Photo: Oscar Palmquist In April of 1912, the news of the tragedy of the sinking of the ship Titanic resonated throughout the world. In the New York metropolitan area, the many immigrants and their families shuddered to think of the sad drownings. Many area residents themselves traveled over ...
By: Rob Novak, Bridgeport Fireman Some years ago, fellow firefighters showed me the following excerpt in the August 2004 edition of Firehouse magazine - “August 20 1904: Bridgeport, CT – An explosion during a fire in a powerhouse of the Burritt Lumber Company hurled two men, ...
By Eric D. Lehman A healthy child of over nine pounds, Charles Stratton was born in 1838 in north Bridgeport to a carpenter and a waitress. However, a faulty pituitary gland kept his growth slow. At age four, he was only twenty-five inches high, and would ...
by Michael J. Bielawa One hundred and thirty years ago this autumn, in 1888, Jack the Ripper terrorized the Whitechapel neighborhood of London, England. The madman brutally murdered five women. Then vanished. Never to be heard from again. Or was he? Some 21st century Ripperologists, as ...
The gangster Arthur Flegenheimer, more commonly known as "Dutch Schultz," came to Bridgeport April 30, 1935. Schultz and his bodyguard, Lulu Rosenkrantz, occupied the fourth floor suite at the Stratfield Hotel on Main Street downtown. Schultz was interviewed by local reporters in the suite. One reporter said ...
Elias Howe Jr, invented the first practical sewing machine in 1845. Howe opened a factory along the banks of the Pequonnock River in 1863. The factory was located on the east side of the Pequonnock River. The factory produced as many as 400 sewing machines a day. ...
Fanny Crosby, whose formal name was Francis Van Alstyne, was one of the corner stones of Bridgeport and a beacon for Bridgeport women. Her creative ingenuity inspired people all over the world, and her songs have been sung by generations of church-goers. As early as age 8, ...
WCVB - Boston television interview on Gustave Whitehead with Mary Witkowski, BHC Head, Bridgeport Mayor Bill Finch, et. al. INTERVIEW - "Wright Brothers: Wrong Story?"
Bridgeport’s Scholar-Athlete James Henry O’Rourke 1850 – 1919 “Orator Jim” O’Rourke, one of the most colorful, popular and accomplished baseball ballplayers of the 19th century was born in East Bridgeport, Connecticut on September 1, 1850. His parents, Hugh and Catherine, had migrated from County Mayo, Ireland, and eventually ...
It may be surprising to some that Bridgeport operated under Socialist rule for almost a quarter century. Jasper McLevy had stood on street corners for 20 years railing against the greed of political parties, and voicing what he’d do to make life better during the dog ...
1810-1891 Phineas Taylor Barnum (P.T. Barnum) was born in Bethel, Connecticut on July 5, 1810. After a Connecticut boyhood, he became interested in entrepreneurial enterprises which included a variety of businesses, such as owning a newspaper, amusements, show business and other entertainment ideas. He ran the ...
The crowd of 6,000 came to see then Senator John F. Kennedy. The crowd,as estimated by Superintendent of Police Francis J. Shanley, cheered when Kennedy said that Connecticut was a key state in the election. "The nation will have its eyes on Connecticut," Kennedy told the crowd.Kennedy ...
By Carolyn Ivanoff Dr. George Loring Porter in old age. (Library of Congress) In 1936 the City of Bridgeport celebrated its Centennial. As a lasting memento of that celebration, Elsie Nicholas Dannenberg authored The Story of Bridgeport. According to the Centennial Committee the volume was to ...
Abraham Lincoln was still a Republican candidate for president when he came to Bridgeport on March 10, 1860. It was a Saturday night and Lincoln was scheduled to give his talk downtown in Washington Hall, a lecture room in the Fairfield County Courthouse, which is now ...
By Andy Piascik There’s an old expression in Broadway theatrical circles that goes something like “Everything outside of New York is just Bridgeport.” Perhaps Broadway Joe Namath felt that way when he travelled to the Park City in 1967, perhaps not. But on one summer evening nearly ...
By: Mary K. Witkowski, Bridgeport City Historian Cartoonist Walt Kelly, who created the comic strip "Pogo," about a group of swamp animals that discuss politics, developed his talent as a young man here in Bridgeport. Born Walter Crawford Kelly, Jr. in 1913 in Philadelphia, Walt Kelly moved with ...
