Listen to Ocean Vuong talk about Hartford and Literature on “Shelf Talker,” an audio file from CT Museum’s Connecticut’s Bookshelf exhibit, 2024. Continue reading Ocean Vuong, “Hartfordian”
Tag Archives: Hartford History
Fall of the Charter Oak
Sigourney wrote several poems in homage to the famous Connecticut tree known as the Charter Oak. This poem was written in the period of state-wide grief when the tree was struck by lightening and fell on August 21, 1856. Hartford even organized a funeral procession for the tree that drew crowds of mourners. The wood from the tree was harvested and turned into keepsakes that can still be viewed at places like the CT Museum of Culture and History and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art. Charles De Wolf Brownell’s painting of 1857 is often on view at the Wadsworth, a spectacular homage to the tree whose frame is made from the Charter Oak’s wood. Read what Mark Twain had to say about the Charter Oak on his first visit to Hartford and to the Wadsworth in this anthology (see “Glimpse of Hartford” under Samuel Clemens/Mark Twain.) To learn what made this such an iconic tree and to see an image of Brownell’s painting, go to The Legend of the Charter Oak on Connecticuthistory.org. Continue reading Fall of the Charter Oak
from Horseless Carriage Days
Chapter VII of Percy Maxim’s memoir Horseless Carriage Days recounts Maxim’s role in the pioneering of the automobile, particularly:
pioneer days between the years 1893 and 1901, when a ride out into the country in a horseless carriage was an adventure; when that temperamental machine, the gasoline engine, was being tamed; when there were no good roads, no road signs, no road maps, no filling stations; when gasoline had to be purchased either in paint shops before dark or in drug stores; when there were no registration plates, no operator’s licenses, no protection against wind, rain, and cold; and when every horse on the road stood upon his hind legs and made a scene. (Maxim 1937, xi) Continue reading from Horseless Carriage Days
Girls of Tender Age, Chapter 22 (Final Section)
Girls of Tender Age, Chapter 22 (Final Section)
Reader Advisory: some readers may find this segment disturbing
In Chapter Twenty-Two the central horror of Tirone Smith’s childhood is almost too difficult to read. Tirone Smith is not one for sensationalism, though, and crafted detail follows crafted detail in grim succession. The aftermath of the murder of 11-year-old Irene Fiedorowicz starts with a police officer leaving for work late at night. Continue reading Girls of Tender Age, Chapter 22 (Final Section)
Girls of Tender Age, Chapter Nine
Girls of Tender Age, Chapter Nine
Chapter Nine of Girls of Tender Age treats a visit to the downtown Hartford department store G. Fox, a visit that can’t possibly have been duplicated any time in the store’s history. Continue reading Girls of Tender Age, Chapter Nine
from Girls of Tender Age
In Girls of Tender Age (2006), Tirone Smith drew on the memories of a Hartford childhood and the tragedy that haunted it. In Chapter Seven we meet her autistic and beloved brother Tyler, a portrait of the Charter Oak Terrace housing project in its early days, and a hilarious piano-moving scene. Continue reading from Girls of Tender Age
from Masters of Illusion
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
“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