Noah Webster House and West Hartford Historical Society - A True Destination for All Ages
The Noah Webster House and West Hartford Historical Society is a veritable treasure not only because it was the home of one of CT's most prominent families but because it also provides a hands-on educational opportunity for residents of all ages. Noah Webster is most notable for his Blue Back Speller (later Webster's Dictionary), but his vociferous nature extended to create and establish schooling opportunities for the greater good of the new nation.
He was far ahead of his time as an abolitionist and supporter of women's right to educational pursuits. Although his family sustained their livelihood on their home that originated on 200 acres, Noah pursued the wider world through his attendance at Yale University in New Haven.
Susan Regan, Host of CT Valley Views takes a personal tour of this living museum with its Executive Director Jennifer Dicola Matos in a show you won't want to miss and certainly should plan a family outing to this unique and valuable facility.
Noah Webster House // Connecticut's Cultural Treasures
Afoot in Connecticut 49 - Noah Webster House
Eric D. Lehman is the author of Bridgeport: Tales from the Park City, Hamden: Tales from the Sleeping Giant, and A History of Connecticut Wine. His fourth book, Insiders Guide to Connecticut, will be released soon, as well his fifth, A History of Connecticut Food. He teaches creative writing and literature at the University of Bridgeport and his series Afoot in Connecticut highlights the Nutmeg State's natural and historical treasures.
This episode finds Eric in West Hartford at the Noah Webster House.
Keep up with Eric at his blog: or at his home page
Noah Webster: Biography, Education, Facts, History, Dictionary, Quotes (1999)
Noah Webster, Jr. (October 16, 1758 – May 28, 1843) was an American lexicographer, textbook pioneer, English-language spelling reformer, political writer, editor, and prolific author. He has been called the Father of American Scholarship and Education. His blue-backed speller books taught five generations of American children how to spell and read, secularizing their education. According to Ellis (1979), he gave Americans a secular catechism to the nation-state.
Webster's name has become synonymous with dictionary in the United States, especially the modern Merriam-Webster dictionary that was first published in 1828 as An American Dictionary of the English Language.
Webster was born in the Western Division of Hartford (which became West Hartford, Connecticut) to an established family. His father Noah Sr. (1722–1813) was a descendant of Connecticut Governor John Webster; his mother Mercy (Steele) Webster (1727–1794) was a descendant of Governor William Bradford of Plymouth Colony.[4] His father was primarily a farmer, though he was also deacon of the local Congregational church, captain of the town's militia, and a founder of a local book society (a precursor to the public library).[5] After American independence, he was appointed a justice of the peace.[6]
Webster's father never attended college, but he was intellectually curious and prized education. Webster's mother spent long hours teaching her children spelling, mathematics, and music.[7] At age six, Webster began attending a dilapidated one-room primary school built by West Hartford's Ecclesiastical Society. Years later, he described the teachers as the dregs of humanity and complained that the instruction was mainly in religion.[8] Webster's experiences there motivated him to improve the educational experience of future generations.[9]
At age fourteen, his church pastor began tutoring him in Latin and Greek to prepare him for entering Yale College.[10] Webster enrolled at Yale just before his 16th birthday, studying during his senior year with Ezra Stiles, Yale's president. His four years at Yale overlapped the American Revolutionary War and, because of food shortages and threatened British invasions, many of his classes had to be held in other towns. Webster served in the Connecticut Militia. His father had mortgaged the farm to send Webster to Yale, but he was now on his own and had nothing more to do with his family.[11]
Webster lacked career plans after graduating from Yale in 1778, later writing that a liberal arts education disqualifies a man for business.[12] He taught school briefly in Glastonbury, but the working conditions were harsh and the pay low. He quit to study law.[13] While studying law under future U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice Oliver Ellsworth, Webster also taught full-time in Hartford — which was grueling, and ultimately impossible to continue.[14] He quit his legal studies for a year and lapsed into a depression; he then found another practicing attorney to tutor him, and completed his studies and passed the bar examination in 1781.[15] As the Revolutionary War was still going on, he could not find work as a lawyer. He received a master's degree from Yale by giving an oral dissertation to the Yale graduating class. Later that year, he opened a small private school in western Connecticut that was a success. Nevertheless, he soon closed it and left town, probably because of a failed romance.[16] Turning to literary work as a way to overcome his losses and channel his ambitions,[17] he began writing a series of well-received articles for a prominent New England newspaper justifying and praising the American Revolution and arguing that the separation from Britain was permanent.[18] He then founded a private school catering to wealthy parents in Goshen, New York and, by 1785, he had written his speller, a grammar book and a reader for elementary schools.[19] Proceeds from continuing sales of the popular blue-backed speller enabled Webster to spend many years working on his famous dictionary.[20]
Webster was by nature a revolutionary, seeking American independence from the cultural thralldom to Britain. To replace it, he sought to create a utopian America, cleansed of luxury and ostentation and the champion of freedom.[21] By 1781, Webster had an expansive view of the new nation. American nationalism was superior to Europe because American values were superior, he claimed.
