Category:

Connecticut

The Legend of the Israel Putnam Wolf Den

Gen. Israel Putnam famously left his plow in the ground when he heard about the Battles of Lexington and Concord and immediately rode the 100 miles from his farm in Brooklyn, Conn., to Cambridge. That plow became something of a local attraction. Years earlier, he created another local attraction, one still around today: The Israel Putnam Wolf Den.

Israel Putnam

Known as Old Put, he was one of the most interesting and vigorous characters of the American Revolution. A reckless fighter, he survived a shipwreck in Cuba, galloped down a rocky cliff to escape the British and risked his life to save a burning powder magazine. During the French and Indian War he served as a Rogers’ Ranger. Mohawk Indians captured him and came close to burning him alive until it rained and a French officer intervened.

The Israel Putnam Wolf Den

Israel Putnam was born on Jan. 7, 1718 in what is now Danvers, Mass. His birthplace still stands, now owned by his descendants.

Israel Putnam birthplace

At 22, he then moved to Pomfret, Conn., attracted by the town’s cheap land for sale.

According to legend, Israel Putnam killed Connecticut’s last wolf in Pomfret two years after he arrived.

Putnam had a substantial home by then, cleared fields and a flock of sheep. But a she-wolf kept attacking his and his neighbors’ flocks. Finally, Putnam and his neighbors got together and decided to pursue the wolf until she was dead.

They spotted her one winter night and followed her to a stream six miles away. Then she turned and entered a cave. The men set up a guard, gathered a crowd of men and boys with guns and dogs and lit a fire at the mouth of the cave.

Hours passed and the wolf remained inside. Finally, Israel Putnam persuaded his neighbors to let him go into the cave with a torch. They tied a rope around his ankle and prepared to pull him out when he kicked.

Israel Putnam Wolf Den

Dead Wolf, Live Farmer

The den’s narrow passageway sloped down fifteen feet, then ran horizontally about 10 feet more and rose gradually 16 feet. Putnam crawled into the cave – you couldn’t stand up in it — and saw the she-wolf’s eyeballs three yards away from him. He kicked the rope, and was dragged out so quickly he lost his shirt.

Putnam then crawled back into the cave with a gun and shot the wolf. His neighbors dragged him out again, nearly overcome by smoke. He revived and crawled back into the cave a third time, where he found the dead wolf, seized her by the ears and kicked the rope. The dead wolf and the live young farmer were dragged out together.

The story was told many times during Putnam’s military career.

Gen. Israel Putnam escapes British dragoons, another of his famous exploits

Putnam’s Wolf Den is on the National Register of Historic Places, and can be found in Mashamoquet Brook State Park.

At the turn of the 20^th century, author Clifton Johnson visited Old Put’s old stomping grounds in Pomfret. In his 1915 book Highways & Byways of New England, Johnson tells of visiting the Wolf Den and of meeting an old New Englander.

“We had that plough of Putnam’s on exhibition here once,” said the old man. “And by gosh! When I saw it I didn’t blame Putnam for leaving it in the field. It was nothing but a crooked stick shod with iron, and I’ll be darned if I’d put it in the barn if it was mine.”

Images: Israel Putnam Wolf den By Ehkastning – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=35801371. Cartoon image of wolf https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/.

This story last updated in 2023.

6 comments 1.1k views

The Trial of Dr. Benjamin Spock

Dr. Benjamin Spock was a card-carrying member of the Eastern Establishment until a presidential remark set him on a different path. It ended with his criminal conviction for opposing the Vietnam War.

He started out as a WASPy pediatrician who wrote a best-selling book. Then he began to rail against the Vietnam War and got himself indicted by the federal government.

Dr. Benjamin Spock

Just before his trial, he told a reporter, “It sometimes seems as if my friends are shooting by me to the right while they see me as sky-rocketing to the left.”

Benjamin Spock

Benjamin Spock was born on May 2, 1903, the son of a prominent New Haven lawyer. He followed his father’s academic path: Philips Academy and Yale University. He belonged to Scroll and Key, the secret society for future CIA directors and secretaries of state. Benjamin Spock even won a gold medal for rowing in the 1924 Olympics.

