Norfolk Then . . .
Spring piglets? Although we don’t know the time of year this photograph was taken, the litter of piglets asleep near the warmth of a cast-iron stove may well have been born at the end of a long Norfolk winter. The photograph is one of many Marie Hartig Kendall (1854-1943) took of Norfolk farm scenes at […]
Norfolk Then . . .
From Mother Goose to Ogden Nash, March winds have been the poet’s muse. In the familiar nursery rhyme, they bring April showers and May flowers. In 1888, however, March winds brought in the biggest blizzard to hit the Northeast in recorded history. Beginning on March 12, the storm lasted three days and crippled the region […]
Norfolk Then . . .
With the Norfolk Curling Club back in full swing, or sweep, have a look at the earliest days of curling in Norfolk. The sport was introduced here 60 years ago by Elisabeth Childs, whose father John Walcott Calder had been an avid curler in Utica, New York. The first games were held on Tamarack Pond […]
Norfolk Then
Holiday greetings from farm country in the early 1890’s. Photographer Marie Kendall set up this enchanting tableau in the back yard of the family home on Greenwoods Road, opposite the entrance to Westside Road. Look carefully in the distance across the town meadow and you can see the houses that lined Laurel Way in a […]
Norfolk Then
Dr. Richard Barstow practiced medicine for fifty years in Norfolk, opening his office overlooking the village green in 1936. Active in the educational, political, and cultural life of the town, Dr. Barstow served as chairman of the Norfolk committee for a regional high school at a time when Norfolk was grappling with regionalization. Planning for […]
Norfolk Then
With a new firehouse proposed for Norfolk, here’s a look back at the ground-breaking ceremony for the Shepard Road firehouse on June 6, 1970. By then the Norfolk Volunteer Fire Department had outgrown its original quarters in the Royal Arcanum Building, built in 1904 on Station Place. Pictured in this photograph from left to right […]
Norfolk Then . . .
The railroad was a visible part of the Norfolk landscape a century ago. Constructed in 1870, it approached the village from the south along Litchfield Road, first passing through the hamlet of Grantville near Winchester Road. After skirting the Village Green to the east, the tracks crossed under Greenwoods Road (Route 44) at the entrance […]
Norfolk Then . . .
Meet John o’the Woods, perhaps the most well-known homeless man in 19th century Connecticut. In the course of his migrations, which spanned forty years, he regularly tramped through Norfolk in late spring and early fall, taking meals at farms along his route. The Town of Norfolk was expected to care for its destitute, and […]
Norfolk Then
While the shrill whistle and smoke of locomotives arriving at the Norfolk station have been replaced by the downshifting and diesel fumes of trucks on Route 44, the landscape of Norfolk is still marked by the railroad. There are track beds hidden in the woods, now used as nature trails, and bridge abutments can be […]
Norfolk Then…
Roller skating fever struck Norfolk in 1885, as it did many towns across the country. The Norfolk Roller Skating Association had 30 members that year, and the rink was in the newly-constructed Village Hall (pictured here at that time). The first roller skating rink had been opened at the Atlantic House resort hotel in Newport, […]
