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New Canaan, Connecticut

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New Canaan, Connecticut
Town
Location in Fairfield County, Connecticut
Location in Fairfield County, Connecticut
CountryUnited States
StateConnecticut
NECTABridgeport-Stamford
RegionSouth Western Region
Incorporated1801
Government
 • TypeSelectman-town council
 • First SelectmanJeb Walker
Area
 • Total
22.5 sq mi (58.3 km2)
 • Land22.1 sq mi (57.3 km2)
 • Water0.4 sq mi (0.9 km2)
Elevation
344 ft (105 m)
Population
 (2005)[1]
 • Total
19,984
 • Density904/sq mi (349/km2)
Time zoneUTC-5 (Eastern)
 • Summer (DST)UTC-4 (Eastern)
ZIP code
06840
Area code203
FIPS code09-50580
GNIS feature ID0213468
Websitehttp://www.newcanaan.info/

New Canaan is an upscale town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, 8 miles (13 km) northeast of Stamford, on the Five Mile River. The population was 19,395 at the 2000 census.

The town is one of the most affluent communities in the United States. CNN Money ranked New Canaan first in the nation with the highest median family income. [2]

New Canaan has two Metro-North railroad stations: the New Canaan station and the Talmadge Hill station, both on the New Canaan Branch of the New Haven Line. Travel time to Grand Central Terminal is approximately one hour.

Geography

East view of the central part of New Canaan (1836) by John Warner Barber

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 22.5 square miles (58.2 km²), of which, 22.1 square miles (57.3 km²) of it is land and 0.3 square miles (0.9 km²) of it (1.56%) is water. The town is served by the Merritt Parkway, and by a spur line of the Metro North railroad. The downtown area consists of many restaurants, an old movie theater, and antique shops. There are also several churches in town, as well as the historic Roger Sherman Inn.

The town is bounded on the north by Lewisboro and Pound Ridge in Westchester County, New York, on the east by Wilton, on the southeast by Norwalk, on the south by Darien and on the southwest and west by Stamford.

The Silvermine neighborhood (which also extends into Norwalk and Wilton) is in the southeast part of town.

History

New Canaan train station

In 1731, Connecticut's colonial legislature established Canaan Parish as a religious entity in northwestern Norwalk and northeastern Stamford. The right to form a Congregational church was granted to the few families scattered through the area. As inhabitants of Norwalk or Stamford, Canaan Parish settlers still had to vote, pay taxes, serve on juries, and file deeds in their home towns. Because Canaan Parish was not planned as a town, New Canaan, when incorporated in 1801, found itself without a central common, a main street or a town hall.[3]

Until the Revolutionary War, New Canaan was primarily an agricultural community. After the war, New Canaan's major industry was shoe making. As New Canaan's shoe business gathered momentum early in the nineteenth century, instead of a central village, regional settlements of clustered houses, mill, and school developed into distinct district centers. Some of the districts were centered on Ponus Ridge, West Road, Oenoke Ridge, Smith Ridge, Talmadge Hill and Silvermine, a pattern which the village gradually outgrew.[3]

With the 1868 advent of the railroad to New Canaan, many of New York City's wealthy residents discovered the quiet, peaceful area and built magnificent summer homes. Eventually, many of the summer visitors settled year-round, commuting to their jobs in New York City and creating the residential community that exists today.[3]

Lewis Lapham, a founder of Texaco and great-grandfather of long-time Harper's Magazine editor Lewis H. Lapham, spent summers with his family at their estate that is now 300-acre (1.2 km2) Waveny Park next to Talmadge Hill and the Merrit Parkway.

The "Harvard Five" and modern homes

New Canaan was an important center of the modern design movement from the late 1940s through roughly the 1960s, when about 80 modern homes were built in town. About 20 have been torn down since then.[4]

"During the late 1940s and 50s, a group of students and teachers from the Harvard Graduate School of Design migrated to New Canaan ... and rocked the world of architectural design", according to an article in PureContemporary.com, an online architecture design magazine. "Philip Johnson, Marcel Breuer, Landis Gores, John M. Johansen and Eliot Noyes -- known as the Harvard Five -- began creating homes in a style that emerged as the complete antithesis of the traditional build. Using new materials and open floor plans, best captured by Johnson's Glass House, these treasures are being squandered as buyers are knocking down these architectural icons and replacing them with cookie-cutter new builds."[5]

"Other architects, well known (Frank Lloyd Wright, for example) and not so well known, also contributed significant modern houses that elicited strong reactions from nearly everyone who saw them and are still astonishing today. ... New Canaan came to be the locus of the modern movement's experimentation in materials, construction methods, space, and form", according to an online description of The Harvard Five in New Canaan: Mid-Century Modern Houses, by William D. Earls.[6]

Some other New Canaan architects designing modern homes were Victor Christ-Janer, John Black Lee and Allan Gelbin.[4]

The film The Ice Storm (1997) shows many of New Canaan's modern houses, both inside and out.