He graduated first in his class at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons and started practicing as a pediatrician. He came across as gentle and dignified in his Brooks Brothers suits.

In 1946, he wrote Baby and Child Care, which instantly became the bible for new parents. For 52 years, no other book sold more copies except for – well, the Bible.

A Matter of Wording

Dr. Benjamin Spock turned into a peace activist in 1962 because of something President John F. Kennedy said. In May 1968, Spock told Life magazine:

The thing that did it was actually very small, a matter of wording. It was when President Kennedy decided to resume nuclear testing in 1962, after Russia resumed. He said that his experts told him we were way ahead of the Soviet Union in everything, but if we didn’t resume testing they could conceivably catch up sometime in the future. It made me realize that if a country can’t stop testing when it’s behind and can’t stop when it’s ahead either, then every excuse worked for more bombs and none for less. That was my turning point.

Arrest

Then at age 59 he joined the Committee for a Sane Nuclear Policy. As the United States got more and more involved in the Vietnam War, Dr. Benjamin Spock got more strident opposing it. He urged young men not to register for selective service, burn their draft cards and skip their physicals.

He and other prominent writers, academics and public figures signed a statement calling the war illegal. They published it in the New York Review of Books on Oct. 12, 1967. Four days later, he joined a “Turn In, Burn In” rally at the Arlington Street Church in Boston. Young men marched on Boston Common, then burned their draft cards inside the church.

A draft card burning at the Arlington Street Church

Spock Arrested

On Dec. 5, 1967, he was arrested for protesting the war. A month later, U.S. Attorney General Ramsay Clark indicted him and four others for conspiring to counsel young men to evade the draft. Clark, who also opposed the war, chose prominent targets because he wanted a vigorous debate about the conflict.

Brought to trial in Boston on May 19, 1968 were Dr. Benjamin Spock, William Sloane Coffin, chaplain at Yale; Marcus Raskin, head of a think tank; Mitchell Goodman, novelist; and Michael Ferber, a Harvard graduate student. The press dubbed them the Boston Five.

It was the first major prosecution of the Vietnam War and it pretty much backfired. Alan Dershowitz later called it “a national disgrace.”

The men had never met each other, which made the conspiracy charge questionable. Dershowitz speculated the government brought a weak conspiracy charge because it would have the greatest impact on discouraging organized opposition to the Vietnam War.

Ramsey Clark, though, later indicated he brought a weak case because he wanted to lose it. ” “We won the case, that was the worst part,” he said.

Ramsey Clark and Lyndon Johnson in 1967.

Unknown Co-Conspirators

The trial, held in federal court in Boston, was a study in prosecutorial overreach and judicial bias.

Prosecutor John Wall claimed the defendants conspired with “diverse other persons, some known and others unknown.” The defense lawyer asked the prosecution to identify those people. Wall showed three hours of television footage of mass meetings, church services and news conferences. Wall later told a reporter that a man who claps and cheers like mad when Spock speaks is a co-conspirator, but the man who sits glum is not.

The judge, 85-year-old Francis Ford, appeared to be biased against the defendants. After the prosecutor made a cutting remark, Ford said to his clerk, “Tell that son of a bitch to cut it out! He’ll blow this case if he keeps this up, and get us all in trouble.”

At one point, the prosecutor asked one of the defendants whether he applauded William Sloane Coffin out of politeness or agreement. The defense attorney objected, saying, “I didn’t know applause was a crime.” Judge Ford threatened the attorney with contempt.

Conviction

Nonetheless, the jury convicted all but Raskin. The judge sentenced Dr. Spock to two years in prison. He never did time, as an appeals court judge overturned his conviction in 1969.

In a press conference after his conviction, Dr. Spock lost his composure. “I say to the American people, ‘Wake up.’ “ he shouted. “Get out there and do something before it’s too late. Do something NOW!”

