Archive Record
Images
Metadata
Catalog Number |
2014.301.0205 |
Object Name |
Clippings |
Title |
Titicus crossroads |
Collection |
Information Ridgefield |
Scope & Content |
This photo of the Titicus crossroads with a horse drawn cart and two people in it first ran in the Ridgefield Press Old Ridgefield column on Febuary 2, 1982. On April 17, 2014, it was rerun with the following information added: "An astonishing amount of information is known about this century-old picture. The scene is Titicus crossroads, with photographer Joseph Hartmann standing in the middle of North Salem Road, which heads off northward in the background. At left is Saw Mill Hill Road and at right, Mapleshade Road. The horse-drawn cart is stopped at a watering trough that stood at the crossroads for many years to serve passing beasts of burden. In the cart are Aaron B. and Sarah Loder Gilbert — Mr. Gilbert, with white chin beard, is turned toward the camera. Also in the cart is a lawn mower. According to the Gilberts' grandson, the late Aaron V Gilbert, his grandparents were returning from a visit to the nearby Ridgefield Cemetery, where they had mowed the Gilbert family plot. Their home was a short distance to the left of the edge of this picture. Mr. Gilberts grist and saw mills used the waters of the Titicus River along Saw Mill Hill Road; the river is shown here going under the crossroads. Grandson Aaron could even date the photo to the spring of 1909. The house in the background, a saltbox dating to the 1730s, still stands today. In the mid-1700s it belonged to Epenetus Howe, a hatter, miller and prominent citizen. However, Howe was also a Tory at the beginning of the Revolution, which must have made for interesting family conversations — he was married to Sarah, daughter of Capt. Vivus Dauchy, a prominent Ridgefield patriot. Local legend had it that Howe maintained a "Tory-hole" in that house, for hiding loyalists from the colonials. The sign on the tree just above the horse says, "Good laundry work done here, Mrs. E. Russell." Perhaps like Gilbert and Howe, she used waters of the Titicus, too." |
Accession number |
2014.301 |
Lexicon category |
8: Communication Artifact |
Lexicon sub-category |
Documentary Artifact |
Imagefile |
018\20143010205-1.JPG |
People |
Dauchy, Vivus Hartmann, Joseph Epenetus Howe |
Source |
Ridgefield Historical Society |