A well-rounded look at Noah Webster
Did you know the author of the first American Dictionary was from Connecticut?
Noah Webster best
Description
Noah Webster Biosketch
***Teachers: instead of assigning a boring biography report to your students, why not try a biosketch? This is a biosketch (a very brief biography) of Noah Webster, the man who created the first American dictionary. Intended for educational purposes; created for an Elementary Education Social Studies course.
West Hartford, CT Our Town™
Our Town videos are your access to the communities in which we serve. Visit parks, main streets, shops, neighborhoods and all the sites that make each town unique. Sit back, enjoy, and welcome to Our Town. Our Town videos are an exclusive feature of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage.
Welcome to West Hartford, CT!
Noah Webster
GT History/Herstory
The Father of the Modern Dictionary
NOAH WEBSTER: A FORGOTTEN FOUNDING FATHER ~ Pastor Garry Clark
IN GOD WE TRUST! In this video message, you'll meet someone you most likely know nothing about, a Forgotten Founding Father! Pastor Garry Clark will take us on a little tour of the man Noah Webster, and although you may not know it, his Godly influence, changed this nation!
Noah Webster: Contributions to the American Education System
Noah Webster greatly influenced the method of teaching students back during the founding of the United States of America.
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#5: Whispering History of the States: Connecticut
Relax as I give you some very brief information about the State of Connecticut.
HILL-STEAD MUSEUM // Connecticut's Cultural Treasures
A National Historic Landmark and a official project for Save America's Treasures, Hill-Stead Museum in Farmington, Connecticut, is a stop on the Connecticut Art Trail and a member of Connecticut's Historic Gardens. Hill-Stead is noted for its 1901, 33,000-square-foot house filled with art and antiques. Pioneering female architect Theodate Pope Riddle designed the Colonial Revival-style house, set on 152 hilltop acres, to showcase the Impressionist masterpieces amassed by her father, Cleveland iron industrialist Alfred A. Pope.
Connecticut's Cultural Treasures is a new series of 50 five-minute vignettes that profiles a variety of the state's most notable cultural resources.
HILL-STEAD MUSEUM
Connecticut Office of Tourism
CPTV
© 2013 Connecticut Public Broadcasting, Inc.
Hartford's Saturday Hoopsters
We meet on Saturday afternoons to let off a little steam during the winter, and sharpen our basketball skills. It's lots of fun!
Two Minute Tour of Connecticut: 50 States for Kids - FreeSchool
Want to know a little bit more about Connecticut but only have two minutes? Take our two minute tour of the Constitution State, the fifth state in the United States of America. Learn about the origin of its name and some important people from Connecticut, as well as some history and state symbols (state tree, state bird, state motto, state flag, state flower, etc.). FreeSchool is great for kids!
Like this video if you want to see more tours of the 50 states!
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And our NEW channel for little ones, FreeSchool Early Birds!
Music: Jaunty Gumption, Plucky Daisy - Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Connecticut
A small state with a lot of nicknames: The Nutmeg State, the Constitution State, the Yankee State, the Land of Steady Habits and the Provision State. Public Affairs Officer Jan Krč describes Connecticut, then and now. #50states #CT
Transcript:
Not many people are familiar with my home state. My name is Jan Krč and I'm the Public Affairs Officer at the U.S. Embassy in Vienna. And I'd like to introduce you to Connecticut. I come from New Haven, Connecticut's second largest city and its principal seaport.
Connecticut is the third smallest state, but also one of the most densely populated. Three and a half million people live within the state's 5 ½ thousand square mile territory.
The name Connecticut comes from the Native American word, Kenetuket, which means, beside the long tidal river. The official state nickname is the Constitution State. This is because the early British settlers were governed by the Fundamental Orders of 1638 which are considered by many historians to be the first ever written constitution and these Orders served as the basis for the much better known U.S. Constitution. My state is also known as the Nutmeg State and people from Connecticut are sometimes called Nutmeggers. That nickname may have come from sailors in the 18th and 19th centuries returning from their voyages with this spice.
My state has another nickname, the Land of the Steady habits. And some people call it the Yankee State.
Connecticut is one of the original 13 colonies and became an official state in 1788. It's part of the group of states known as New England.
Connecticut was previously home to about 6 to 7 thousand Native Americans before Dutch fur traders arrived in 1614. In 1633, the Dutch purchased land from the Algonquian tribe and erected a fort and trading post at what is now Hartford, the state capital. Later, it was taken over by British settlers from neighboring Massachusetts who established their first settlement in Connecticut at Wethersfield in 1634.
