Norwalk After Two Hundred & Fifty Years

Here the speaker drifted to the first school in the town, and the foundress of the first school, who came to East Norwalk and drilled the children in what they then called the keeping room, or what we would call now the parlor. That is how the first school was started, the same as the first town clerk's office, in the parlor of Thomas Fitch's house. He told about this foundress lying in the East Norwalk cemetery, and how her teach- 99 ings have come down to this day, and what effect her early training had upon the children of to-day, even. Mr. Selleck then told of the first teaching he did in Nor- walk. After teaching a little while he went to Troy, and there opened a private school. He told about one day a knock was heard on his school door and when he opened it, there stood a very distinguished looking lady. It proved to be Madame Ella Willard, who glanced around the room and then stated that there was one thing lacking, and that was "Temple of Time." Here Mr. Sel- leck described minutely what that temple of time was, and wished that the schools of to-day could have them. There was a picture of a large temple, and in it were the names of all the distinguished men from Adam down to the present. He said that it was an education in itself to look at the temple and study what was in it. OVER RIVER SCHOOL. The pupils of the Over River School assembled at 9 o'clock in the High school room. The exercises opened with singingof "Hail Columbia" by a chorus of voices. Hon. E. J. Hill addressed the school in his most inspiring manner, and held his young audience spell- bound. He impressed upon the minds of the children the great advantages they had inherited by being born in New England, the best part of our noble land. He illustrated his lessons by telling and showing what he had seen and heard in the foreign lands from which he has just returned with heartfelt thankfulness that he was an American citizen. Such a lesson so delivered will do more to inspire a feeling of citizenship in young minds than many a lesson taken from books. In closing Mr. Hill urged the children not to forget in the midst of their rejoicing, to offer up a sincere prayer that our noble President may, by the grace of God, be spared to his people. The school then sang "The Star-Spangled Banner," after which Lieutenant-Governor Keeler ad- dressed them, telling the advantages the pupils have to- day in contrast to those of even fifty years ago. He also gave a brief forecast of the possibilities of the future. The lesson he drew was that of the boy who would suc- ceed in any sphere of life must work faithfully and dili- gently. Rev. Alexander Hamilton, who was also pre- sent and spoke to the pupils in a few words told of the heroism of their forefathers in the Revolutionary War. 100 His personal reminiscences were very interesting, and from them the pupils were led to feel that an honest, true and faithful life would win the favor of God and their fel- low-men. The principal, Mr. Wigham, then gave a brief outline of the history of the Over River School district, with which he has been so closely associated for so many years. The exercises closed by the pupils singing "America." MIDDLE FIVE MILE RIVER SCHOOL. This little school is one of the oldest in the town. It occupies a modern building on the continuation of West street, near the intersection of the road from New Canaan to Rowayton Landing. There are nearly sixty pupils regularly attending the school. Miss Carrie St. John is the principal and Miss Bishop assistant. The building was tastefully decorated and after the singing of patriotic songs an address was delivered by Mr. Samuel Richards Weed, who began by recalling the appearance of the school in its old building in 1847, a* which time he was one of its pupils. He briefly recounted the early history of the settlement of Norwalk and called attention to the fact that the old histories and geogra- phies used to lay great stress upon the fact that when William Penn, the Quaker, settled in Philadelphia he made a treaty with the Indians and paid them for the land. This was in 1674, while the site of Norwalk was purchased by Roger Ludlow from the Indians in 1640, a few years before William Penn was born, and a little later Captain Partrick bought from the Indians the land on the west of the river, including the very land upon which this school-house now stands. He commended their honorable example to the children. The exercises concluded with patriotic songs. EAST NORWALK SCHOOL. The following address on "Earliest Norwalk" was given by Miss Angeline Scott, this morning, at the anni- versary exercises of the East Norwalk school, in the East Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church: Connecticut was a beautiful wilderness 260 years ago when the first white settlements were planted, Wind- sor, Hartford, Wethersfield, fifteen years before the founding