Cemeteries
In 1934 a gentleman by the name of Charles R. Hale, under the auspices of the
F.E.R.A. and the W.P.A., compiled a list of Weston's cemeteries and noted
the names, dates and inscriptions on the stones
The Norfield (or Coley) Cemetery is located south of Goodhill Road on Route
57 near the Westport line.
The Lyons Plain Cemetery is located behind the Emmanuel Episcopal Church
The Osborn Cemetery, is on Old Farm Road, off Route 57.
The Rollins Cemetery was east of Valley Forge, but was moved to Redding when
the reservoir was built in the 1940's.
The Tharp Cemetery, is east of Lyons Plain Rd. on Kellogg Hill.
The Devils Den Cemetery is located on Route 53 just past Valley Forge Road,
up in the wooded area. It is sometimes referred to as the Godfrey Cemetery
.
Old
Post Office
There were several post offices around Weston serving local areas
between 1750-1830. Although built in approximately 1790, this
building, located originally at the
corner of Weston Road and Newtown Turnpike, became the official Weston Post
Office in 1883, being called the Norfield Post Office until 1846.
The building was originally used as a general store for the area. One could
purchase such goods that they could not produce on the farm, and they could
come and sit
by the pot-bellied stove and talk about the weather and other farming or small
business tales.
A back room as well as an upstairs were added later and the postmaster and
his family lived in the building running the store and the Post Office.
Devil's
Den
In response to a 1966 Planning and Zoning Commission survey, the
majority of town residents stated an appreciation for the town's "rural character".
Even before there was a national attention to environmental issues, the town
of Weston was caring for its natural resources.
The Aspetuck Land trust, a private local organization began acquiring property
for open space in 1966. To that same objective in 1967 Katherine Ordway of
Weston donated 1,400 acres of land to the Nature Conservancey, known as the
Lucius Pond Ordway Preserve, in memory of her father. It is more colloquillay
known as Devil's Den. This huge tract of land guaranteed that much or the northern
portion of Weston would remain without buildings or human habitation. With
additional donations over the last 50 years, the acreage is now up to 1800
acres. Saugatuck Reservoir
About 1920 the Bridgeport Hydraulic Company began acquiring land on both branches
of the Saugatuck River for the purpose of building two reservoirs. In 1927
the Connecticut General Assembly empowered the company to condemn property
when necessary or expedient for its corporate purpose>" By
1936 they had already acquired 4,500 acres of 5,000 necessary to build the
reservoir. Hard hit by the depression, many families were glad to sell out,
but affluent newcomers were not impressed with the offers.
An association vowed to fight the big company, but in the end they were eclipsed
by the courts and big business. In 1938 the town agreed that Bridgeport Hydraulic
would pay the town $40,000 in damages to the roads the dam would interrupt
and agreed to build certain new roads. Bridgeport Hydraulic also guaranteed
that they would not pursue damming up the west branch of the Saugatuck . We
received limited fishing and hunting privileges.
An entire town was flooded with the building of the dam which covers 635 acres
and at an elevation of 283 feet above sea level. It holds over 12 billion gallons
of water which is piped to the town of Norwalk. |
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