in Hartford
A scion of one of Connecticut’s oldest and most prominent families, world-famous actor and playwright William Hooker Gillette, was born in Hartford in 1853. Drawn early to the theater arts, he left the city at the age of 20 to seek his fortune as an actor and stage producer. He met with moderate success…
February 11: England’s Greatest Novelist Speed-Visits New Haven
On the evening of February 11, 1842, three words spread through the streets of New Haven like wildfire, causing crowds of people to rush toward the city’s downtown Toutine Hotel: “Dickens has come!” Just before 8:00 p.m. that night, Charles Dickens had arrived at the city’s Union Station, traveling by rail from Hartford. The…
February 10: The Civil War’s Biggest Wedding: “General Tom Thumb” & “The Queen of Beauty”
Born in 1838 in Bridgeport, Connecticut, legendary entertainer Charles Sherwood Stratton, a.k.a. “Tom Thumb,” began touring with internationally famous showman and fellow Connectican P. T. Barnum at the tender age of five. Stratton had first attracted Barnum’s attention because of his unusually small size; he had dwarfism and never grew taller than 42 inches…
January 30: She Cooked Up the Recipe for Success, and Set the Table for Those Who Followed
Before the fictional Betty Crocker and the very real Julia Child, Gordon Ramsay, Paula Dean, Bobby Flay, and Rachel Ray, there was Ida Bailey Allen. Born today in 1885 in Danielson, Allen used training in domestic science, a tireless entrepreneurial spirit and a faultless instinct for the potential of mass-market communications to create the…
January 28: The World’s First Commercial Telephone Exchange & Connecticut’s First Transcontinental Phone Call
In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell received a U.S. Patent for the first practical telephone design, ushering in one of the most revolutionary devices of the late 19th century. The earliest telephones, however, were extremely limited: they allowed for communication between two receivers, but only if they were directly connected by a single wire. It…
January 23: A Pie in the Sky Idea Flies Off the Shelves
In 1871, a Civil War veteran and baker by the name of William Russell Frisbie opened the Frisbie Pie Company in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He later built a large factory on the city’s east side to accommodate the growing demand for his pastries. Little did this simple but successful pieman know that one day, several decades…
January 11: A Sell-Out Crowd Celebrates The New Home Team’s New Home
Today in 1975, Hartford became home to a professional hockey team for the first time as the New England Whalers played their inaugural home game at the brand-new Hartford Civic Center. The Whalers had been organized in 1972 as one of the first teams of the World Hockey Association, an upstart professional hockey league…
December 1: PEZ Candy Opens Wide in Orange
Today, PEZ candy conjures up images of whimsical plastic dispensers full of small, brick-shaped little candies. First invented in Austria in the early 20th century, PEZ candy has quite a storied history — one that visitors can learn for themselves with a visit to the PEZ Visitors Center in Orange, Connecticut, which first opened…
November 30: Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz Marry in Greenwich
Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, two of the most famous entertainers in the history of American television, first met in 1940, over a decade before their mega-hit sitcom, I Love Lucy, first aired. Ball, already well known as a model and Broadway actress, and Arnaz, a popular Cuban bandleader, met on the set of Too…
November 29: Connecticut’s Presidential Portrait Painter
Today in 1982, a very special delivery was received at the White House: a stunningly photo-realistic portrait of President Jimmy Carter, painted by Connecticut artist Herbert E. Abrams. The painting was President Carter’s official White House portrait, and after viewing it, White House curator Clement Conger declared Abrams the best contemporary artist he had…
October 31: Trick or Treat? The Legend of the Charter Oak
One of the most important symbols in Connecticut history is the Charter Oak – the giant, gnarled oak tree that represents Connecticut’s “steady habit” of self-rule and resistance against tyranny. Depictions and namesakes of the Charter Oak are plentiful throughout the state: schools, streets, social organizations, parks, Connecticut’s state quarter, and even a brewery…