News and Events

Historic postcards depicting towns throughout Connecticut will be on display at a wine and cheese reception on Thursday, March 30.

The reception will be held from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. at the Petrini Gallery, located in the former G. Fox department store building at 960 Main Street. The event is sponsored by the gallery and the Antiquarian & Landmarks Society.

On display will be postcards from the collection of Raymond Cable, a Milford resident who owned about 12,000 images, including albums, loose cards, and a dozen boxes of glass-plate negatives of Connecticut landmarks dating primarily from 1870 to 1920. The collection is a rich source of illustrations for authors, publishers, educators, and researchers. All 169 Connecticut cities and towns are represented in his postcards. (Shown here is a postcard depicting Hartford's Bushnell Park at a time when the Park River remained exposed.)

According to A&LS, the reception "will be an opportunity to order your personal landmark image. It could be the place where you were born or your parents lived all their lives; it could be a building which doesn’t exist anymore or your favorite place in Connecticut. Do not miss this unique chance to view, to mingle, to cherish, to acquire a keepsake which will last for ever!"

The full Cable Postcard Collection is available for viewers by appointment at A&L’s headquarters at 255 Main Street, 4th floor, Hartford, CT 06106, call (860) 247-8996, ext.12 or visit www.hartnet.org/als.

Petrini Gallery specializes in quality custom framing and has been serving the Hartford area since 1970. The gallery is open to the public Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, 10:00 a.m. to 4 p.m., Thursdays 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. For more information call (860) 241-1099.

The Antiquarian & Landmarks Society is a statewide cultural organization that operates a network of historic house museums. It promotes interest in Connecticut's special places by preserving properties and collections of historic, scenic, and artistic value

# Posted by Kevin Flood at 10:45 PM

Saturday, February 25, 2006

Know someone deserving of a preservation award?

This call has gone out to members of the Hartford Preservation Alliance:

"In May of each of the past five years, national Preservation Month (formerly Preservation Week) in Hartford has been celebrated with an awards ceremony for persons who have, during the preceding year, contributed in exceptional ways to architectural preservation in Hartford.

"We have now started the process of collecting recommendations for this year's preservation awards and would very much appreciate your suggestions. We are especially interested in awards which show preservation activity at the neighborhood level. Recommendations will be accepted in at least the following categories:

Historic restoration, exterior and interior
Historically-sensitive in-fill and new construction
Historic painting
Facade restoration
Park improvement and landscaping
Historically-sensitive streetscape improvements
Historic signage
Historic district creation
Adaptive reuse
Community education
Preservation advocacy
Lifetime contribution to the preservation movement

"These categories, however, are not exclusive. Recommendations of all sorts are welcome -- we encourage creativity. We also encourage you to ask your friends and associates to help identify potential awardees.

"If you have recommendations for Preservation Week awards in 2006, please send them to us. We would appreciate your responding by March 11 (although we will accept recommendations past that date)."

# Posted by Kevin Flood at 11:44 AM

Find out what's new at the Old State House

Among the Aetna First Thursdays events to be held in Hartford on Thursday, March 2, will be a noontime talk on the developments planned for the Old State House. Given at the downtown landmark by Old State House Executive Director David M. Kahn, it will include a multi-media exhibit, "History Is All Around Us." It's free. Bring your own bag lunch. For more information, call 522-6766.

Another First Thursday event planned for 5:30 to 7 p.m. that day is an exhibit photographs taken throughout the Hartford area over the past 30 years by Glastonbury photographer Robert Thiesfield. They include images of the state Capitol, the Ancient Burying Ground, and Hartford City Hall. Meet the artist during a wine and cheese reception in the Aetna Gallery at the Butler-McCook House and Gardern at 396 Main Street. For more information, call 522-1806. The Butler-McCook House is operated as a museum by the Antiquarian & Landmarks Society.

# Posted by Kevin Flood at 11:19 AM

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

First 150 years of Hartford Courant now online--for free!

A news release from the Connecticut State Library:

"HARTFORD, CT -- It was April 10, 1865 and the Hartford Daily Courant headline read 'Glorious News! Surrender of Lee and His Whole Army!' This is but one of the fascinating moments in time captured by the Hartford Courant historical collection, a newly created digital archive offered through the State Library’s Connecticut Digital Library (iCONN) project.

"The Hartford Courant historical collection is a fully searchable digital archive of more than 280,000 pages of the paper that is 'older than the nation.' The collection spans over 150 years of news, from the inception of the paper in 1764 to December 31, 1922.

"'This is an exciting and signficant addition to the suite of iCONN databases and one that benefits all Connecticut residents,' said State Librarian Kendall F. Wiggin.

"The Hartford Courant historical collection joins the current iCONN offerings of more than 4,000 full-text magazines, newspapers, scholarly journals, ebooks, images, encyclopedia entries, and a statewide library catalog. iCONN databases are available to every academic, public, and K-12 library in Connecticut. They are also accessible to Connecticut residents through www.iconn.org. Residents using iCONN from outside of a library need their public library card to use the service.

"The Connecticut State Library worked with a coalition of other libraries, educational institutions, and private foundations to underwrite the costs of digitization. The State Library contracted with ProQuest Information and Learning to create the digital archive.

"'This was the first time the State Library has gone to the library community to help fund an iCONN database and the response was gratifying,' noted Mr. Wiggin.

"The Connecticut Digital Library – a.k.a., iCONN - was proposed by then-Lieutenant Governor M. Jodi Rell in 1999 and was subsequently passed into law in the 2000 legislative session. Since the service 'went live' in 2001, over 30 million searches have been conducted. iCONN is administered by the Connecticut State Library, in conjunction with the Department of Higher Education.

"A direct link into the Hartford Courant historical collection is available at http://rqst-agent.auto-graphics.com/LoginModule/Goto.aspx?cuid=rqst&dataid=765. If you are outside of a library, you will be asked to provide a valid public library barcode number to enter the database.

"If you have questions or comments about the Hartford Courant historical project, you can contact the Connecticut Digital Library offices at 860-344-2475 or via our web-based form at: http://www.iconn.org/SendComments.aspx."

# Posted by Kevin Flood at 12:11 AM

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Pictures sought for book on Hartford's West Indian community

"West Indian-Americans in Greater Hartford: Images of the Past, 1920 to 1970" will be published this fall by Arcadia Publishing, the same company responsible for the wonderful "Images of Hartford" picture books. This book, slated to appear in the fall, is being put together by members of the West Indian Foundation, the West Indian Social Club, and other organizations, according to the Hartford Courant. Photographs are still being sought. If you have any you'd like to share, call Keith Carr at 860-241-0379 or Fiona Vernal at 860-486-5539.

# Posted by Kevin Flood at 11:19 PM

Sunday, February 19, 2006

Hartford's synagogues

Today's Hartford Courant includes a long and fascinating op-ed article on the history of Hartford's synagogues, "Temples Woven In Hartford History." The author, Mary M. Donohue, architectural historian of the Connecticut Commission on Culture & Tourism, writes: "There are no active Jewish synagogues in the city today, but there were more than a dozen, beginning in the 1800s." She notes that many of the buildings remain in use, "most often as Protestant churches with largely African-American congregations." A sidebar article lists nine major Hartford synagogues and their current uses.

Hartford History