STAMFORD, CONNECTICUT, 1641–1893:
the first two-and-a-half centuries
by Dr. Estelle F. Feinstein
Professor of History, Emeritus
University of Connecticut – Stamford
Transcript
of speech delivered at The Ferguson Library,
Wednesday, May 5, 1999 on the occasion of a celebration of the 50th
anniversary
of consolidation of the City and Town Governments of
Stamford.
Co-sponsored by Friends of the Ferguson Library
and The Stamford Historical Society.
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A long time ago the poet Homer suggested
that it was a wise child who knew his own father. Similarly it is a
wise citizen who knows his own community. The information that
follows attempts to point out critical factors that shaped the
community of Stamford from its founding as a town in 1641 to the
establishment of the City 252 years later in 1893.
Over the past three-and-a-half
centuries, Stamford, CT has evolved from Puritan village to
manufacturing town to research center to - at present - home base for
major corporations. Through all the shifts, however, it has remained
tied to two regional cultures. Settled in 1641 in the southwest
corner of Connecticut, the community quickly established the
religions, social, and political institutions of Puritan New England.
Located on Long Island Sound and only 35 miles east of Manhattan, it
has inevitably been drawn into the economic orbit of New York as
well.
A bitter quarrel, cause unknown, within
the Church of Christ in Wethersfield, precipitated the founding of
Stamford. On October 19, 1640 the dissenters organized the
Wethersfield Company and resolved to move, as a body, west along the
Long Island shore to the banks of the Rippowam River. The land,
originally about 128 square miles, had been purchased from local
Indian tribes by Nathaniel Turner, an agent of the New Haven Colony,
and New Haven was eager to sell it to fellow Puritans.
In the summer of 1641,
28 would-be
planters and their wives and families and at least two “Negro
servants” began building a meeting-house and their own homes on
high ground above the harbor. At first they tried to transfer to the
new world the semi-collective open-field system of farming that they
had been familiar with in England. But the availability of land and
the urge for privatization crippled the effort. By 1700 almost all
the acres were in individuals hands. By that date too, Stamford had
ceded territory in the north to the towns of Bedford and Pound Ridge
in the Province of New York and was reduced to 80 square miles.
Ultimately the formation of New Canaan in 1801 and Darien in 1820
reduced Stamford to its present size of almost 40 square
miles.
All the settlers had previously
participated in the establishment of the basic religious and
political institutions that made a Puritan community. The
Congregational Church, as The Church of Christ was popularly known,
was easily transplanted… (They had brought a minister with them.)
Other denominations were barred. Even the Church of England did not
secure a foothold until 1742.
Political decisions and
setting the mill rate were made at the annual town meeting, a gathering of
the adult
male planters. Special meetings were called when necessary. Between
meetings civic affairs were left in the hands of an elected Board of
Selectmen, but, by law and in practice, the First Selectman was
clearly “primus inter pares”. A large number of minor
offices were also filled at the annual meetings. The system endured
for over 300 years.
For the first two centuries the economy
was based on agriculture. Farmers grew potatoes, wheat, rye, corn,
and oats and engaged in stock-breeding, fishing, and oystering. New
York City was the primary market though a few local vessels sailed as
far as the West Indies. A variety of skilled artisans and mills
supplied community needs. Prior to the Civil War two manufacturing
corporations dealt in the national market. They were the Stamford
Mfg. Company, which produced dyes and licorice paste, and the Charles
H. Phillips Company, eventually best known for its production of Milk
of Magnesia.
The impact of the Revolutionary
War was
doubled-edged. On the one hand there were problems with over 100
Loyalists, mainly Anglicans, and with “skinners” and
pirates. The skinners, from Westchester County, stole food, firewood,
and whatever was portable for sale to the British. The pirates,
secure in their hiding places in the many inlets and coves of the
Sound, harassed shipping. On the other hand, Stamford gained a
stronger voice in the governing of Connecticut than it had ever
known. The voice belonged to Abraham Davenport, the wealthiest and
most influential local figure, who sat on the Council of Safety of
the State of Connecticut and was part of the inner circle of Governor
Jonathan Trumbull.
In the late 1840s two
events presaged the entry of Stamford into the emerging industrial economy
of the
United States. One was the decision in 1848 by the New York, New
Haven and Hartford Railroad to schedule Stamford as a regular station
stop. The other was the arrival of hundreds of impoverished Irish
refugees fleeing the potato famines of 1845-1848. Their presence
brought willing hands and increased the town population from 3500 (in
round numbers) in 1840 to 7200 in 1860, an increase of 100% in two
decades. Stamford was utterly unprepared for this non-Yankee,
non-Protestant influx. The newcomers confronted a severe lack of
housing, jobs and schools and aroused a violent wave of
anti-Catholicism. Branded drunkards and street brawlers, they were
blamed for higher crime and delinquency rates and for the spread of
dreaded diseases. In the 1850s William T. Minor of Stamford was
chosen Governor on the anti-Catholic, anti-immigrant “Know
Nothing” ticket. The Irish-Americans, though poor, responded by
building and supporting their own churches and schools and gained
good will by volunteering for the Union cause in record
numbers.
