For more than a century after practical photography was invented in 1839, all photographers had to wait to see the pictures they had taken until the images had gone through a lengthy, chemical developing process. The man who was to change all that, Edwin Land, was born in Bridgeport today in 1909. Land, a…
Tag: popular culture
May 4: Romanticizing Nature for an Industrializing America
Today in 1826, iconic American landscape painter Frederic Edwin Church was born in Hartford. The internationally famed artist’s Connecticut roots ran deep: he was a direct descendant of one of the original English Puritans who settled Hartford with Rev. Thomas Hooker. His father, a prominent silversmith, also became a director of Hartford’s Aetna Insurance…
April 21: On This Day, Rumors of His Death Were NOT Greatly Exaggerated
Today in 1910, Mark Twain, one of America’s most famous authors and Connecticut’s most famous residents, died at his home in Redding. Born Samuel Langhorne Clemens, he grew up in Missouri and traveled extensively, working as a newspaper reporter and fiction writer, until settling with his family in 1871 in the wealthy “Nook…
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 Tontine 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…
January 11: A Sell-Out Crowd Celebrates The New England Whalers 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…
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…
August 10: An Orphaned Girl’s Bumpy Journey to Fame Begins in East Haddam
The story of an orphaned girl’s unshakable faith in the parents who left her as a ward of the state as a very young child would not on first glance seem to be the stuff of which world-renowned and unforgettable broadway musicals are made. Yet, today in 1976, an unlikely play with that plot…
July 13: P. T. Barnum’s Greatest Performance Wasn’t on a Stage
Today in 1865, Connecticut’s Greatest Showman Phineas Taylor “P T” Barnum was as busy as ever – but not on a stage or in a tent. Rather, he was giving an impassioned speech in the Connecticut legislature, where he was serving his first of several terms as a state representative. The seasoned showbiz veteran…