• Sweets on the Green

    A Decade of Decadent Desserts By Andra Moss How is your naughty versus nice rating? Those needing to influence Santa with an especially impressive treat should grab their stockings and head to the Norfolk Historical Society (NHS) for the 10th Annual Cake Auction on Saturday, Dec. 7.     Now a Norfolk holiday tradition, the event was […]

  • Artist Tom Burr Brings His Torrington Project to an End

    Performances celebrate studio closing By Stephen Melville Norfolk resident and artist Tom Burr organized a day of performances and exhibition at his studio in Torrington on Oct. 26, marking an end to what he has called “The Torrington Project.” For the past three and a half years, Burr has rented a vast—15,000 square foot—former industrial […]

  • New Meanings for a Monument

    Light Shines on the Memorial Green By Joe Kelly On Monday, Nov. 11, Veterans Day, a crowd of about 100 gathered for the rededication of Norfolk’s World War 1 memorial, artfully restored under the auspices of the Norfolk Community Association. It was sunny. Temperatures in the low ‘60’s. Another day of no rain. Everyone talked […]

  • Norfolk Then…

    This 1920s postcard shows Memorial Green just after the War Memorial, designed by Alfredo Taylor, was built. It was Taylor’s wife Minna who first proposed that a memorial “heroes grove” be planted on the small lot of land known as the Triangle opposite the Catholic Church. The lot had been left empty with the demolition […]

  • Restored war memorial to be celebrated on veterans day

    plaque now honors all who served By Patricia Platt A World War I monument, designed by Alfredo Taylor and erected on Norfolk’s Memorial Green in 1921, bears the inscription, “for those who gave and those who offered their lives for liberty, the people of Norfolk have built this monument and crowned it with the Liberty […]

  • NLT Tail Ablaze with Runners

    More than 120 runners enjoyed perfect fall weather as they wound their way through picturesque Barbour Woods in the 11th Annual Norfolk Land Trust Trail Race. Some chose to add a challenging loop over Haystack Mountain, while the half-marathoners just kept moving on up—topping out at over 2,000 feet of elevation gain. *photo by June […]

  • Can you spot the Real Curler?

    There was movie magic ice to be made, and the pros of the Norfolk Curling Club were the first to get the call. In October, NCC’s Jon Barbagallo, Lou Barbagallo, Rachel Barbagallo, Mark Walsh, Harvey Chalmers and Phill West were hired by a production company to make curling ice at a Rhode Island hockey rink […]

  • Norfolk Then…

    This 1917 photograph is a timely reminder of the long struggle fought by many dedicated women for basic civil liberties, including the right to own property, hold public office, sit on juries, participate in public assemblies and vote. The group of 25 suffragists—20 women and five men—gathered on the porch following their meeting with Congressman […]

  • The chicken who wanted to be a star and other tales from a norfolk movie set

    By Andra Moss Secrets and small towns don’t often pair well, and Norfolk is a small town. Yet, for eight weeks this summer, a crew of nearly 100 people quietly transformed Tim and Paula Webster’s 1908 Norfolk farmhouse into a film set for a feature-length production, all the while staying under the local radar.  It […]

  • great blue heron rookeries

    working together to provide sustainable breeding habitats By Jude Mead Great Blue Herons are a familiar sight in Norfolk and are one of the largest of all North American herons, standing up to four feet tall with a wingspan of close to six feet. They are most noticeable in flight as they soar across the […]

  • Norfolk Then…

    Tennis at Town Hall? The building we know as Town Hall was originally the Eldridge Gymnasium, built in 1892. Located within easy walking distance of hotels and boarding houses in Norfolk at the turn of the last century, the Gymnasium was a popular gathering place for both residents and visitors. People played croquet on the lawn […]

  • Looking Back Over the Years

    The End of an Era for Norfolk Now By Colleen Gundlach After 10 years and over 30 issues, Ruth Melville has put on her Norfolk Now editor’s hat for the last time. In June, the paper marked the end of an era with the publication of Ruth’s final issue as one of the executive editors […]

