• 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 […]

  • A Look Into Norfolk’s Past

    Exhibit Explores Pupin’s Haven of Happiness on Westside Road By Patricia Platt The Norfolk Historical Museum graces Norfolk’s village green with the reserve and understated elegance of a New Englander well worth getting to know. Visitors who step inside will find exhibits that tell the stories of the town’s past, often with intriguing ties to […]

  • Norfolk Past and Present

    The Summer Chapel Eases Gracefully Into Its 130 Years By Elizabeth Bailey Ayreslea Rowland Denny began attending services at The Church of the Transfiguration in Norfolk in 1939 on the eve of World War II. A New Yorker, she was a student at the Chapin School in New York City, but her family had been […]

  • Church Steeple Shines Once Again

    Local dignitaries and friends of Norfolk’s Church of Christ Congregational gathered on Saturday, May 25, to formally celebrate the completion of the steeple restoration project. The Rev. Erick Olsen thanked the community for supporting the years-long effort and welcomed everyone to enjoy a splendid cake featuring an image of the steeple.

  • Making the Native… Personal

    Cheryl Heller Builds a Wild Garden in Norfolk By Joe Kelly Gardens are best when they’re personal, argued the late Fred McGourty, who remains Norfolk’s best- known plantsmen. McGourty’s 1989 book, “The Perennial Gardener,” recounts the gardens he and his wife, Mary Ann, created at Hillside, their home near Dennis Hill State Park. Were he […]

  • This Old Norfolk House

    Stevens House By Joe KellyWhen our Puritan forebears arrived on these shores in the early 1600s, they were no doubt surprised todiscover how the traditional thatched roof cottages they knew from back home were no match for thewind and cold of a typical New England winter. But it would have likely surprised them even more […]

  • Can wildlife safely cross Norfolk’s Roads?

    By Shelley Harms Where are animals crossing Norfolk’s roads? Are they making it across? Is it possible to make theircrossings safer? Julia Rogers, Senior Land Protection Manager at the Housatonic Valley Association (HVA), helped agroup of interested Norfolk residents explore these questions at a training session sponsored by theNorfolk Land Trust on March 22 at […]

  • Great Mountain Forest’s New Executive Director Returns to His Connecticut Roots

    By David Beers Mike Zarfos started his new position as executive director of Great Mountain Forest (GMF) at the end ofFebruary. It has been a lively time for Zarfos and his family; in addition to moving from Washington,D.C., to Connecticut, they are expecting a baby in April. Zarfos grew up in Deep River, Conn., where […]

  • Norfolk Then…

    In the late 19th century, the arrival of every train at the depot on Station Place was widely anticipated.There were freight trains, milk trains and passenger trains unloading throngs of summer visitors. Theattractive station pictured here was built in 1898, replacing an earlier modest structure. Constructed ofnative granite, it was designed by Hill & Turner, […]

  • Focus on New Firehouse shifts to funding

    Costs likely to rise beyond initial $5 million estimate By Joe Kelly After months of sometimes contentious public hearings, plans for a new Norfolk firehouse are nearing the end of the wetlands/zoning part of the approval process and heading into a decisive new phase: finding the money to pay for it all. The Planning & […]

Articles

Norfolk—A Thousand Points of Light

Improved communication channels should help town develop   By Kurt Steele Noting that Norfolk has, in the words of a long-ago Presidential candidate, a thousand points of light and yet believing that these need to be coordinated, the Norfolk Economic Development Commission and the Coalition for Sound Growth are focusing on improving communications among the […]

State Board of Ed Approves Regionalization Plan

Towns to hold hearings and referendums   At its regular meeting on July 1, the State Board of Education approved the Norfolk-Colebrook Study Group’s plan for consolidating the towns’ primary schools under one roof and one regional district. Official notification reached the town clerks’ offices in both Norfolk and Colebrook on July 29. In the […]

Tobey Pond—From Glacial Kettle to Local Swimming Hole

By Christopher Sinclair Several thousand years ago a glacier inched its way through the southern Berkshires, and upon its retreat left the patch of land that would later become Norfolk, Connecticut, with a parting gift. Tobey Pond, the locally famous and universally beloved swimming hole, is that gift —nearly as pristine now as it was […]

Rebuilding the American Chestnut Tree

Rescuing a Forest Icon   By Ruth Melville From Connecticut to Mississippi, along the Appalachian Mountains and into the Ohio Valley, the American chestnut tree, able to grow as big as 130 feet tall and 10 feet in diameter, once dominated the forest canopy. Although American chestnuts were almost wiped out by disease by 1950, […]

Property Taxes Drop Slightly

Town budget trimmed back By Wiley Wood Norfolk will spend less in the coming year, and the tax rate will be marginally lower. The budget presented by Michael Sconyers, chairman of the Board of Finance, at a special town meeting on June 10 was almost $200,000 lower than last year’s, a drop of 3 percent. […]

Tour of the Litchfield Hills Raises Funds for Cancer Patients

Local nonprofit hopes to reach one million dollar mark this year By Suzanne Hinman Imagine being told that you have cancer and have weeks, months or even years of treatment ahead of you. Coping with the physical and emotional challenges of cancer treatment is daunting enough, but the financial burden is often the most overwhelming […]

Scott Shaw: Running like the Wind

By Lindsey Pizzica Rotolo Norfolkian Scott Shaw won the town’s annual Five-Mile Road Race in May with an all-time course record of 28 minutes and 23 seconds. The second place finisher, Brandon LeClair, set the course record last year with a time of 29 minutes and 59 seconds. LeClair beat that time by 44 seconds […]

The Gardener Is Moving On, But the Spirit of Her Garden Will Remain

Mary Ann McGourty Heads for Warmer Climes By Ruth Melville After almost four decades in Norfolk, Mary Ann McGourty, expert gardener and avid birder, is packing up her gardening tools and bird books and moving to Athens, Georgia. Mary Ann and her husband, Fred McGourty, were, until 2004, the proprietors of Hillside Gardens, a nationally […]

Mia Weiner Opens Pinacoteca Art Gallery in Bantam

By Ruth Melville Art lovers in northwest Connecticut now have a new and unusual gallery to visit. Norfolk resident Mia Weiner has recently opened Pinacoteca in Bantam, where she will show and sell European paintings and drawings from the 16th to 20th century. Although she has been a gallery owner and dealer for 35 years, […]

Human Remains Found in Norfolk Woods

Missing East Hartford Man Identified By Ruth Melville   The story of the man who left his car in Station Place in March 2014, and then vanished, came to a sad end on April 26, 2015, when human bones were found in the Norfolk woods. Early that Sunday afternoon, a passerby found the bones in […]

New Head Chef at Infinity Bistro

by Lindsey Pizzica Rotolo   John Welch took over as Chef de Cuisine at Infinity Bistro this spring. His brand-new menu hit tables in mid-May. A few of the old favorites are still there–lobster hushpuppies, the edamame burger and lobster roll, but the menu has otherwise been totally re-worked. Welch visited the first outdoor farmers […]

Lime Rock Park Gears Up for Seventh Decade

By Lindsey Pizzica Rotolo Driving down sleepy Route 112 on a weekday afternoon in May, the average motorist would never know that Lime Rock Park is absolutely humming with activity. I, for one, expected the track office to contain one or two part-time workers and the grounds to be relatively empty. Not exactly–the small track […]