Northwestern Freedom Trail Quilt Display

Redeemer's A.M.E. Zion Church/Norton House

Plainville

Diane Ross Lipari, Laurie Regish, Peg Yung, Agnes Pane

The Redeemer's African Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.) Zion Church represents a movement also evident elsewhere in Connecticut: the joining together of African denominations in town to establish a church which nurtured black leadership and generated community support. Organized in 1903, the congregation built its church structure a year later. Throughout this century, members have been leaders in Plainville and have provided a voice for the black community.

Samuel Deming House

Farmington

Marilyn Elling, Norma Francini

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Rev. Noah Porter House

Farmington

Dick Pandora, Norma Francini, Ruth McCarthy

Belonged to the minister of the Congregational Church and provided a home for one of the three African children in the Amistad group. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions was organized here. It is a private residence and not open to the public.

Hopkins Street Center

Waterbury

Beverly Murphy

Located at the corner of Hopkins and Pearl Streets, this building was once known as the Pearl Street Neighborhood House. It served as a settlement house for Waterbury's African American community, particularly migrants arriving from the South after the First World War. It continued to be a settlement house and community center from the 1920s into the 1980s and is now used for cultural events in conjunction with its owner, the Zion Baptist Church. The Waterbury NAACP was founded in this building in 1942, and it was once the home of the city's Urban League.

Elijah Lewis House

Farmington

Dick Pandora, Jean Johnson, Peg Yung, Priscilla Warren Pyatt

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Uriel Tuttle House

Torrington

Patricia Strout

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Milo Freeland Grave

North Canaan

Jill Gibbons, Corinne Levy

Milo Freeland is credited with being the first African American to volunteer for the Union Army during the Civil War. He did this as a member of the 54th Massachusetts Regiment, the subject of the film, Glory. His picture appears in the book, A Brave Black Regiment by Luis F. Emilio. Originally a resident of Sheffield, Massachusetts, Freeland died in 1883 while living in East Canaan. The stone that now marks his grave was placed in Hillside Cemetery, Route 44, East Canaan in 1996 following a rededication ceremony in his honor, and is located in Lot B8 to the rear of the cemetery, immediately to the right of the center driveway.

Austin Williams Carriage House

Farmington

Cynthia Cooper, Peg Yung, Eunice Heinlein, Betty Kelly

Was the location of the primary home for the Amistad Africans during their stay in Farmington. Austin F. Williams, a leading abolitionist in town, had a building constructed as a residence for the Africans. Shortly after this, he built his own home and later converted the first structure to a carriage house. The property is privately owned and not open to the public.

Union Hall

Farmington

Sara Prentis, Dick Pandora, Betty Kelly

Is now the Art Guild. Its upper floor was rented to abolitionist groups for meetings. It was originally located at the present site of the Porter Memorial on Main Street and is now owned by the First Church of Christ, Congregational.

Canal House and Pitkin Basin

Farmington

Diane Ross Lipari, Laurie Regish, Peg Yung, Agnes Pane

Is the location where Foone, one of the Amistad Africans, lost his life. It was also here that the Africans embarked to other towns to give exhibitions and raise money for their return to Africa.

Smith-Cowles House

Farmington

Sara Prentis, Jean Johnson, Penny Davidson

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Isaiah Tuttle House

Torrington

Elizabeth Morgan

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Foone's Grave

Farmington

Betty Kelly, Peg Yung

Riverside Cemetery is where Foone, one of the Africans on the Amistad, is buried. He drowned while swimming in Pitkin Basin. Beyond the Indian Obelisk was the Farmington Canal and open meadow where the Africans raised crops.

First Church of Christ Congregational

Farmington

Sara Prentis, Jean Johnson, Peg Yung, Joan Dahlberg, Ruth Bernadt, Betty Kelly

Supported the Amistad Case through its members who provided clothing, housing, education, and Christian teaching to the Africans while they lived in Farmington awaiting funds to return to Africa. The church is a National Historic Landmark.

