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Speranza
East Haven today is slightly different from 400 years ago.
This town was just a "village" up to 1650.
The "village" struggled hard to become "incorporated" as a "town".
The first and oldest part of what we know call "East Haven" was around the now known "green" on the corner of Hemingway street and main street.
The old families of the Bradleys, Smiths, and Hemingways are all from the days of England's rule.
Indians shared the lands until the lands were removed from them.
The Indian reservation was indeed the old lighthouse area NOW in New Haven, that used to be part of the "village" of East Haven till the new government of the United States took possession of it and made it the reservation, later to be used for the lighthouse.
Fair Haven known as "The Dragon" neighbourhood of East Haven in 1800 became a "village" of its own now, growing fast do to oysters and the shipping along the majestic Quinnipiac river.
The town was divided over the bridges that were built privately but turned over to the East Haven town do to the maintenance and replacement costs.
The debts of the wars and bridges sold Fair Haven to New Haven.
Currently most of what was of the then Fair Haven has disappeared in time.
A road across the so-called "Dragon" Bridge to the road know known the Quinnipiac Riverside Avenue was the only road to North Haven and North Branford through East Haven in the village of Foxon.
Trains and trolleys had come to the villages in 1870.
The shore line electric rail way was built from State street to the village of Guilford .
East Haven today is a thriving suburb and residential "bedroom community" of New Haven.
One time in the 1890s East Haven was what we may call a "resort" town.
The glorious Lake Saltonstall, for example, had steamers, picnic areas, swimming, boating, and fishing.
The Yale boat teams indeed used to race on Lake Saltonstall.
The trolley company built a line from the Morris Cove area to Lake Saltonstall, which was owned by George H. Townsend (who had his mansion on Townsend avenue, Raynham) but he sold it to the New Haven Water Company.
In its hayday you would get there by stagecoach for 5 cents.
Residents, who made about 3 dollars a week then, could take the trolley for 5 cents.
School children got books of 50 tickets at 2.50, making it 5 cents to go to school in New Haven by trolley.
The tracks were pulled up from Lake Saltonstall and moved to Momauguin Cosy beach, where a hotel was built by the trolley company after Lake Saltonstall was closed to the public for good ("or bad", as others think).
We now switch to Cosy beach and Silver Sands hotels, and bathing became very popular as well as dining.
East Haven was beautiful with silvery sand glowing in the sun, the cool blue waters of Long island Sound as well as the escape from the buzzle of New Haven.
Cosy Beach became the hottest summer place to be, with every prestigious resident building summer cottages and homes and other lodging hotels.
The cove at Mansfield Grove (including Mansfield's Point) was also a attraction with a hotel and eatery, dancing ,camping, boating, fishing, bathing now known as swimming.
Up until the 1938 hurricane, it all prospered.
The invention of the automobile wiped out the need for the trolleys -- although the trolley museum still exists!
By the 1950s, metal for the war was needed and the tracks, poles, and lines were all gone.
The beach was wiped out by the hurricane, too, alas.
Not much of the beach was rebuilt, but by 1970 the East Haven shoreline (now part of the green trailway) was ready for re-vitalization,making it what it is to day.
The sophisticated "Silver Sands Hotel" was alas torn down.
It used to feature talented popular artists performing there.
The Bridgeport college used to own property in East Haven and use it.
The centre of town as we know now was very different in 1890.
Picture as you will homes all along the street from Hemingway avenue to the town line today.
The homes covered both sides of the street as farms.
Notably, a few stores operated out of the wooden structures.
The old stone church was a centre of attraction for those who lived in the now "town" of East Haven.
The first church was in the green, as was the school.
The church was built after its likeness of the one in the state of Massachussetts.
At the time, it was not wise to build a church out of stone.
But it was built with objection, as across the street was an old farm.
This farm was razed to build a bank in 1920.
This bank became the new home of Holcomes's drug-store.
Later a movie house, a bowling ally, and Goodies occupied this building, as well as others.
Then the town hall was built as well as the fire station.
All removing the old "farms" that once stood in their place.
The tavern across from Holcomes was full of East Haven's history.
The tavern was torn down and replaced by a fuel station till it also was replaced by a bank.
The town of East Haven grew when the town decided to revitalize the center.
By then, Saltonstall parkway, past the main street, past all the stores on main street.
