There are so many things that are cool, fun, awesome, and interesting about Connecticut. Tons of notable famous people are from here, it has lots of historical first (especially in industry and manufacturing), and it has lots of wonderful and curious places to visit. It also happens to have all the trappings drop-dead gorgeous New England scenery is known for, and the combination of all this cool stuff made our latest entry in our 50 States project a blast to put together. Up next: Delaware, Florida, and Georgia.

What is Connecticut Known For?

1. Connecticut is known for being one of the six New England states, but it’s also part of Greater New York City metropolitan area, which can make for a particularly intense Red Sox versus Yankees in-state rivalry.

2. Speaking of professional sports, Connecticut used to be known for hosting the Hartford Whalers of the National Hockey League, until they relocated to Raleigh, North Carolina in 1997 to become the Carolina Hurricanes. In 2003, the Orlando Miracle of the Women’s National Basketball Association relocated to Uncasville to become the Connecticut Sun.

3. Connecticut is known as the Constitution State for its influence on the development and shape of modern government. The Fundamental Orders of Connecticut, which described the structure and powers of government set up by towns by the Connecticut River, was established in January 1639. Historians view this as the one of the first written constitutions (in addition to the Mayflower Compact 19 years earlier) in the United States and a kind of precursor to the Constitution that was eventually ratified in 1787.

4. The state is also known for being the location of Yale College, which was founded in 1701 near Saybrook. It was named for the Welsh merchant Elihu Yale, who helped give the school its start with his donation of 417 books. The school would go on to graduate many many smartypants over the next 300 years.

5. With more than 600 miles of coastline in the state, including the navigable rivers, Connecticut has a very strong maritime tradition that includes seafood production and shipbuilding. The Naval Submarine Base New London is the Navy’s first one, and there’s no shortage of recreational boating and marinas.

 

Early History of Connecticut Facts

6. How did Connecticut get its name? It originates from the word Quinnehtukqut, which is Algonquian for “long tidal river,” and refers to the Connecticut River.

7. The very first European to explore the Connecticut region was a Dutchman trader named Adriaen Block, who did so via the Connecticut River in 1614. He was a pretty prominent explorer, and his other claim to fame is that he’s the dude who figured out Manhattan and Long Island were islands.

8. The first English settlers came to Windsor in 1633, and more came to settle in Wethersfield the next year. Saybrook Colony was created in 1635 by Jon Winthrop the Younger, and then a whole bunch more settlers came in 1636, establishing the Connecticut Colony, Quinnipiack Colony, and New Haven Colony.

9. The settlement of Hartford was founded in 1636 by the Reverends Thomas Hooker and Samuel Stone, and was named after Hertford in England, where Stone was born. Hooker eventually became known as the “Father of Connecticut.”

10. Copper was discovered in Simsbury (in the area that is currently East Granby) in 1705. The first charted copper mining company in America was formed here, and by 1730, the coins that were minted were among the first to be used in America.

11. Roger Sherman is a big deal in Connecticut history. Not only was he the first mayor of New Haven, he is the only dude to have signed all four founding documents of the United States: the Continental Association, the Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation, and last but not least, the Constitution.

12. Connecticut was admitted to the Union as the 5th state on January 9, 1788.

13. Connecticut actually two state capitals for more than 170 years. From 1703 to 1875, sessions of the General Assembly alternated their meetings in Hartford and New Haven. In 1875, Hartford became the one and only capital of Connecticut.

14. In 1975, Ella Grasso became the first woman to be elected governor in Connecticut. Speaking of women in Connecticut politics, Susan Bysiewicz, the current lieutenant governor, wrote a book about Grasso when Bysiewicz was still in law school.

 

Click to buy this book!

 

Official Connecticut State Symbols

15. The official nickname of Connecticut is the Constitution State. Other unofficial nicknames include the Provisions State, the Nutmeg State, and the Land of Steady Habits.