The Civil War did absorb
community
energies. Three years after hostilities ceased, however, Stamford
plunged into the industrial economy. In 1868 Linus Yale, Jr., an
inventor, and Henry T. Towne, the highly educated son of a wealthy
engineer, formed a partnership to produce Yale's newly-patented
pin tumbler lock and slim, flat key. They selected Stamford as their
base because of its proximity to New York, its accessibility via land
(railroad) or via water (a canal and the Sound) and its large labor
pool. Although Yale died suddenly at the end of 1868, Towne went
ahead with their plans. The business succeeded quickly and expanded
rapidly. Eventually the Yale & Towne building complex spread over
25 acres south of the railroad station. Beginning with 30 workers in
1869, the corporation employed 1,000 men and women by 1892 in a town
with a total population of 16,000.
Yale & Towne was by
far the largest but not the only corporation that found Stamford attractive.
A range
of entrepreneurs took advantage of the availability of public water
supply, electric power, and telegraph connections. The nearness of
New York City, the 80 trains departing daily on the New Haven line,
and the electrification of a comprehensive trolley system were other
assets. Various light industries manufactured, among other products,
steam rock drills, wallpaper, bicycles, bearings, speedometers, and
typewriters.
As economic opportunities
multiplied, so did the population. Stamford reached 15,700 in 1890 and 19,000
in
1900. Census data showed that a high percentage of the demographic
increase was based on immigration. Between 1900 and 1910 native-born
whites of native-born parents rose from 8,000 to 10,000. However the
number of foreign-born and first-generation whites rose from 10,600
to 18,000. Of these 4,400 hailed from Ireland, 2,900 from Italy and
2,000 (mostly Jews) from Russia. Smaller contingents arrived from
Germany, Austria, Greece, Poland, and other parts of Europe. “Cultural diversity” flourished
as migrants steadily urged their cousins and compatriots to follow. The Excelsior
Hardware
Company even set up whole departments by languages. (Non-whites
played a small role prior to the Great Depression. Blacks increased
from 275 in 1900 to 343 in 1910, and Asians totaled only 27 in both
decennial years.)
Inevitably as population
and problems
multiplies, attention shifted to Stamford's venerable form of
government. The old guard, who dominated the town meeting system,
could not cope with the challenges raised by the sheer numbers and
needs of the newcomers. One of the worst problems was the outbreak of
deadly epidemics among children in an area called “Dublin” and in other
ethnic enclaves. During the years 1889 to 1899 Stamford had the dubious distinction
of leading Connecticut in death from
typhoid, diphtheria, and scarlet fever. Fatalities were especially
high among Irish-Americans living in downtown tenements next to a
stagnant pool of water formed by the damming of an old
canal.
Long before 1890 the inadequacy
of the
town meeting was evident. As early as 1830 business interests had
persuaded the General Assembly to approve the creation of the “Borough of Stamford” to
serve the core area around Atlantic Square. Initially it covered only three-quarters
of a square
mile and 633 inhabitants. It was later expanded to one-and-a-half
square miles. The function of the Borough was to deal with fires,
streets, and similar matters of peculiar interest to the merchants
and residents. The administration was placed in the hands of an
elected Board of Warden and Burgesses. Borough meetings were poorly
attended and desultory although the Borough could and did levy a
separate tax. The Warden and Burgesses were effectively in
charge.
As Stamford became increasingly
urbanized, the need for a governing body larger than the Borough but
smaller than the town became increasingly obvious. The issue provoked
impassioned debate and a number of proposed City Charters. In 1893
the Stamford electorate and the Connecticut General Assembly finally
agreed on a charter for the new entity, The City of Stamford. The
City area comprised the southern fifth of Stamford - i.e. all the
territory south of Bull's Head with the exception of Glenbrook in the
east and a corresponding area in the west. But residents of the City
equaled four-fifth of the community's population. They continued to
be full residents of the town and paid taxes to both governments. The
City, itself, was divided into four wards, which were carefully drawn
to assure control by the Irish of a least one ward... A Common
Council of nine members was set up - two from each ward and one
chosen at large. For the first time Stamford had a Mayor. However the
Charter gave the Mayor few or no veto, appointment, and operational
powers, and the position fell into the “weak” mayor
category. Moreover the dual government structure was inherently
awkward at best and unworkable at worst. Yet, surprisingly, the
clumsy mechanism endured until 1949, a period of 56 years. Clearly
the year 1893 marked the end of an era - the completion of the first
two-and-a-half centuries of the community of Stamford,
Connecticut.