of Norwalk. The forest stretched eastward, 101 westward, southward, over all the hills and valleys, with bears and deer and birds within its shadows. The unpol- luted waters of the rivers and the Sound were full of fish and shellfish covered the seashore. Dusky human fig- ures clad in doe skin and decked with beads and feathers flitted in noiseless mocassins through the forests or floated down the streams in birch-bark canoes. Hunger was the Indian's only spur to activity, his mind was alert to the possibility of lurking foes and his powers of observation were trained to serve him as hunter or warrior. Bountiful as the land was, not more than 2,000 Indians dwelt in all Connecticut at the time of which we speak, and only about 300 Indians lived in the Norwalk purchased by Ludlow and Partrick. These were scattered remnants of tribes, as the relics of the Old Field near the almshouse testify, being of diverse kinds, and the modes of burial in the graves dis- covered are different. Evidently hungry Indians had come to Norwalk as wanderers from their original country. There was a village of a clan of Mohegans at Belden's or Wilson's Point, however, one of the inde- pendent villages which Bancroft tells us were scattered between the Hudson and Connecticut rivers. It was then called Naramake, after a great chieftain, and Nor- walk is a name derived from the same root-word, instead of being a punning contraction of Northwalk, which is a general impression. The late William S. Boutou, a local antiquarian, distinctly traced the site of this village twenty years ago, near the present residence of Mr. Bur- chard. Nearbv was a feasting ground marked by a deposit two feet deep of shells and animals' bones where the Indians u=ed to have what we call Rhode Island clambakes. Naramake was the home of Mahackemo and the others who signed the deeds which Roger Lud- low and Daniel Partrick secured from the Indians. On the hill over which the Tramway now runs, near Witch Lane, were defensive settlements from which a watch might be kept of the islands and the Sound. Be- low the hill runs the brook Pampaskeshanke, named in two of the Indian deeds as a boundary; we call it Roton Brook. It rises far back on the hills and flows in a gen- eral southerly direction, emptying into Wilson's Cove; this brook is the western boundary of the City of South Norwalk where it crosses the highway near the residence of Dr. Burke. Roger Ludlow's tract of land purchased in 1640 lay between the Norwalk and Saugatuck rivers 102 a day's walk up into the country from the sea, for which he paid 50 pounds judiciously invested in the following highly desirable articles: (Deforest 177) Eight fathoms of wampum, 6 coats, 10 hatchets, 10 hoes, 10 knives, 10 scissors, 10 jewsharps, 10 fathoms of tobacco, 3 kettles of six hands about, and 10 looking glasses. A few months later Captain Daniel Partrick pur- chased a tract of land west of the Norwalk river from the same sachem, Mahackemo,, its western boundary being the brook Pampaskeshanke. In 1650, a company of planters headed by Nathaniel Eli and Richard Olsmtead entered into a conditional agreement with Roger Lud- low as to the transfer of his Norwalk land to them. The final assignment to the settlers of Norwalk was made by Ludlow four years later. In July, 1650, the same company added the Partrick tract to the Ludlow pur- chase and further enlarged the bounds of the new set- tlement by the addition of the Indian lands known as Runckinheage or Rooaton, west of the Pampaskeshanke, and known to us to-day as Rowayton. This deed also included the Norwalk Islands; it dated 1651. Since the Ludlow agreement required the settle- ment of the land before the next Spring after the sign- ing of the papers, it is altogether probable that some of the men came to Norwalk immediately and began a clearing in the forest for the little colony of not less than thirty families, who came very early in the Spring of 1 65 1. The emigrants from Hartford entered Norwalk by way of what is now France street and encamped at the Rocks one night, arriving next day at their destina- tion, the place marked by the Founders' Stone in East avenue. It is hard to beiieve that wheeled vehicles were not used in Connecticut until the middle of the 18th cen- tury, so that all the goods our forefathers brought to the first Norwalk must have come on the backs of their horses and oxen. The black house which sheltered the company till their log and shingle houses were built, stood in the rear of Mr. H. M. Prowitt's residence. Nearby, in 1659, the first meeting house was built by Walter Haite and Ralph Keeler, and covered with "2,000 good and sufficient shingles furnished by Matthew. Marvin. The meeting house was used for town meetings as well as religious services ; and, in front of it, was a common, which was used on training days for a parade ground. Across the common opposite the church was the home of the Rev. 103