16. The Connecticut motto is Qui transtulit sustinet, which is Latin for “He who transplanted sustains.” No idea what that even means, tbh.

17. Speaking of that motto, it’s featured on the Connecticut state flag. The flag was approved by the Connecticut General Assembly in 1897 and in addition to the motto, it features a white baroque shield with three sets of grapevines within it. The grapes actually represent Windsor, Hartford, and Wethersfield, which are the three oldest settlements in Connecticut. It’s not super clear why grapes were specifically chosen but there you have it! Here is a picture of the Connecticut state flag.

 

18. The American shad is known as “the fish that fed the nation’s founders,” and as such, it’s the Connecticut state fish.

19. The official state bird is the American robin. The robin is also the official state bird of Wisconsin and Michigan.

20. The official state animal of Connecticut, designated in 1975, is the magnificent sperm whale. It was chosen because of the state’s historic relationship to the whaling industry, as well as to recognize the animal’s status as an endangered species.

21. Connecticut has an official dance and it’s the square dance. It also happens to be the official dance of Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, and Georgia, as well as Idaho, Illinois, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, and Missouri. And Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, and Oregon, as well as Tennessee and Texas. And Utah. And Virginia. And also Washington state. It’s also the official folk dance of California, New Jersey, and South Carolina. Clearly, America needs to diversify its dance card.

22. Designated in 1907, the official state flower is the mountain laurel, sometimes called calico-bush or spoonwood. It’s also the official state flower of Pennsylvania. It’s so lovely that Laurel County, Kentucky, and Laurel, Mississippi are also named for it. Here is a picture of the mountain laurel.

 

23. There’s an official insect of Connecticut that was made official on October 1, 1977, and it’s the European mantis. More commonly known as the praying mantis, it is considered an introduced species and, ironically, not actually native to Connecticut.

24. There is an official state heroine of Connecticut, and her name is Prudence Crandall. Born in 1803, she created the very first academy for Black women in New England in 1833, facing a whole lot of backlash and violence over the next year. She was even placed on trial — twice! — for breaking a law that prohibited the school from even operating in the first place. Even though the charges were eventually dismissed, the school closed in 1834. In 1995, the General Assembly honored her by making her the state heroine, and the Prudence Crandall House is now a National Historic Landmark.

25. “Yankee Doodle” is the official state song, and it’s probably one of the more popular ones, considering the famous James Cagney movie how much we hear it in other contexts. Its origins are also pretty old, with the melody perhaps dating as far back as the 15th century. Lyrically, it was originally written around 1755 by Dr. Richard Shuckburgh, who was a British Army surgeon, to basically make fun of what he perceived as disheveled Colonial troops under Colonel Thomas Fitch—who happened to be the son of Connecticut Governor Thomas Fitch. It is not a very flattering song but by 1781, Americans had embraced it as a source of pride. Almost two hundred years later in 1978, it was officially made the Connecticut state song.

 

Cool & Weird Facts About Connecticut

26. You might be old enough to remember when phone books were a lot more common than they are now. The very first phone book was published in New Haven on February 21, 1878, even though it wasn’t really a book so much as it was a sheet of cardboard that listed the names of 50 people and businesses in New Haven who happened to have a telephone. Not coincidentally, the first demonstration of the telephone was made by Alexander Graham Bell in New Haven in 1876.

27. In 1825, the first American carpet factory was opened in Tariffville. It burned down in 1867 and was replaced a year later by the Connecticut Screw Company. They’re no longer in business, but the building remains and it’s still being used today.

28. Inventor Barney “Cap” Girden was a teacher at Lebanon’s Mooween summer camp in 1922, where he taught 13-year-old Edwin Herbert “Din” Land how to get rid of the glare from a tabletop using a Nicol prism. The teacher’s influence on the student was so effective, thorough, persuasive, and inspirational that it was basically the beginnings of the Polaroid corporation. Land went on to patent 535 inventions in his lifetime — more than any American except for Thomas Edison, Mr. Light Bulb and Record Player himself — including the instant camera.