Helping to make the stores become dilapidated from less shoppers knowing they were there.
Main Street was rebuilt as you see it today.
Farms in 1930 became money-makers for the development of neighbourhoods.
The ending of the war and revitalization of New Haven helped to build East Haven as a bigger and better residential suburban "bedroom community".
There are three super-markets and small residential business of all kinds in East Haven to serve the residents without really having to go anywhere else.
This town has had its sheer of happenings in its past.
These includes three air plane accidents, hurricanes, salt storms, and a tornado.
The town fire department was built in 1900.
The police department was built in 1928 under city hall.
It moved to North High in 1972.
The fire department has been in the same building location since it founding but replaced its old wooden building, moving it to the rear for the public works dept being demolished in the revitalization of the center with its Georgian style brick one as you see today
At one time the only street though East Haven to New London was our main street known as a the post road, made for the post men.
All other paths were cow or Indian paths eventually made into roads.
The East Heaven centre green was once used as a market, cow feeding ,and camping for the revolutionary soldiers.
East Haven has a history never told to the public in school books about the men of this time war against the British.
The invasion of New Haven came up on East Haven shores and marched to the old stone church and down to Forbes's bridge.
School started on the green with a small building attached to a church.
It burned down.
It was rebuilt after some time across from the green.
Then the first brick building was built, and a second wood school on high street was moved to the rail way station next to the high street bridge called "Rail way avenue"
The rail way station was removed in 1940.
A second school was built of brick, then a third.
By 1950, all have been made of brick even in Foxon.
Foxon area was still farms, but was replaced with neighborhoods too.
Today, East Haven is a modern town, as nice as it used to be, even if it looks like any other Connecticut town (in parts).
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For the record,
East Haven, Connecticut
MILITIA
1840 Officers and privates of fifth company, second regiment, second brigade infantry, member of Captain Hotchkiss company .
Joseph Ives Hotchkiss, captain
Nathan Andrews, lieutenant
Philip Street, sargent
Lucius Lindsley, orderly sargent
Edward Hemingway, second sargent
Privates:
Jared Andrews
Charles Wolcott
Edward A. Walker
Laban Smith
Ashuel Thompson
Charles Bishop
Edward Thompson
Alfred Hughes
Roswell Hughes
Samuel Forbes,
Robert Rowes,
Jared Smith,
O.B Thompson,
Thaueous Street,
Abraham Chidsey,
Benjamin Street,
Charles Auger,
Street Chidsey,
Justin Bradley
Henry Forbes,
Jeremiah Barns,
Hezekial Bradley
William Tuttle
It’s been a decade since those 16 days in February 2005 when the artist duo Christo and Jeanne-Claude installed 7,500 gates along New York's Central Park’s walkways, each adorned with shimmering saffron-colored panels creating what Christo described as “a golden river appearing and disappearing through the branches of the trees.”
It was a spectacle like no other in the park’s long history.
The $20 million project, financed by the sale of Christo’s artworks, pumped nearly $250 million into the city’s economy and attracted four million visitors.
“It put New York City in the international headlines for something hopeful for the first time since 9/11,” recalled Patricia E. Harris, the former deputy mayor and, for decades, a leading supporter of the project with her boss, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.
“It reminded the world that our city’s artistic spirit was alive and well.”
The $20 million project, financed by the sale of Christo’s artworks, pumped nearly $250 million into the city’s economy and attracted four million visitors.
“It put New York City in the international headlines for something hopeful for the first time since 9/11,” recalled Patricia E. Harris, the former deputy mayor and, for decades, a leading supporter of the project with her boss, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.
“It reminded the world that our city’s artistic spirit was alive and well.”
And also showed the world that art has the power to change the landscape.
Whether they were wrapping the Reichstag in a million square feet of fabric, or raising a 365-foot-high curtain across a valley in Colorado, Christo and Jeanne-Claude produced visual feats that resonated with the public in a way few artists ever have.
“You become part of the dialogue,” said Germano Celant, the Italian curator.
“These projects are a kind of dream, one that everybody can understand and everybody can participate in.”
Whether they were wrapping the Reichstag in a million square feet of fabric, or raising a 365-foot-high curtain across a valley in Colorado, Christo and Jeanne-Claude produced visual feats that resonated with the public in a way few artists ever have.