On the National Register of Historic Places

  • Hampton Inn — 179 Oenoke Ridge; Also known as The Maples Inn, it was built by the Elwood brothers in Queene Anne, Colonial Revival style. (added November 27, 2004)
  • Hanford Davenport House — 353 Oenoke Ridge (added September 3, 1989)
  • John Rogers Studio — 33 Oenoke Ridge; built in 1878 by John Rogers, who was called "the people's sculptor" in the later 19th century. The studio houses a collection of the artist's famous groups of statuary, many sculpted on site. The studio was closed during needed restoration and scheduled to reopen in the summer of 2006. (added November 15, 1966)[7] "He used this studio from 1876 to the end of his life. The John Rogers studio houses one of the finest collections of Rogers Groups in the nation."[8]
  • Landis Gores House — 192 Cross Ridge Rd. "With its flat-roofed single-story form, full-height glass walls, and emphasis on horizontal planes, the house he designed for himself in New Canaan is an outstanding example" of modernist architecture.[9] (added April 21, 2002)
  • Maxwell E. Perkins House — 63 Park St. (added June 6, 2004)
  • Philip Johnson Glass House — 798-856 Ponus Ridge Rd. (added March 18, 1997)
  • Richard and Geraldine Hodgson House — 881 Ponus Ridge Rd. (added February 28, 2005)

Demographics

Historical population
of New Canaan[9]
1810 1,599
1820 1,689
1830 1,830
1840 2,217
1850 2,600
1860 2,771
1870 2,497
1880 2,673
1890 2,701
1900 2,968
1910 3,667
1920 3,895
1930 5,456
1940 6,221
1950 8,001
1960 13,466
1970 17,451
1980 17,931
1990 17,864
2000 19,395

As of the censusTemplate:GR of 2000, there were 19,395 people, 6,822 households, and 5,280 families residing in the town. The population density was 876.5 people per square mile (338.4/km²). There were 7,141 housing units at an average density of 322.7/sq mi (124.6/km²). The racial makeup of the town was 95.27% White, 1.04% African American, 0.04% Native American, 2.29% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 0.38% from other races, and 0.98% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 1.74% of the population.

There were 6,822 households out of which 41.7% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 69.2% were married couples living together, 6.6% had a female householder with no husband present, and 22.6% were non-families. 19.4% of all households were made up of individuals and 9.3% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.83 and the average family size was 3.26.

In the town the population was spread out with 31.2% under the age of 18, 3.3% from 18 to 24, 25.4% from 25 to 44, 26.6% from 45 to 64, and 13.5% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 40 years. For every 100 females there were 91.2 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 85.7 males.

The median income for a household in the town in 2007 was $178,651 [10] and the median income for a family was $231,138, the highest in Connecticut. Males had a median income of $100,000 versus $53,924 for females. The per capita income for the town was $82,049. About 1.4% of families and 2.5% of the population were below the poverty line, including 2.2% of those under age 18 and 2.2% of those age 65 or over.

According to the New Canaan Advertiser's 2008 town answer book, in 2007, 254 single family homes were sold in New Canaan with a median sale price of $1.85 million and an average sale price of $2,301,608.

Education

Saxe Middle School
The front also bows out

New Canaan has five public schools:

  • Elementary School: East School, South School, West School
  • Middle School: Saxe Middle School
  • High School: New Canaan High School

There were 3,980 students enrolled in grades K-12 in the 2003-2004 school year and the total expenditure was $50,786,700.