29. The first flight of the first helicopter took place in Stratford on September 14, 1939. The Vought-Sikorsky VS-300 was designed by Russian-American aviation pioneer Igor Sikorsky, and modifications of the design evolved to the Sikorsky R-4, which eventually became the first mass-produced helicopter in the world in 1942.

30. In 1996, Southington passed a ban on Silly String after a couple cops were doused with the brightly-colored plastic stream of festive resin at the Apple Harvest Festival. It should be noted that they’re only so dangerous because they were not banned at schools — only at town events after the chief of police whined about it. Stick it to the man and buy your own case of Silly String so you and your friends can string everything to your heart’s content at your next local Apple Harvest Festival.

Click below to buy your own Silly String! You know you want to. Do it.

 

31. There are several people who can take credit for the first hamburger. It’s a pretty good example of multiple discovery, and as such, there’s probably no one true inventor. But Louis’ Lunch, a New Haven restaurant that opened in 1895, is one such inventor that can lay a legitimate claim to fame to creating the hamburger in 1900. As the legend goes, a customer wanted something quick and hot so Louis himself made a patty out of leftover ground beef trimmings, grilled it, and put it in between two pieces of toast. The rest helped make American culinary history, and you can still get the original version of the hamburger sandwich — with toasted sliced bread as opposed to a more traditional bun — at the original location today.

32. You are not allowed to walk backwards after sunset in Devon. It may seem weird and silly but then again, walking backwards when it’s dark is irresponsible and kinda sorta potentially dangerous, isn’t it?

33. You’re probably familiar with Naugahyde, the brand of faux-leather material often used for upholstery. It got its named from Naugatuck, the Connecticut town where the fabric was created.

34. Danbury was once known as the Hat Capital of the World because it was the center of the hatting industry in the 19th century. It all started when a dude named Zadoc Benedict used a piece of animal fur to plug a hole in his shoe and discovered that the pressure, heat, and moisture from his foot turned it into felt over time. He turned that eureka moment into the city’s first hat factory in 1780 and by 1850, Danbury was a worldwide leader in hat-making.

35. In 1853, Gail Borden created his processed to make sweetened condensed milk and opened his first condenseries in modern-day Torrington with his partners. Unfortunately for Connecticut, they were not successful but fortunately for people who love condensed milk, his next one in New York was.

36. The lollipop was invented in Connecticut, kinda. The Bradley Smith Company in New Haven first started making them in 1908, then branded as “Lolly Pops.” Because the term “lollipop” had already existed in a dictionary from the early 1800s, Bradley Smith had a difficult time getting it trademarked. They were eventually successful in 1931, though the term has been genericized to death to the point that a trademark is too difficult to enforce. Historians suspect that some variation of the lollipop has been around for centuries, so perhaps the real hero of the story is Bradley Smith foreman Max Buchmüller, who invented a machine to insert sticks into the beloved lollipop and produced 125 of them per minute. After a few tweaks, the machine was able to make 750 of the sticked hard candy per minute, and the candy hasn’t looked back since.

 

Connecticut Geography and Topography

37. That little two-mile notch you see on the northern border that breaks an otherwise straight line with Massachusetts? That’s called the Southwick Jog.

38. Next to Delaware and Rhode Island, Connecticut is the third-smallest state at 5,567 square miles. Almost 700 square miles of that is water.

39. How small is the third-smallest state? More than 100 Connecticuts can fit into Alaska.

40. In typical picturesque New England fashion, Connecticut has lots of gorgeous outdoor space and scenery. There are 91 state parks, along with 30 state forests.

41. Connecticut isn’t really that old. It was only around 15,000 years ago that it was covered by a big-ass glacier, which makes the landscape a lot younger than most places in the world.

42. The capital of Connecticut is Hartford, and Bridgeport is the largest city. Other major cities include New Haven, Stamford, and Waterbury. There are a total of 169 incorporated towns in Connecticut.