“You become part of the dialogue,” said Germano Celant, the Italian curator.
“These projects are a kind of dream, one that everybody can understand and everybody can participate in.”
But since Jeanne-Claude’s death in 2009, from complications of a brain aneurysm, some wondered if the dream had died too.
It seemed to many that Christo had disappeared from public view.
The couple had been inseparable for 47 years, collaborators for most of that time.
She was the more vocal and visible, with her flaming red hair, a shade she enjoyed telling people was specially chosen by her husband.
They even shared the same birthday, June 13, 1935, and a penchant for using only a first name.
He was born Christo Javacheff in Bulgaria, his wife Jeanne-Claude de Guillebon in Morocco.
It seemed to many that Christo had disappeared from public view.
The couple had been inseparable for 47 years, collaborators for most of that time.
She was the more vocal and visible, with her flaming red hair, a shade she enjoyed telling people was specially chosen by her husband.
They even shared the same birthday, June 13, 1935, and a penchant for using only a first name.
He was born Christo Javacheff in Bulgaria, his wife Jeanne-Claude de Guillebon in Morocco.
In fact, Christo has been quietly busy, juggling several projects at once. And now, he is poised for a comeback on his own.
His first commercial art exhibition in nearly 50 years opens on Nov. 6, at the Craig Starr Gallery in Manhattan, with examples of some of his earliest works, his Show Windows and Store Fronts, architectural installations he started making in the early 1960s, shortly after he and Jeanne-Claude arrived in New York from Paris.
His first commercial art exhibition in nearly 50 years opens on Nov. 6, at the Craig Starr Gallery in Manhattan, with examples of some of his earliest works, his Show Windows and Store Fronts, architectural installations he started making in the early 1960s, shortly after he and Jeanne-Claude arrived in New York from Paris.
But it is “The Floating Piers,” his first fantastical outdoor installation since “The Gates” and the first project conceived since Jeanne-Claude’s death that consumes his every waking hour.
For 16 days starting June 18, on Italy’s tiny Lake Iseo, the public will be able to walk for nearly two miles on water, atop 200,000 floatable cubes covered in glittering, dahlia-yellow fabric fashioned from tightly woven nylon. “They will feel the movement of the water under foot,” Christo said. “It will be very sexy, a bit like walking on a water bed.”
For 16 days starting June 18, on Italy’s tiny Lake Iseo, the public will be able to walk for nearly two miles on water, atop 200,000 floatable cubes covered in glittering, dahlia-yellow fabric fashioned from tightly woven nylon. “They will feel the movement of the water under foot,” Christo said. “It will be very sexy, a bit like walking on a water bed.”
A wiry figure with tufts of snow-white hair, Christo speaks quickly, with a thick Bulgarian accent, in a high-octane, animated fashion.
He often gets so wound up that he is actually unable to sit still.
He often gets so wound up that he is actually unable to sit still.
“I love to work; I love to walk."
"Basically I like to move around and do physical things,” he said recently, wearing baggy bluejeans and a light blue shirt, pacing up and down the second floor of his SoHo home and studio in a 200-year-old building he and Jeanne-Claude bought in 1973.
This is where collectors come to buy his artwork — impeccably rendered collages of his projects, with the proceeds channeled back into his public projects.
Right now the walls are filled with “Floating Piers” drawings alongside some of his wrapped objects, including an old-fashioned wall telephone clad in canvas and plastic tied together with bits of old string.
"Basically I like to move around and do physical things,” he said recently, wearing baggy bluejeans and a light blue shirt, pacing up and down the second floor of his SoHo home and studio in a 200-year-old building he and Jeanne-Claude bought in 1973.
This is where collectors come to buy his artwork — impeccably rendered collages of his projects, with the proceeds channeled back into his public projects.
Right now the walls are filled with “Floating Piers” drawings alongside some of his wrapped objects, including an old-fashioned wall telephone clad in canvas and plastic tied together with bits of old string.
“I don’t like anything about computers,” Christo continued.
“Young people today on their flat screens, it’s all virtual."
"Nothing is real."
"All our projects involve real things — real wind, real sun, real wet, real danger, real drama."
"And this is very invigorating for me.”
“Young people today on their flat screens, it’s all virtual."
"Nothing is real."