He continued to speak out against the war on college campuses and at peace rallies. He was received warmly. “It’s worth being a criminal to get this kind of reception,” he said.

But he paid a price. Sales of Baby and Child Care dipped. His political enemies said the book promoted the permissiveness that caused the turmoil of the 1960s. Conservative minister Norman Vincent Peale said ‘the U.S. was paying the price of two generations that followed the Dr. Spock baby plan of instant gratification of needs.’

The criticism spread and took hold.

Spock dismissed it as politically motivated. But 25 years after the trial, reporters were asking him if he was still permissive. “You can’t catch up with a false accusation,” he said.

But he didn’t stop his peace activism. In 1987, police arrested him at Cape Canaveral Florida for protesting the Trident II missile.

Dr. Benjamin Spock protesting in Florida at age 83. He is at the microphone.

Dr. Benjamin Spock died on March 15, 1998, in La Jolla, Calif.

With thanks to America on Trial: Inside the Legal Battles That Transformed Our Nation by Alan Dershowitz.

This story about Benjamin Spock was updated in 2022.

Images: Dr. Spock protesting in Florida By Please credit "Family collection of Infrogmation of New Orleans" – Photo by deceased parent of Infrogmation of New Orleans, 1987. Inherited with sole rights by Infrogmation of New Orleans., CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=88286649. Draft card burning from WGBH, Howard Zinn And Burning Draft Cards – The Rewind, Episode 8, via youtube. Ramsey Clark and LBJ By LBJ Library photo by Yoichi Okamoto – http://www.lbjlibrary.net/collections/photo-archive.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=103501216. “Stop the War Now” sign By State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory, https://floridamemory.com/items/show/25387, Attribution, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44251446.

7 comments 997 views

In Colonial New England, the New Year Started on March 25

In colonial New England, the new year did not start on January 1. Not because the Puritans didn’t want people to have too much fun on New Year’s Eve. It was because England refused to go along with the rest of Europe in adopting the Gregorian calendar.

The English year didn’t change until March 25, or Lady Day, when Christians celebrate the Feast of the Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin. So in 1620, John Winthrop’s father Adam wrote in his diary, “The new year beginneth,” on March 25.

European New Year

Didn’t go along with the pope.

The whole thing started with Julius Caesar. In 45 B.C., he ordered a new calendar, one with 12 months, 365 days and a start date of January 1. Every fourth year would include a leap year to compensate for the extra six hours or so it takes the earth to revolve around the sun.

By the 9^th century, some southern European countries began celebrating the first day of the new year on March 25 to coincide with the Annunciation. Balky England didn’t follow along until the 12^th century.

By the 16^th century it became obvious that the Julian calendar overcompensated with too many leap years. Equinoxes were falling 10 days too early. Catholics worried they weren’t celebrating Easter in the proper season. So in 1582, Pope Gregory XIII approved the New Style, or Gregorian calendar. Ten days were dropped from October 1582 and leap years came slightly less often. Only millennia years divisible by 400 would have leap years. January 1 would be New Year’s Day.

Pope Gregory by Lavinia Fontana

Most of Europe went along with the change. England did not. In 1582, Protestant Queen Elizabeth I did not intend to take orders from the Catholic Church. March 25 remained the legal start of the new year. But the English people began celebrating January 1 as New Year’s Day along with the rest of Europe. Almanac publishers went along with them, too.

Double Dating

That’s how double dating got started in colonial record keeping. Dates between Jan. 1 and March 25 were identified with a slash mark between the years that overlapped. Just as an example, records of the first parish in Brewster, Mass., show double dates: ’Eleazer Crosbeys Eunice baptized on Jan : 9 . 1731/2’ and ‘Jonathan Cobb admitted on March 19 . 1731/2.’

Connecticut State Library

Double dating wasn’t for everyone, as the Connecticut State Library points out. The Colony of Connecticut’s records show a court at Hartford on 27 December 1636 followed by a court at Hartford on 21 February 1636 followed in turn by a court at Hartford on 28 March 1637. You might think the February session was recorded out of sequence, but it’s correct: December 1636 was followed by January and February 1636, because 1636 continued until March 24.