43. It won’t take very long to drive across Connecticut. It’s only 70 miles from north to south, and 110 miles from east to west.

44. The highest elevation point in the state is Mount Frissell near the Massachusetts border. It’s about 2,379 feet above sea level. That’s different from the highest peak, which is Bear Mountain in the northwest corner of the state in Salisbury.

 

Where Should I Visit in Connecticut?

45. The area around Mystic Seaport is downright beautiful and pretty much the epitome of picturesque New England scenery. The Mystic Seaport Museum contains no less than four vessels that have been recognized as National Historic Landmarks. It also has a few other vessels that are more than a hundred years old, and visiting is a maritime history buff’s dream. Even if you’re not a big boat fan, there is still lots to like here.

46. Opened in 1846, Lake Compounce in Bristol is the oldest continuously operating amusement park in the country. There is a water park and plenty of other attractions, but of particular note is the Boulder Dash, considered one of the best wooden roller coasters in the world.

 

47. The New England Carousel Museum in Bristol was established in 1990, and has been expanding both the building and its collection ever since. Not only does it encompass the history of carousel and show off the evolution of its craftsmanship, it also includes the Bristol Center for Arts & Culture and the Museum of Fire History. They manage to cram a lot into the former hosiery factory building, and well worth any Connecticut visitor’s time.

48. Less than a mile away from the Carousel Museum is the American Clock & Watch Museum, which is every bit as exciting as you’d guess! Horology is the study of timekeeping, and it’s one of the few places dedicated entirely to that most obscure of niches. Here, you can get a brief history of time, how it evolved from sundials to pocket watches and grandfather clocks to mass-produced alarm clocks. Did you know there is such a thing as a grandmother clock? That’s the kind of knowledge you can acquire when you visit a place like this.

49. The Wadsworth Atheneum in downtown Hartford opened in 1844 and it’s the oldest continually operating public art museum in the country. They were the first museum to acquire a Salvador Dalí, and the first to host a major retrospective of Pablo Picasso. Today, they have a lot of art heavyweights on display, like Winslow Homer, Jackson Pollack, Georgia O’Keeffe, and plenty more. It’s a pretty impressive collection for a museum in a relatively modest city.

50. It should be of no surprise that the author of A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court took up residency in the state, and with Mark Twain being such a colorful figure, it shouldn’t be a surprise that his former home is now a museum. The Mark Twain House & Museum in Hartford was also where he wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, perhaps his two most popular works. The place is no less interesting than Twain himself, and has been called “part steamboat, part medieval fortress, and part cuckoo clock” by his biographer Justin Kaplan, and has been called one of the “Ten Best Historic Homes” in the world by National Geographic.

51. Smack on the border of East Haddam and Lyme, Gillette Castle State Park was originally the house of Sherlock Holmes stage actor William Gillette, who lived there from 1919 to 1937. It’s a building with lots of personality, combining gothic elements and Victorian-style influences with steampunk details (before steampunk was even a name) to create its own unique building. Gillette had no children, and his will stated that the house not be left to any “blithering sap-head who has no conception of where he is or with what surrounded.” That obviously did not apply to the State of Connecticut, who took over the place in 1943.

52. Located on the third floor of the Old State House in Hartford is the Museum of Natural and Other Curiosities, created by painter Joseph Steward in 1797. He wanted to show off his work, but also used it as an opportunity to display weird and odd stuff he came across. His collection eventually grew so big that in 1808, he moved across the street to the Talcott Mansion, and when he passed away in 1922, the museum relocated and reopened in 1824. The collection remained until 1840, when it was broken up and donated back to the Old State House by the Connecticut Historical Society, where visitors can view it today. It was actually one of the very first museums in North America so it’s quite nice that it was able to return full circle to its original location.

