Masters of Illusion (1994) was Mary-Ann Tirone Smith’s fourth novel. It is a fictional account of the Hartford Circus Fire of 1944 and the decades following. The protagonist and the fire arrive on the first page, and then there’s a life-changing meeting on an Old Saybrook beach. Continue reading from Masters of Illusion
Tag Archives: Hartford History
“Awhirl in a Kaleidoscope of City Memories”
With five novels and three mysteries under her belt, Tirone Smith had established a sterling reputation by 2002 when she was asked by Hartford Courant Books Editor Carole Goldberg to write the keynote essay for the newspaper’s first annual Literary Supplement, which focused on Hartford authors. A phone call from a reader helped lead to her acclaimed memoir, Girls of Tender Age. Continue reading “Awhirl in a Kaleidoscope of City Memories”
The Legend of Hartford
The Legend of Hartford
by Eleanor O’Rourke Koenig
With overtones to what he said,
This man may he believed:
Go into the Cities and Towns, and there you
shall find many compassed about with the chains
of captivity, and every man bemoaning himself.
Thomas Hooker. Continue reading The Legend of Hartford
Glimpse of Hartford, 1868
When Samuel Clemens first visited Hartford in 1868 to see about the publication of his first full-length work, The Innocents Abroad: The New Pilgrims’ Progress, he was still a “special correspondent” for the San Francisco paper, the Alta California. These three letters describe his first impressions of the city, its sights, its industries, and its people. Continue reading Glimpse of Hartford, 1868