Articles

Historical Society’s Summer Exhibit

“Norfolk in the Great War” opens May 27   On April 6, 1917, the United States entered the Great War, and life in Norfolk changed quickly. The Eldridge Gymnasium (now Town Hall) became an armory and the setting for outdoor drills with a rifle range set up on the rocky ledge behind Fox Hill, home […]

William Eggers Loves to Make Stuff

  By Ruth Melville When Bill Eggers was 10 years old, he took the motor out of the family lawnmower and put it into a little wooden car he had built himself. A policeman brought him home and complained to his mother that he had been going 50 miles an hour on the highway. She […]

Botelle Students Perform ‘Charlotte’s Web’

By Lauren Valentino The curtain rose for Botelle School’s performance of “Charlotte’s Web” on Thursday, April 6 and the audience—young, old and in-between—was entertained by this long-time favorite story of an unlikely friendship between a young pig and a wise spider. Directed by Bruce Connelly and Elizabeth Allyn as part of the Norfolk After School […]

The Nuts, Bolts and Tools to Start Your Own Business

The Entrepreneurial Center of Northwest Connecticut offers training and support By Colleen Gundlach With increasing technology and internet access, more and more people are leaving traditional jobs to pursue the dream of owning their own businesses. Going solo into a new business can be a difficult, time-consuming and expensive endeavor, but a new program at […]

The Murky Origin of Norfolk Street Names

  By Lindsey Pizzica Rotolo For one of the largest towns in the state (geographically), there are relatively few roads in Norfolk, and the ingenuity in their naming is generally at a minimum. Many street names denote their ultimate destination—Bald Mountain, Goshen East, Litchfield, Meekertown, North Colebrook, South Sandisfield, State Line and Winchester, for example, […]

Getting a Second WIN

It’s early days yet, but town organizations are starting to plan their events for the second Weekend in Norfolk, scheduled this year for August 4, 5 and 6. At a meeting on March 11 in Town Hall, a few organizations sent representatives, while many others wrote in suggestions. All participating groups are urged to submit […]

Botelle Beat

Student Council Works to Make the School the Best It Can Be By Mackenzie Casey  At Botelle School, the student council represents the school’s belief that students should be responsible, respectful, persevering, honest and good at collaborating with others. This council is made up of eight members of the 5th and 6th grades: Olivia Olsen, […]

Crissey Place: The Changing Shape of 19th-Century Norfolk

By Ryan Bachman Like many New England towns, Norfolk boasts an impressive selection of historic architecture. Colonial-era farmhouses face seldom-traveled backroads, surviving industrial buildings stand along the Blackberry River and Gilded Age summer homes line the shores of various lakes. Individually, each of these buildings illustrates a select period of the town’s history, and efforts […]

Where Wise Men Also Fish

A bookstore in the Berkshires   By Wiley Wood The Bookstore has been in the same brick building in Lenox, Mass., for five decades and is something of a pilgrimage site. Still, why travel to a bookstore when just about any book you can think of is available online? As I push open the bookstore’s […]

Kirk and Cindy Sinclair Face the Most Difficult Journey of All

From Walking Sticks to Pedicabs By Colleen Gundlach For their fifth date, Kirk and Cindy Sinclair hiked the entire 2,200 miles of the Appalachian Trail. Avid hikers, the pair met when he was a University of Connecticut alumnus and she was a student there. Having reached their 30th wedding anniversary together, their exercise routine is […]

The Stained Glass Windows of Norfolk

A Tale of Two Masters By Babs Perkins When stained glass is mentioned in conversation, for many, the first name that springs to mind is Tiffany: Louis Comfort Tiffany, son of jeweler and Tiffany & Co. founder Charles Lewis Tiffany. When stained glass windows and Norfolk are referenced, the windows in Battell Chapel, the library […]

Coffee, Cake and Community Storytelling

  Photo by Bruce Frisch Last month’s Coffee House in Battell Chapel was a warm and convivial evening. Conceived as a different kind of fundraiser for the Congregational Church, the event offered a warm, candlelit setting, delicious homemade desserts and coffee and also storytelling and poetry reading by local authors. Gloria Gourley, a member of […]