My state is very industrious. It is called the birthplace of Yankee ingenuity, ranking first in the nation in the per capita numbers of engineers and issued patents. As early as 1657, there was a thriving ship building industry in Connecticut.
George Washington even gave Connecticut one more nickname -- The Provision State because of the aid the state gave during the Revolutionary War.
Eli Whitney, the inventor of the cotton gin in 1798, lived in Connecticut. But did you also know that Whitney was the mastermind behind the idea of mass production? He used standard parts to produce muskets in 1798. That revolutionized industrial production in the U.S. and his cotton gin made that crop pre-eminent in the American south.
In the early 1900s, Groton, Connecticut, became the site of a U.S. Submarine Base. And the state became a munitions supply center in World War I. Connecticut remained an important supplier during the Second World War, producing planes, engines, propellers, submarines and other supplies. The first atomic powered submarine, the U.S.S. Nautilus was launched there in 1954. Today, Groton is still the center for U.S. submarine development and construction.
And modern day Connecticut based factories also produce sewing machines, jet engines, helicopters, motors, hardware, tools, cutlery, clocks, locks and silverware.
Here are some of the firsts for Connecticut:
Founded in 1764, the Hartford Courant is the oldest continuously published newspaper in the U.S.
America's first law school was founded in 1784 in Litchfield.
The first tax-supported public library opened in Salisbury in 1803.
The first commercial telephone exchange was established in New Haven in 1878.
And many other first inventions came from my state like the sewing machine in 1846, ice making machine in 1853, the vacuum cleaner in 1933, the helicopter in 1939 and color TV in 1948.
Connecticut is more than industrial cities. The small colonial towns and rural areas attract many tourists. The resorts along the Long Island Sound shoreline are also popular. In fact, two thirds of the state are open land with more than 100 state parks and forests.
Not only does Connecticut have a beautiful landscape, it's also an easy commute to New York City. That's why many famous people chose to live there. And that might be the reason Connecticut has the highest per capita income of all U.S. states. Katharine Hepburn, Dylan McDermott, Milos Forman and Christopher Walken have all lived in Connecticut. And Meg Ryan grew up in Fairfield.
The 1988 film, Mystic Pizza, starring Julia Roberts, is based on an actual pizza parlor in Mystic, Connecticut. To this day, the state has the best pizza in the U.S. and it was in a New Haven eatery named Louis that the first ever hamburger was served in 1895. In addition to celebrities, Connecticut has its share of famous people from history.
Maria Sassi - Teachers Make a Difference
Maria Sassi, who was for several years Poet Laureate of West Hartford, Connecticut, is a prize-winning poet and playwright. Her first poetry collection, Rooted in Stars, now in its second printing, is part of The Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University. Her chapbook What I See presents ekphrastic poems, three of which have won international poetry prizes: the René Magritte Prize and the Salvatore Dali Prize. Maria’s poems have been choreographed and performed on national television, and she is the author of several plays. Among these is the verse-play Dreams and Loves of the Septre Family, which received the Bicentennial Award and was staged at Hartford’s Old State House, and The Yellow Light, winner of the One-Act Prize sponsored by the Hartford Stage Company, which produced it in concert. Her prize-winning video, Five Ocean Poems, completed with a grant from the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving, was distributed to public institutions throughout Connecticut. For many years Maria taught creative writing with an emphasis on poetry at Hartford College for Women/University of Hartford, and she has hosted poetry events at several venues including the Noah Webster House, Hartford’s Old State House, and the Charter Oak Cultural Center. Her work has been much anthologized and published by many literary journals. She has read at venues throughout the Northeast and at the Poets Library in Edinburgh, Scotland; and she has lectured on the work of many national Poet Laureates.
STATE’S TOP SPELLERS TO COMPETE IN THE CONNECTICUT SPELLING BEE march 9
The Connecticut Spelling Bee returns to West Hartford on Saturday, March 9 at the University of Saint Joseph (USJ). More than 40 students from throughout the state will compete to earn the right to represent Connecticut at the Scripps National Spelling Bee in Maryland in May. The Connecticut event is co-sponsored by the Noah Webster House (very fitting, re: Webster’s Dictionary)/West Hartford Historical Society and the Hartford Courant. This is the third year the vent is hosted by USJ. See all background info in the
Why are Spelling Bees so popular in the U.S.?
Complexity of the English language compared to other languages
How Sharon teaches English to USJ Education students
o What do you think it takes for the kids to make it to the state final?
They have to want to be in the Bee and dedicate the time to improve their language skills
Studying word origins from many countries
Support from teachers, family and friends
Dedication to continuous learning inside/outside of the classroom, something we do at USJ
Hartford - Insurance capital of the world
A short visit to Hartford, CT. Old State House, Wadsworth Museum of Art, Connecticut State Capitol.
Russian audio, English subtitles.