BHC Special Events/Announcements
NEW BHC Exhibit: Jasper: The People’s Mayor
Sunday, September 22 - November 1, 2024
12:00 am
“When the old parties win, Bridgeport always loses– but everybody wins with Jasper!”
It may be surprising to learn that Bridgeport’s city government was run by Socialists for nearly thirty years. During the election of 1933, frustrated with the scandals surrounding the Democratic and Republican parties, many voters decided to take their chances with a longtime sidewalk politician known as Jasper McLevy, a relentless campaigner promising implementation of progressive reform. Following McLevy’s mayoral victory, and electoral victory of his fellow Socialist Party members in other positions, the city of Bridgeport would see drastic changes, including improved infrastructure, expanded affordable housing, and honesty in government.
Who was Jasper McLevy? What did he do during his record term? And what was the Bridgeport Socialist Party that he belonged to? Our new exhibit “Jasper: The People’s Mayor” chronicles the rise and career of Bridgeport’s longest serving mayor, and the profound impact that he left upon the city.
From Fields of Promise: Gee’s Bend, Alabama to Bridgeport
Tuesday, October 1 - December 31, 2024
12:00 am
Have you heard about Gee’s Bend, Alabama and its connection to Bridgeport? Gee’s Bend is a remote village in west Alabama whose tenant farmers became self-sufficient land owners through an innovative Depression era program by the Farm Security Administration. In the 1950s-60s, many people from Gee’s Bend became activists during the civil rights movement. Some migrated north for work to cities like Bridgeport or Detroit and established “colonies” there. Over generations, those with roots in Gee’s Bend spent time in both locations, sending children back and forth between the two communities and visiting for holidays. Today, Gee’s Bend is known world-wide for its centuries-long tradition of quilt making and quilts by the women of Gee’s Bend have been exhibited in major museums across the country such as the Whitney in New York and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston.
Eleven panels telling the Gee’s Bend-Bridgeport story are currently on display on the 3rd floor of the Burroughs-Saden library.
View detailsBHC News
BHC x CTDA: Bridgeport’s history, now more searchable than ever
Find BHC Materials ONLINE
The Bridgeport History Center has been a proud part of the Connecticut Digital Archive for years now, taking advantage of this unique digital preservation platform that invites cultural institutions from all around Connecticut to share digitized material. Since March of 2020, BHC has worked hard to take advantage of CTDA’s hosting, search features, and support in order to make more of it’s holdings available and easier to search.
BHC is proud to share its updated CTDA space. Explore Black Bridgeport. Get to know our Archives and Manuscripts better. Did you know we have yearbooks digitized? All of our Grassroots Historians articles are available too, along with postcards and Mary Witkowski’s newspaper articles. You can search within the Bridgeport History Center’s collections only, or expand it to all of CTDA in order to find more material.
New and Noteworthy at BHC
The Bridgeport History Center updates our new and noteworthy page on a regular basis! Check back to see what we’ve added and you can come in and use. This page was last updated on April 22, 2022.
New Oral Histories
Bridgeport and New Haven Puerto Rican Oral Histories, 2023-2024
Fifth year Yale University doctoral candidate Amanda Rivera conducts oral histories to facilitate her research on the bilingual education movement in Bridgeport as led by Puerto Ricans in the 1970s. Rivera interviews community members about this topic in both Bridgeport and New Haven from 2023-2024. The interviews she conducted are now part of the History Center holdings as an oral history collection.
New Special Collections
BHC has long held biographical newspaper clipping files. Now researchers can view the list of names included in this substantial collection.
New Photographs
BHC has been continuing to add photographs to the Connecticut Digital Archive. There are over one thousand images available, with more on the way! Don’t see what you’re looking for? Contact us on our contact form.
New Digital Collections
BHC has one of the best newspaper clippings collections in the state. Explore some of the initial offerings from this vast resource.
Maps online!
Plat maps with details of lot apportionments and street details for cities across the United States
Maps with details on buildings prepared for the insurance industry
New Research Guides
Hot off the heels of finishing up the Records of the Warner Brothers Company, the Bridgeport History Center is pleased to present not one, not two, but three brand new research guides! Our women’s suffrage guide will help you celebrate a century of voting rights, the belatedly spooky guide to local witchcraft and hauntings will provide a different kind of January chill, and our comprehensive guide to material related to the Warner Brothers Company and the family will assist researchers who are keen to know more about one of Bridgeport’s biggest manufacturers.
BHC Events & Regular Monthly Programming
Featured Articles
When the Aztec Eagle Began to Soar Over Bridgeport: Part 2 – From “Puebla York”, “Oaxakeepsie” and “Mexchester”
by Abraham Lima
This is Part 2 of a 5 Part Series at the Bridgeport History Center:
The tri-color flag of Mexico, the green red and white. In the middle stands an eagle on a cactus with a snake, the legacy of this eagle, the eagle the Aztecs saw in the middle of the lake with artificial islands they would build soon surrounding the spot. A sign of Huichilopochtli the war god. On it was built Tenochtitlán- or as we say today, Mexico City.
This eagle soars over 2,000 miles away, in Bridgeport, Connecticut, resides the largest Mexican population, both largest foreign born and Mexican descendant population, of any city in New England, ahead of Boston and New Haven. This is her story. (more…)
A Look Back at the Little Liberia Community via the Historical African American Press
By Sharon Bunyan
Before I begin, I want to acknowledge the Golden Hill Paugussett Nation’s ancestral land, which is the geographical area where the Little Liberia community was established. This land, rich in history and culture, is the location for the news articles I will discuss.
The Charles Brilvitch article entitled The Mary and Eliza Freeman Houses provides the historical context for the articles written in historically African American newspapers that shed light on the Little Liberia Community, a testament to the resilience and determination of a community of ‘free people of color.’ This community began to coalesce around the lower reaches of Bridgeport Harbor the same year (1821) that Bridgeport itself came into being.