53. Open since 1771, the Scoville Memorial Library in Salisbury is the oldest public library in the United States. The library began with a mere 200 books bought in London by local blast furnace owner Richard Smith, and collected fees from patrons who damaged books with wax drippings from the candles they read by.

 

Who are Famous People From Connecticut?

54. Who are some of the most famous people from Connecticut? One is Harvard graduate, Weezer frontman, and emo music pioneer Rivers Cuomo, who spent much of his childhood at an ashram in Pomfret. He also attended E.O. Smith High School in Storrs under the name of Peter Kitts. Incidentally, Peter Tork of The Monkees also attended school there.

55. Meg Ryan, everybody’s mother’s favorite actress, was born in Fairfield.

56. Stephenie Meyer, who penned the ridiculously popular Twilight books — which have sold over 100 million copies — was also born in Fairfield. Speaking of mega-popular book series, Suzanne Collins, author of The Hunger Games and its sequels, was born in Hartford.

57. Four-time Oscar winner and iconic actress Katharine Hepburn was born in Hartford. She was very fond of Connecticut; she kept a family home in Fenwick, as well as another beach home in Old Saybrook, which opened the Katharine Hepburn Cultural Arts Center in 2009.

58. The list of female actors from Connecticut includes a lot more than just Meg Ryan: Marilyn Monroe, Glenn Close, Jessica Hecht, Linda Hamilton, Chloë Sevigny, Jane Curtin, Linda Blair, Dana Delany, Allison Janney, Gretchen Mol, Kyra Sedgwick, and Joanne Woodward all have Connecticut roots.

59. Michael Bolotin, lead singer of the late-70s glam metal band Blackjack (who scored a modest hit single with “Love Me Tonight” in 1979), was born in New Haven. After the band broke up, he changed his name to Michael Bolton and embarked on a very successful solo career, which is how you probably know him. Bonus fun fact: Blackjack songs have been sampled by none other than Jay-Z (“A Dream”) and Kanye West (“Never Let Me Down”).

60. Plenty of titans of industry have Connecticut roots. Circus man P.T. Barnum was born in Bethel and even served as the mayor of Bridgeport and member of the Connecticut House of Representatives. Gun-maker Samuel Colt was born in Hartford and built his first factory near the Connecticut River. Charles Goodyear, developer of vulcanized rubber and for whom the Goodyear Tires are named for, was born in New Haven. Retail businesswoman icon and television personality Martha Stewart began her empire-building in Westport, where she bought, restored, and decorated an old farmhouse that unlocked her talent for interior design.

 

Connecticut in the Movies

61. Parts of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1951 mystery thriller Strangers on a Train was filmed at what is now the Danbury Railway Museum.

 

Click on the movie to buy! It’s a really good flick.

 

62. Scenes from Joseph L. Mankiewicz’s All About Eve (1950) starring Bette Davis were shot at the Taft Hotel and Shubert Theater in New Haven.

 

Click on the movie to buy!

 

63. A whole bunch of movies have been shot in Stamford over the last few years, thanks to a 30% state tax credit that was enacted in 2006. These include Oscar-nominated films like Jonathan Demme’s Rachel Getting Married (2008), and Sam Mendes’s Revolutionary Road (2008).

64. Other recent films that have used Stamford as a filming location include Lynne Ramsay’s We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011), Sam Mendes’s Away We Go (2009), P.J. Hogan’s Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009), and Sanaa Hamri’s Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 (2008).

65. As the title implies, Donald Petrie’s 1988 cult favorite Mystic Pizza, starring Julia Roberts, Lili Taylor, and Annabeth Gish, takes place and was shot in Mystic, as well in neighboring towns like Pawcatuck and Noank. Bonus fun fact: the movie is also Matt Damon’s debut.

 

Click on the movie to buy!

 

66. A few prominent movies used Stamford as a shooting location even before the 2006 tax credit encouraged filmmakers to look to Connecticut. These include Otto Preminger’s The Cardinal (1963) and Elia Kazan’s Boomerang (1947).

 

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