England and her colonies finally caved in to the new calendar when Parliament passed the Calendar Act of 1750. As of 1752, January 1 was officially the new year and 11 days were dropped from September.

Historians generally list both Old Style and New Style dates for pre-1752 records. Look up Ethan Allen, for example, and you’ll see his dates listed as ‘January 21, 1738 [O.S. January 10, 1737] – February 12, 1789.’ But that isn’t always the case. George Washington changed his birthdate from Feb. 11, 1732 under the Julian calendar to Feb. 22, 1732 under the Gregorian calendar.

So a word to the wise historian: Be careful how you date!

This story was updated in 2023.

Image: Connecticut State Library By STATELIB – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=60468962

15 comments 2.7k views

The First Lady of Connecticut Newspapers, Hannah Bunce Watson

As if caring for five children under the age of seven wasn’t enough for the newly-widowed Hannah Bunce Watson, American revolutionaries needed the support of her Connecticut newspaper, the Courant.

An early edition of the Connecticut Courant.

Hannah Bunce Watson was born on Dec. 28, 1749 in Lebanon, Conn., and married Ebenezer Watson, the Hartford printer who published the Connecticut Courant. It was a second marriage for both of them. Ebenezer Watson died suddenly of smallpox in late 1777, creating a dilemma for American patriots.

The Courant was crucial to maintaining popular support in New England for the American Revolution, as the British had shut down all the newspapers in Boston. Plus, New York’s newspapers were all Loyalist and printed nothing but pro-British news. The Courant was the only paper large enough to provide reliable news to patriots in the Northeast.

Hannah Bunce Watson knew little about printing, but she went ahead publishing the Courant to support the war effort. She made 20-year-old George Goodwin a business partner, as he had already worked for the newspaper for 12 years. They ran stories about battles, short local news items, analyses of colonial politics and criticisms of the British Parliament.

No Recipes

Hannah Bunce Watson may have been one of the first women to edit a newspaper in America, but the Courant didn’t have much in the way of recipes and fashion. She published only nine non-news stories during the two years she ran the paper.

A year later, Tories set fire to the mill that produced paper for the Courant. Watson and Goodwin managed to print a half-sheet paper the day after the fire — and announced it would have to close soon.

The loss of the paper mill was a blow not just to the newspaper but to the patriot cause. It produced writing paper — crucial to communication in that era — as well as newsprint. The British had made sure paper in all forms was scarce in America by cutting off imports.

Sarah Ledyard was the widow of Ebenezer Watson’s partner in the mill. She and Hannah Bunce Watson decided to appeal to the Connecticut Assembly. They asked the Connecticut Legislature for a loan to rebuild the mill. Within a day, lawmakers agreed to establish a state lottery to raise funds for the paper mill. It was rebuilt in the spring, and the Courant continued publishing without interruption.

Despite all the demands on her, Watson managed to find time for a courtship with Barzillai Hudson. They married in 1779, and he took control of the newspaper. In 1837 the Connecticut Courant became the Hartford Courant. It is to this day the largest daily newspaper in Connecticut.

Hannah Bunce Watson died on Sept. 27, 1807. She was inducted into the Connecticut Women’s Hall of Fame in 1994.

If you enjoyed this story about Hannah Bunce Watson, you may want to read about another early American printer, Ann Smith Franklin, here. This story was updated in 2018.

13 comments 524 views

High Thinking and Low Living in Old Lyme

Florence Griswold suffered reversals of fortune that, in the end, transformed her beautiful old Georgian home into the Old Lyme Art Colony, the most famous collection of artists in its day. In the process, she gave Old Lyme, Conn., a new identity and shaped the careers of a generation of artists.