"All our projects involve real things — real wind, real sun, real wet, real danger, real drama."
"And this is very invigorating for me.”
But another very real constant throughout his career is the often excruciating process of waiting — sometimes decades — for a project to come to fruition.
Works are sometimes held up because of politics — securing the necessary government clearances and permits or wading through opposition from local dissenters. Other times, delays are caused by the sheer complexity of the undertaking.
Works are sometimes held up because of politics — securing the necessary government clearances and permits or wading through opposition from local dissenters. Other times, delays are caused by the sheer complexity of the undertaking.
Christo and Jeanne-Claude waited 32 years to shroud 161 trees in black and white polyester mesh in a park in Basel, Switzerland.
Nearly 25 years to get the green light to install “The Gates” in New York's Central Park.
24 years for the German government to give the approval to wrap the Reichstag in Berlin in aluminum-colored fabric.
10 years for French authorities to approve their vision for shrouding the Pont Neuf in Paris with 454,178 square feet of champagne-colored textile; seven years before they were able to plant a forest of umbrellas in the rice paddies near Tokyo and along the hillsides of Southern California.
Nearly 25 years to get the green light to install “The Gates” in New York's Central Park.
24 years for the German government to give the approval to wrap the Reichstag in Berlin in aluminum-colored fabric.
10 years for French authorities to approve their vision for shrouding the Pont Neuf in Paris with 454,178 square feet of champagne-colored textile; seven years before they were able to plant a forest of umbrellas in the rice paddies near Tokyo and along the hillsides of Southern California.
“I turned 80 in June,” Christo declared one afternoon during an interview at his house.
He recalled a car ride he took last year from Stuttgart, Germany, to his warehouse in Basel, Switzerland, with his nephew Vladimir Yavachev, and Wolfgang Volz, his photographer and the project manager of “The Floating Piers.”
He recalled a car ride he took last year from Stuttgart, Germany, to his warehouse in Basel, Switzerland, with his nephew Vladimir Yavachev, and Wolfgang Volz, his photographer and the project manager of “The Floating Piers.”
“I cannot wait so long anymore,” he told them.
“I am not sure I will live another 10 years.
I think we should do something not so complicated.
Something we can manage. Something we can actually get done.”
“I am not sure I will live another 10 years.
I think we should do something not so complicated.
Something we can manage. Something we can actually get done.”
Jeanne-Claude had taken care of the practical side of their projects — the organization and financial details — leaving Christo to throw himself into the creative end. “I have always worked alone,” he explained about his art.
He has kept his studio a family affair, relying on Jeanne-Claude’s two young assistants: Yavachev, now operations manager of “Piers,” and Jonathan Henery, Jeanne-Claude’s nephew, who runs Christo’s office.
He has kept his studio a family affair, relying on Jeanne-Claude’s two young assistants: Yavachev, now operations manager of “Piers,” and Jonathan Henery, Jeanne-Claude’s nephew, who runs Christo’s office.
“I’m always missing Jeanne-Claude,” Christo said a bit wistfully.
A brilliant problem-solver, “her ferociously critical mind” has left a huge void, he said.
Christo is carrying on the couple’s two remaining projects, both challenging.
One, intended for an oasis about 100 miles west of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, was conceived in 1977 and is an immensetrapezoidal benchlike structure called “The Mastaba.”
It would be the tallest project in his career, reaching nearly 500 feet high, fashioned from 410,000 multicolored barrels.
(He is working with the ruling family of Abu Dhabi on the logistics of the project.)
One, intended for an oasis about 100 miles west of Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates, was conceived in 1977 and is an immensetrapezoidal benchlike structure called “The Mastaba.”
It would be the tallest project in his career, reaching nearly 500 feet high, fashioned from 410,000 multicolored barrels.
(He is working with the ruling family of Abu Dhabi on the logistics of the project.)
“The Mastaba” is to be one of Christo’s few permanent installations and — though it may have been designed years ago — it feels fitting to ask if he isn’t seeing it in different terms now, perhaps as a marker of his life and mortality.
Balking at the premise that it is in any way about death, he instead called this monumental work “a very natural, three-dimensional shape that is older even than a pyramid.”
The other work in progress is “Over the River,” begun in 1992, a temporary installation that involves suspending 5.9 miles of silvery fabric panels high above the Arkansas River in south-central Colorado.
