Winter 2021-2022

November 29, 2021

Counterfeiter William Stuart, Hero of His Own Story

By Morgan Bengel (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! William Stuart is a dynamic character in Connecticut’s history who has been identified in many different ways. Stuart recognized himself as a counterfeiter […]
November 27, 2021

P.T. Barnum Builds a City

By Bruce E. Hawley (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! P. T. Barnum, the legendary showman, museum operator, and entrepreneur, was 41 years old in 1851. He had accumulated substantial wealth from […]
November 27, 2021

Mary Rogers Williams: “We Shall Want To Do a Lot of Rambling”

By Eve M. Kahn (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! The life of Hartford-born painter Mary Rogers Williams (1857 – 1907), who was largely forgotten after her death, is documented in vibrant letters and […]
November 27, 2021

Venture Smith: “Thanks for My Gold Rings”

By Elizabeth J. Normen (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! Venture Smith’s narrative, published in New London in 1798, is among the earliest published autobiographies by a Black person in the United […]
November 27, 2021

Noah Porter and the Spotted Fever Epidemic of 1808 – 1809

By Charles N. Leach (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! Reverend Noah Porter Jr. (1781 – 1866) was a son of a minister of the First Congregational Church in Farmington, and he […]
November 27, 2021

William Apes, A Son of Colchester

  By Phyllip Thomas (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! My reading selection is from A Son of the Forest. The Experience of William Apes, A Native of the Forest. Comprising a […]
November 27, 2021

Edwin Ayer: “My Adventures in Mining and Exploring”

By Teddy Levy (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! In 1896, when Edwin Ayer (1824 – 1901) was in his 70s and wishing his ancestors had written about their lives, he wrote […]
November 26, 2021

Josiah Atkins: “Ye Enemy Are Upon Us”

By Mary Christ (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! But I must shut my book for ye present, ye drum beats for parading… ye enemy are upon us.” Private Josiah Atkins, 5th Connecticut […]
November 23, 2021

Rediscovering “William Grimes, the Runaway Slave”

By Regina E. Mason (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! In 1825, at a time when African American autobiography was rare, a formerly enslaved man named William Grimes rejected the system that […]
November 22, 2021

Milton Avery: “So Close to Hartford”

By Erin Monroe (c) Connecticut Explored Inc. Winter 2021-2022 Subscribe/Buy the Issue! Born in upstate New York, artist Milton Avery (1885 – 1965) in his early years called Connecticut home. He worked and took his […]
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