Boston Common at Dusk by Childe Hassam, member of the Old Lyme Art Colony

Florence Griswold

Florence Griswold was born Dec. 25, 1850 in Old Lyme, Conn., the youngest of four children. Her family was descended from early settlers of the town, and her father was a prosperous sea captain. In 1841 he bought a Georgian mansion on a 12-acre estate for his new bride.

Two decades later, the arrival of the Civil War and steam-powered vessels forced Florence’s father into early retirement. Bad investments cost him his fortune.

Old Lyme, once a prosperous shipbuilding town, fell on hard times as well.

So to make ends meet, Florence’s mother and two sisters in 1878 turned the rambling house into a school for girls. Then Florence and her sister Adele found themselves in a financial bind when their father, mother and sister died.

In 1892 the sisters started to take in boarders, an acceptable way for women to make money and a fortunate choice for Florence and the American art world.

Florence Griswold. Painting titled The Harpist by Alphonse Jongers, 1903. Courtesy Florence Griswold Museum.

The Old Lyme Art Colony

In 1899, artist Henry Ward Ranger came to Old Lyme, having just returned from the European art scene. He saw in the pretty coastal town an American version of France’s Barbizon, which spawned its own school of art.

Ranger rented a room from Miss Florence and encouraged his friends to come to Old Lyme. The next year, his friends Lewis Cohen, Henry Rankin Poore, Louis Paul Dessar, and William Henry Howe joined him. Two hundred more artists would pass through the colony over the next three decades, creating a school of art known as American Impressionism.

Florence Griswold called herself ‘the keeper of the art colony.” The artists called her Miss Florence. She charged $7 a week for a room, which included meals, a daily pitcher of water and a kerosene lamp to find one’s way to one’s rooms (or around the rooms) at night. She made sure the artists returned year after year by writing them during the winter.

Miss Florence also took a strong interest in the artists’ work and forever tried to sell their paintings. She turned the front hall into a gallery, where she sold the artists’ framed paintings and old furniture.

In August 1902, 12 of the artists put on an exhibition in the Old Lyme Public Library. The Hartford Courant reported the library was ‘thronged’ by visitors from Hartford, New Haven, Middletown, New York, New London, Boston, Chicago, Springfield and elsewhere.

Detail from May Night (1906) by Willard Metcalf, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. The painting depicts the Griswold house.

Childe Hassam Arrives

The success of the exhibit may have attracted Childe Hassam the next year. Hassam, a prolific and influential artist, then in his 40s, had a lot of friends. As the popularity of the summer exhibitions grew, some of the country’s best artists began making the pilgrimage to Old Lyme.

The artists turned barns and sheds into studios. They painted the First Congregational Church, the bridge nearby and old fruit orchards. Mountain laurel, which grew especially well in Old Lyme, was a favorite subject for many of the artists. One artists stuck cotton balls to laurel shrubs so he could paint them after their blossoms faded.

Miss Florence created a warm, cheerful atmosphere. She also provided a respectable veneer for the bohemian habits of the artists. Childe Hassam, in a July 3, 1905 letter, called the Griswold house ‘just the place for high thinking and low living.’ Archaeologists later discovered a stash of beer, wine and liquor bottles in the crawl space under Hassam’s studio.

Detail from “Church at Old Lyme,” oil on canvas, by Childe Hassam. Courtesy of the Albright-Knox Art Gallery.

No Inconsiderable Chapter

Caroline Weir Ely, daughter of artist J. Alden Weir, knew the Old Lyme Art Colony well.

“Miss Florence was the life of the house,” she wrote, “happy go lucky, always ready to get up a picnic, arbitrator of quarrels, and the first to lead the way to the abundant larder, which, night after night, was raided of its new cakes and pies.”

Miss Florence died in 1937. In her obituary, the New York Times wrote, “This generous spirit survives; and not in the Griswold House alone, but as part of no inconsiderable chapter in the history of our native art.”

Her legacy lives on in the renowned Florence Griswold Museum, the ‘Home of American Impressionism.’ You can visit the museum campus year round (click here for more information).

This story about the Old Lyme Art Colony was updated in 2022.