New Canaan also has 3 private schools:

Points of interest

  • New Canaan Nature Center
  • Glass House
  • Waveny Park on South Avenue "was developed in 1912 by Lewis Lapham on what had been Prospect Farm, an early summer estate. In 1967 the Town acquired the 'castle' and 300 acres (1.2 km2) of surrounding parkland."[3]

Pictures

  • Postcard of The Country Club, ca. 1906
    Postcard of The Country Club, ca. 1906
  • Grace House in the Fields, ca. 1915
    Grace House in the Fields, ca. 1915
  • Waveny mansion in Waveny Park
    Waveny mansion in Waveny Park
  • Center School, ca. 1912 (now demolished)
    Center School, ca. 1912 (now demolished)
  • Hampton Inn, ca. 1909
    Hampton Inn, ca. 1909

Notable institutions and organizations

Media

Local weeklies and a monthly

  • New Canaan-Darien magazine. This glossy monthly is owned by Moffly Publications.
  • New Canaan Advertiser. This 100 year old weekly, is owned by the Hersam family of New Canaan and by Hersam Acorn Newsapapers, publishers of several local hometown weeklies. The paper is headquartered in town. The paper's publisher, V. Donald Hersam, Jr., is also the town treasurer and the former Chief of the New Canaan Fire Company #1.
  • New Canaan News-Review is a more recently established weekly covering the town. It is part of the Brooks Community Newspaper chain owned by Hearst Newspapers, which also owns the daily Connecticut Post in city of Bridgeport; and The Advocate in the city of Stamford.

Daily newspapers in the area

Two daily newspapers service the surrounding area.

Notable people, past and present

For more information, see List of people from New Canaan, Connecticut

New Canaan in the media

Films shot in New Canaan

Books about New Canaan

  • In the movie Fools Rush In, Matthew Perry's character grew up in New Canaan.
  • The exteriors of Waveny Mansion are used as Palmer Cortlandt's home in the ABC soap opera All My Children.
  • Karen suggests that Jack's father may be one of the "eight Black brothers of New Canaan, CT" in an episode of Will and Grace.
  • In the ABC drama Commander in Chief, Geena Davis' family home was in New Canaan
  • In the television program Carnivàle Brother Justin is shown to have founded New Canaan
  • The Neighbors are Scaring My Wolf by comic writer Jack Douglas was a 1968 book based on his experiences living in town.
  • In The Cricket In Times Square, main character Chester Cricket lives near New Canaan.
  • In one of the books in the series Gossip Girl, a minor character says he needs to stop in New Canaan.
  • The Official Preppy Handbook makes reference to New Canaan as one of the "preppiest" towns in the country.
  • In the ABC television series Sports Night, Managing Editor Isaac Jaffe (played by Robert Guillaume) lives in New Canaan.
  • In the 1947 movie Gentleman's Agreement, New Canaan is mentioned as a heavily anti-semitic town that won't allow real estate to be rented or sold to Jews.
  • In the USA television series Royal Pains Hank tells Tucker to take his father to a fictional rehab center called simon ranch in New Canaan CT.

For further reading

  • A Guide to God’s Acre, a walking tour of the Historic District; available from the New Canaan Historical Society.
  • My Impressions of the Hour, a journal written by an early New Canaan teacher, Margaret Mary Corrigan; available from the society.
  • New Canaan: Texture of a Community, available from the society.
  • Portrait of New Canaan, available from the society.
  • A Student's Memoir, edited by Robert W.P. Cutler. A history of the Little Red Schoolhouse, based on recollections of some of the school’s graduates.

References

  1. ^ U.S. Census Bureau Population Estimates
  2. ^ [1] CNN Money's 25 Top-Earning TownsJuly 16, 2008, accessed July 17, 2008
  3. ^ a b c d [2] New Canaan Advertiser Web site, Web page for "The Answer Book, April 22, 2006, accessed August 2, 2006
  4. ^ a b [3] "Architect for All Seasons", by David Gurliacci, Fairfield County Business Journal, January 9, 2006.
  5. ^ [4] PureContemporary.com accessed July 2, 2006
  6. ^ http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0393731839/102-8451043-6653762?v=glance&n=283155 From a brief description on Amazon.com of "The Harvard Five in New Canaan: Mid-Century Modern Houses by Marcel Breuer, Landis Gores, John Johansen, Philip Johnson, Eliot Noyes" by William D. Earls ISBN 0-393-73183-9 to be published July 24, 2006, web page accessed July 2, 2006
  7. ^ [5] New Canaan Historical Society Web site, page describing various sites run by the society, accessed August 2, 2006.
  8. ^ [6] "National Parks Service National Historic Parks Program" Web site, "Rogers, John Studio" Web page, accessed August 2, 2006
  9. ^ [7] "Public Archeology Survey Team Inc." Web site, accessed August 2, 2006
  10. ^ New Canaan Advertiser's New Canaan Answer Book Book March 27, 2008, accessed July 17, 2008
  11. ^ [8]Fairfield County Business Journal, January 23, 2006, "State of the Steak" by David Gurliacci, page 1
  12. ^ http://history.nasa.gov/EP-125/part2.htm
Methodist Episcopal Church, postcard mailed 1917

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