John Brown's Birthplace

Torrington

Catherine Pelletier Avallone

One of the most famous abolitionists in America was John Brown, whose armed raid on the U.S. arsenal at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, in 1859 for the purpose of ending slavery, foreshadowed the government's war two years later to achieve the same end. Brown was born in Torrington, Connecticut in 1800 at this site. The house was destroyed by fire in 1918, but the property is maintained by the John Brown Association. The image of Brown's house is incorporated in the City of Torrington's seal. Pikes used by John Brown and his men in the Harper's Ferry raid were made by the Collins Company, located in Collinsville section of Canton. The Canton Historical Museum has one of these pikes on display.

Samuel Deming Store

Farmington

Dick Pandora, Norma Francini, Sara Prentis, Ruth Bernadt

Provided second-floor quarters for the Amistad Africans on their arrival in Farmington, but the space was later set up as a school where they attended classes for five hours a day, six days a week. Although the property is privately owned, it is operated as Your Village Store.

Timothy Wadsworth House

Farmington

Michael Aiezza, Assunta Aiezza, Sara Prentis, Betty Kelly

See the Underground Railroad overview.

Barney House

Farmington

Sara Prentis, Peg Yung, Betty Kelly

Was built in 1832 by John Treadwell Norton, a major supporter of the Amistad Africans. It is operated by the University of Connecticut as a conference center and as a bed and breakfast.

Marian Anderson Studio

Danbury

Janet Hochsprung

Marian Anderson was born in Philadelphia in 1902 and as a young woman was noted for her singing ability. Finding few opportunities to perform in the United States, she won recognition in Europe. After her return to America, she sang in concerts in New York City and at the White House. When she was denied permission to sing at Washington D.C.'s Constitution Hall in 1939, the government arranged for her to perform at the Lincoln Memorial before some 75,000 listeners. A year later she purchased her home in Danbury, known as "Marianna Farms", where she and her husband raised five children. She lived here for some 50 years. Near the house is a small building that she used as her rehearsal studio. Named a delegate to the United Nations in 1958, Anderson received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1963. She retired from concert performances in 1964 but continued to be active in various issues and causes. Her autobiography, My Lord, What a Morning, was published in 1956. In 1999, the company developing Mariana Farm donated the studio to the Danbury Museum and it was moved to the Museum's property on Main Street. A permanent exhibit celebrating Marian Anderson's musical legacy is being installed.

James Mars Poem

Norfolk

Barry Webber, Ruthann Olsson

James Mars was born into slavery in Connecticut in 1790 and became free through the gradual emancipation law enacted by the state in 1784. Mars wrote a pamphlet about his experiences, Life of James Mars, a Slave Born and Sold in Connecticut, which can be found in the book Five Black Lives. Mars was freed at the age of 21 and spent much of his life in Hartford and Norfolk, Connecticut. Always active in the church, he became a deacon of Talcott Street Congregational Church in Hartford. Mars helped organize meetings to promote freedom for slaves and to improve conditions for free African Americans. In 1842, he petitioned the Connecticut General Assembly in an effort to gain the right to vote, which was denied African Americans in the state's constitution. Mars lived his later years in Norfolk and supplied information on the history of that town which appeared in the 1900 publication History of Norfolk, written 20 years after his death. Mars is buried alongside his father, Jupiter Mars, who served in the American Revolution. Nearby are graves of the Freedom family, who are also mentioned in the above town history. These stones are located to the rear and left of the first entrance into the cemetery. To the right of this entrance, and near the wall next to Old Colony Road, is the grave of Alanon Freemen, who served in the all-black Connecticut Twenty-Ninth Regiment in the Civil War. The quilt square incorporates a poem written by James Mars, "God Never Made a Slave":

Lantern Block

Janet Hochsprung

The North Star and lantern are the key elements of the logo of the Connecticut Freedom Trail.