Approved by the federal and state governments, it faces opposition from a local group, which contends that “Over the River” will be destructive to the environment and the wildlife in Bighorn Sheep Canyon.
A suit to overturn permits issued for the project is pending in federal appellate court.
Approved by the federal and state governments, it faces opposition from a local group, which contends that “Over the River” will be destructive to the environment and the wildlife in Bighorn Sheep Canyon.
A suit to overturn permits issued for the project is pending in federal appellate court.
In contrast, “The Floating Piers,” 60 miles east of Milano, has been a breeze. “Giuseppe Faccanoni, the president of the lake, helped us get the permissions in less than a year,” Christo said.
“I wanted to go back to Italy. We have done projects there before.
There’s great food, beautiful landscape.”
“I wanted to go back to Italy. We have done projects there before.
There’s great food, beautiful landscape.”
Lake Iseo is perhaps the least known of Italy’s northern lakes, an idyllic spot with two small islands not yet overrun with tourists (unlike Lake Como, known for celebrity residents like George Clooney).
To Christo, Lake Iseo also offers a storybook landscape.
“It has beautiful small villages and houses and churches and Roman ruins.
To go to the mainland, residents go by traghetto,” he said, using the Italian word for a small boat or ferry. “
The Floating Piers” will connect the islands to each other and to the mainland. “You will be able to walk the entire area,” Christo explained.
The project will also be visible from the surrounding mountains.
As the light changes throughout the day, the view of the piers will change, too, from deep yellow to shimmering gold to a reddish hue when wet.
To Christo, Lake Iseo also offers a storybook landscape.
“It has beautiful small villages and houses and churches and Roman ruins.
To go to the mainland, residents go by traghetto,” he said, using the Italian word for a small boat or ferry. “
The Floating Piers” will connect the islands to each other and to the mainland. “You will be able to walk the entire area,” Christo explained.
The project will also be visible from the surrounding mountains.
As the light changes throughout the day, the view of the piers will change, too, from deep yellow to shimmering gold to a reddish hue when wet.
About a half-million people are expected to visit “The Floating Piers,” its opening timed to coincide with the last two days of Art Basel, the contemporary art fair, an easy pilgrimage of roughly 275 miles.
The project is estimated to cost about $11 million, money Christo said he has already raised from the sale of his art.
(Works for sale in Craig Starr’s show range from $400,000 for a collage to $7 million for one of the 1960s Store Fronts, similar to the ones first shown by Leo Castelli, the legendary dealer.)
The project is estimated to cost about $11 million, money Christo said he has already raised from the sale of his art.
(Works for sale in Craig Starr’s show range from $400,000 for a collage to $7 million for one of the 1960s Store Fronts, similar to the ones first shown by Leo Castelli, the legendary dealer.)
Celant, the project director of “The Floating Piers,” helped Christo get the necessary approvals. Scientists, structural engineers and divers, along with teams of construction workers, have been involved in the Piers creation, floating a section with the covered fabric on a lake in Germany last year to see how they would look.
In February, Christo tested the structural integrity of the piers for wind and wave heights by placing sections in the Black Sea.
Starting in December, divers will place 140 five-ton anchors up to 300 feet deep in Lake Iseo.
Right now, about one million square feet of fabric is being specially woven in a factory in Germany.
In February, Christo tested the structural integrity of the piers for wind and wave heights by placing sections in the Black Sea.
Starting in December, divers will place 140 five-ton anchors up to 300 feet deep in Lake Iseo.
Right now, about one million square feet of fabric is being specially woven in a factory in Germany.
The final installation is expected to take a week and will involve a team of some 600 workers.
Again, as he and Jeanne-Claude did beginning in the 1980s, Christo plans to give each visitor a party favor of sorts, perhaps an actual piece of fabric from the installation.
“Normally it’s a postcard you bring home,” Celant said. “A bit of fabric becomes a part of history.”
“Normally it’s a postcard you bring home,” Celant said. “A bit of fabric becomes a part of history.”
Given the ephemeral nature of these installations, all that remains is the indelible memory.
“It creates an incredible urgency,” Christo said, “because it will never take place again. That’s why it’s so exciting.”
“It creates an incredible urgency,” Christo said, “because it will never take place again. That’s why it’s so exciting.”
