The early residents of Derby were a paranoid bunch afraid of everything from wolves to comets.
Those are two of the tidbits I learned Nov. 26 during a very cool talk by Valley historian Rob Novak, Jr. of Shelton.
This column is ostensibly about Novak’s talk at the Derby Public Library Monday night, but you’ll have to indulge a whole bunch of self-serving paragraphs before I get to Novak.
Self-Serving Paragraphs
I’ve been a reporter for 14 years. Writing about local history in the various towns I’ve covered has never been my strong point.
My aversion to local history stories probably dates back to my upbringing in Somers, N.Y., where local historians sold me a bag of brown BS growing up. My hometown was the “birthplace of the American circus,” I was told repeatedly.
The definitive history book on Somers published in 1988 was subtitled “BIRTHPLACE OF THE AMERICAN CIRCUS.”
(Side note — I see there’s a website selling that book for about $150. How in the wide world of sports is that possible? Is there a black market for 80s-era history books, like there are for kidneys and Viagra?)
There were boastful signs on all the major roads proclaiming you were in Somers, the “BIRTHPLACE OF THE AMERICAN CIRCUS, BABY.”
(Note — the signs didn’t include the word “baby.”)
Years later, I landed a job at The Patent Trader, an independent weekly newspaper later swallowed by a large newspaper company and eradicated from the planet because that’s how many large newspapers chains win local readers — fire the staff, kill the product.
During my tour of duty at the weekly, Somers started taking down those Somers, “BIRTHPLACE OF THE AMERICAN CIRCUS, SUCKAS” signs and replacing them with Somers, “CRADLE of the American circus.”
My paper did a story. Turns out Somers didn’t birth the circus. It was a false claim. We were apparently just one of many weekend nannies to the American circus.
A part of my childhood was soiled.
In the last three years, Jodie Mozdzer, who left us to become a guru at Southern Connecticut State University, usually wrote the ones that have been published in the Valley Indy — or we gave direct access to the historians themselves.
More Words
I was pleasantly surprised to hear Novak’s presentation last month. It will certainly be wandering into Derby’s Oakcliff Cemetery near my house very soon.
The event, publicized on the Valley Indy’s self-serve calendar, had a description that hooked me: “This unique and timely local history program is presented by Rob Novak, Jr., Local Historian. Rob will delve into Derby’s past to see if he can find any “skeletons in the closet.” The strange and peculiar will be explored.”
At the lecture, Novak started out with the truth — nothing he was saying was the word of God. History is written by the people who write it, after all.
But, Novak said, everything he said could be traced to a primary source — from old Valley history books to ancient copies of the Evening Sentinel. It wasn’t about local folklore.
“Everything here is citable. I’m not saying it is true because I was not there,” he said.
Then, at lightning speed, Novak ran through about 315 years of sort of weird things that happened in Derby and the Valley.
I can’t even begin to describe each event Novak talked about — there were just too many. Nor can I do justice to Novak’s delivery by listing each topic. But I walked away with a much better sense of Derby, which is important to me, because it’s where I purchased a home.
I strongly recommend you see him next month when he speaks at the Derby Public Library again.
Novak has a perfect sense of what the average person finds interesting — and it’s not a never-ending list of dates and last names.
He talks about history in a way that makes it personal — he repeatedly referred to “us” whenever he talked about Valley residents, even though he was describing events that happened 100 years ago.
It was a conversational presentation — Novak held court with dozens upon dozens of local history tidbits, such as:
- Derby was settled to grow hops, an ingredient in beer. Alcohol was important because it was used as a way to “purify” drinking water.
“It wasn’t just for, you know, having a good time. It was a way to protect yourself,” Novak said.
- Wolves were an issue in New England back in the day. Colonists were eager to kill them. One of the noted wolf killers — Edward Wooster.
- Derby was founded in 1675 against the backdrop of “King Phillip’s War.”
- The original founders abandoned Derby immediately after it was founded because of fear of the Native American uprising.
- In 1801, a surly, foul-mouthed drunkard nicknamed “Old Parks” ran a rope ferry that crossed the Housatonic River just below what is now O’Sullivan’s Island. Before life coaches and 12-steps programs, Parks managed to turn his life around after allegedly seeing a human skeleton walking on the Housatonic late one night.
“This is one of the actual documented ghost stories in Derby,” Novak said.
- Leman Stone operated a widely successful trading company just about where Smoke and Bones is now on Route 34. Traders arrived using the Housatonic River. Stone saw the business crumble when he helped build Route 34, which helped drive business to New Haven.
Click here for the New Haven Register’s pleasant write up of the event.
