Tag: fog

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Naugatuck Eternal

Naugatuck Eternal (Naugatuck River, Thomaston, Connecticut)
“Naugatuck Eternal”
Naugatuck River, Thomaston, Connecticut
© 2017 J. G. Coleman

Coursing mightily after weeks of springtime rainfall, the Naugatuck River churns up wisps of whitewater as it snakes through mist-engulfed woodlands.

Over the course of a 39-mile journey from its headwaters in Northwestern Connecticut to its confluence with the Housatonic, the Naugatuck River descends more than 500 feet. Such fast-moving waters proved a boon for early industry, turning waterwheels and turbines that powered dozens of bustling factories during the 18th and 19th centuries. Of course, with that appropriation as a power source also came severe ecological decline.

Dams obstructed fish travel and decimated the fishery while factories channeled a foul stew of sewage and waste chemicals into the river on a daily basis right up until the 1960s. Mercifully, new regulations enacted in the 1970s ushered in a rejuvenating era for the Naugatuck characterized by dramatically improved water quality. Furthermore, five old dams have been removed entirely since 1999, reopening great lengths of the river to be traveled freely by rebounding fish populations.

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Veiled Realm of Black Rock

Veiled Realm of Black Rock (Black Rock Pond at Black Rock State Park, Watertown, Connecticut)
“Veiled Realm of Black Rock”
Black Rock Pond at Black Rock State Park, Watertown, Connecticut
© 2016 J. G. Coleman

Sublime mist drifts through the woodlands of Western Connecticut, rendering distant hills in hazy silhouette against an airy, cerulean sky. Deep in the basin below, still waters of Black Rock Pond yield unblemished reflections of a lakeside forest daubed with the lustrous light of dawn.

Connecticut’s Black Rock State Park encompasses over 400 acres of wildlands in the lower Litchfield Hills, its name hearkening back to an ancient history of graphite mining which is still largely shrouded in mystery. Legend holds that, long before European settlers arrived in the region, Native Americans living in these hills would collect graphite to make body paint for ceremonies and warfare.

Traditional stories go on, relating that the prospect of a large-scale graphite mine was among the earliest draws to these rugged forests for Connecticut Colony settlers in the 1600s. When historian Sarah Pritchard published an extensive history of the territory in 1896, she concluded that pioneering “explorers of the region reported the discovery of graphite, and samples of the mineral seem to have been carried away, but the location of the mine, if there was one, has been lost and never re-discovered.”

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Winter Lingered So Long…

Yankee Farmlands № 60 (Cows grazing in early spring, Litchfield, Connecticut)
“Yankee Farmlands № 60”
Cows grazing in early spring,Litchfield, Connecticut
© 2016 J. G. Coleman

Cattle wander aimlessly through a silent pasture veiled in heavy fog which clings to the Litchfield Hills. Though springtime arrived a few days earlier, dormant woodlands at the farm edge still reach skyward with bare branches.

As if the leafless forests weren’t a stark enough reminder of colder months past, Connecticut is expecting another few inches of snow today. In the words of 19th-century author Edgar Nye: “Winter lingered so long in the lap of Spring that it occasioned a great deal of talk.”

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Farmington River Monochrome

Angry Farmington (Farmington River at Tariffville Gorge, Simsbury, Connecticut)
“Angry Farmington”
Farmington River at Tariffville Gorge, Simsbury, Connecticut
© 2015 J. G. Coleman

The Farmington River thunders through a dark gorge in Northern Connecticut, its swift waters boiling angrily over submerged boulders. Stark skeletons of leaf-bare trees reach skywards from the riverbank amidst dense veils of drifting fog.

This foreboding interpretation of the Farmington Valley hearkens back to early, uncertain days in the history of Simsbury. A loose confederation of Native American tribes, angered over the relentless advance of colonial settlements upon their ancestral territory, began launching attacks on the colonies of Massachusetts and Connecticut in 1675. With news that entire towns were being destroyed, the people of Simsbury felt it was best to retreat from their remote frontier village until the emerging conflict subsided. They escaped eastward to Windsor and stayed for two years, a wise decision in retrospect. Upon returning after the war, it was discovered that Native forces had burnt the empty village of Simsbury to the ground.

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Orchard in the Mist

Yankee Farmlands № 46 (Peach orchard, Southington, Connecticut)
“Yankee Farmlands № 46”
Peach orchard in the fog, Southington, Connecticut
© 2015 J. G. Coleman

Heavy fog engulfs the orchards of Central Connecticut during a curious warm streak in mid-December. Rows of slumbering peach trees recede into the distance, eventually rendered in silhouette with pines and bare hardwoods at the grove’s edge.

Peaches were introduced by European settlers throughout much of the Mid-Atlantic and Southern colonies in the New World as early as the 1600s. “In fact,” recalled one 19th-century author,“ peaches were growing so widely in eastern North America by the time of the American Revolution that many assumed the fruit to be an American native.”

New England was a bit slower to truly embrace the peach, instead relying heavily upon apple and pear trees which could better tolerate the harsh northern climate. While scatterings of peach trees may have been planted here or there for a century or more prior, commercial-scale peach orchards in Connecticut didn’t emerge until the early 1900s.

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All Things Connecticut New Print Releases The American Northeast

Secret of the Autumn Hills

Secret of the Autumn Hills (Hills of the Housatonic Valley, Bridgewater & New Milford, Connecticut)
“Secret of the Autumn Hills”
Hills of the Housatonic Valley, Bridgewater & New Milford, Connecticut
© 2015 J. G. Coleman

Ethereal mist rises from the deep, rolling hills of the Housatonic River Valley as autumn tightens its grip upon the dark forests.

Bristling with wooded mountains and carved by scenic valleys, the northwest of Connecticut is perhaps an unlikely vestige of remote –even romantic– natural splendor in an otherwise crowded state which is increasingly consumed by the sprawl of civilization.

Connecticut’s Northwest Hills weren’t always so quiet, though. Mills and factories once clustered along its rushing rivers, iron ore was wrested from its mountains, vast forests were felled to fuel blast furnaces and make way for pastureland. But over the last two centuries or so, most of those industries vanished and agriculture deeply declined. Nature was obliged to beautify the resulting vacancies and did so with masterful skill.

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