15 comments 1.1k views

Catherine Beecher Reluctantly Shares a Plum Pudding Recipe

Catherine Beecher was the Martha Stewart of her day and, like Martha Stewart, lived in Connecticut (Hartford, not Westport). She was Harriet Beecher Stowe’s big sister and together they wrote The American Woman’s Home in 1869. It was probably the most important guidebook of domestic advice in the 19^th century.

From The Century, courtesy Boston Public Library

Catherine had taken over running her family’s household at 16 when her mother died. In addition to becoming a 19^th century domestic diva, she was a pioneer in women’s education. She opened the Hartford Female Seminary in 1823, one of the first major educational institutions for women in the United States. Later in life she established women’s colleges in Iowa, Illinois and Wisconsin.

Catherine Beecher

Catherine Beecher never married, though she was engaged to Yale University professor Alexander Metcalf Fisher. He died at sea before the wedding.

Alexander Metcalf Fisher

She was a woman of strong but not inflexible opinions. She weighed her students’ food before they ate it and fed them the Graham diet, a health food craze of the 1820s. It involved Graham flour, high-fiber foods and no meat, spices or sweeteners.

Her students rebelled against the austere diet, but in a genteel way. Ten of them invited her to eat in a restaurant where she had an excellent meal. The food at the Hartford Female Seminary quickly improved.

Catherine Beecher

In The American Woman’s Home she inveighs against plum pudding and mince pie: “Witness the national recipe for plum-pudding: which may be rendered: Take a pound of every indigestible substance you can think of, boil into a cannon-ball, and serve with flaming brandy. So of the Christmas mince-pie…”

She was not a huge fan of cakes, dismissing confectionery as “pleasing and complicated compounds of sweets and spices, devised not for health and nourishment, and strongly suspected of interfering with both—mere tolerated gratifications of the palate, which we eat, not with the expectation of being benefited, but only with the hope of not being injured by them.”

But in a supplement to The American Woman’s Home, as in her students’ diets, she relented. Here is Catherine Beecher’s recipe for Baked English Plum Pudding from Miss Beecher’s Domestic Receipt Book.

Ingredients:

A quarter of a pound of suet, chopped first, and half a teaspoonful of salt
Half of a pound of bread crumbs
Half of a pound of stoned raisins, wet and dredged with flour
Three ounces of citron
Milk, and six eggs
Half of a pound of currants
Half of a pound of sugar.

Directions:

Pour enough scalded milk onto the bread-crumbs to swell them; when cold, add the other ingredients. If it is too stiff, thin it with milk; if it is too thin, add more bread crumbs. Then add two grated nutmegs, a tablespoonful of mace and cinnamon, and half a gill of brandy. Bake two hours.

Catherine Beecher died of apoplexy in 1878.

* * *

The Christmas holiday actually began in ancient Rome — and so did Italian cookies. The New England Historical Society’s new book, 24 Historic Italian Christmas Cookie Recipes, tells you how to make those delicious treats. It also bring you the history of the Italian immigrants who brought them to New England. Available now on Amazon; just click here.

This story about Catherine Beecher was updated in 2022. Image of plum pudding By Musical Linguist, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=1100178.

16 comments 961 views

Newer Posts

Older Posts

Connecticut

The Legend of the Israel Putnam Wolf Den

The Israel Putnam Wolf Den

Dead Wolf, Live Farmer

The Trial of Dr. Benjamin Spock

Benjamin Spock

A Matter of Wording

Arrest

Spock Arrested

Unknown Co-Conspirators

Conviction

In Colonial New England, the New Year Started on March 25

European New Year

Double Dating

The First Lady of Connecticut Newspapers, Hannah Bunce Watson

No Recipes

High Thinking and Low Living in Old Lyme

Florence Griswold

The Old Lyme Art Colony

Childe Hassam Arrives

No Inconsiderable Chapter

Catherine Beecher Reluctantly Shares a Plum Pudding Recipe

Catherine Beecher

Subscribe To Our Newsletter

Thanks for Signing Up!