Connecticut Museum of Culture and History

Connecticut Museum of Culture and History

Established	1825
Location	1 Elizabeth Street, Hartford, Connecticut, United States
Type	History museum, library, archive, education center
Director	Rob Kret
Public transit access	Connecticut Transit Hartford 11 Simsbury-Granby Express 72 Asylum Ave
Website	connecticutmuseum.org

The Connecticut Museum of Culture and History (CMCH), formerly the Connecticut Historical Society, is a private, non-profit organization that serves as the official state historical society of Connecticut. Established in Hartford in 1825, the CMCH is one of the oldest historical societies in the US.^[1]

The Connecticut Museum of Culture and History is a non-profit museum, library, archive and education center that is open to the public. It houses a research center containing 270,000 artifacts and graphics and over 100,000 books and pamphlets.^[2] It holds one of the largest costume and textile collections in New England.^[3] It was known as the Connecticut Historical Society from its founding until 2023.^[4]

In 1825, a petition signed by citizens of Connecticut including Thomas Robbins, John Trumbull, Thomas Day, and William W. Ellsworth, was presented to the Connecticut General Assembly, calling for the establishment of a society to preserve historical materials.^[5] The General Assembly gave its consent, and the Connecticut Historical Society was established to collect objects important to the history of the Connecticut, and the United States more generally.^[6] The first elected officers were Trumbull, Day, Robbins, Thomas Church Brownell and Walter Mitchell.^[6]

With the rise in prominence of Hartford in the 1820s, the society's committee decided to house its first meetings in the city.^[7] Yet despite a flurry of activity, the society became inactive after 1825 and it was not until 1839 when new interest regained.^[8] The first official quarters for the CMCH were over a store at 124 Main Street in Hartford.^[9]

The society's new ideals and direction were spearheaded by educationalist Henry Barnard, who recommended that the society enroll members from around the state, encouraged a history and genealogy magazine and retrieved speakers for lectures who could address groups throughout Connecticut.^[10]

As its collections expanded, the historical society moved into a room in the newly built Wadsworth Athenaeum in 1843.^[11] By 1844, the collections had grown to include 250 bound volumes of newspapers, 6,000 pamphlets, and various collections of manuscripts, coins, portraits and furniture.^[12] New officers were elected including David D. Field.^[13] The CMCH appointed Thomas Robbins as its first librarian because of his extensive book collection and antiquarian expertise.^[14]

Under Robbins's tenure, the new quarters were open six days a week and interpretive tours of objects were given.^[15] Some early objects in the collection were a chest of William Brewster, a tavern sign of General Israel Putnam and a bloodstained vest worn by Colonel William Ledyard at the Battle of Groton Heights.^[15] After the death of Robbins in 1856, Connecticut historians James Hammond Trumbull and Charles J. Hoadly contributed to the society's work through various published research and lectures.^[16] The first woman elected in the organization was Ellen D. Larned in 1870.^[17]

In 1893, the society hired Albert Carlos Bates as a full-time librarian and it was under his tenure that membership doubled, the annual income increased five-fold and the collection grew.^[18] To accommodate the expanding collection, the CMCH bought a house on Elizabeth Street, which had previously belonged to the inventor Curtis Veeder, in the West End of Hartford.^[19] The building was altered between the 1950s and 1970s, to accommodate book stacks, exhibition galleries, an auditorium and a reading room.^[20]

In the early 2000s, the CMCH hired Bruce Mau^[21] and Frank Gehry to design a new museum near Trinity College, but lack of funds prevented the project from happening.^[22] From 2003 to 2007, CMCH operated the Old State House and created a permanent exhibit "History Is All Around Us".^[23][24]

Permanent exhibits include "Making Connecticut", about the history of Connecticut,^[1] and "Inn & Tavern Signs".^[25] There are also galleries for temporary exhibitions. Recent exhibit topics include the American School for the Deaf, women and needlework,^[26] the Kellogg brothers lithography firm, women's basketball,^[27] the Amistad,^[28] a history of cleanliness,^[29] the Civil War^[30] and Eliphalet Chapin, an 18th-century furniture maker.^[31]

• Albert Carlos Bates, librarian 1893–1940
• George C. F. Williams, president 1919–1922,1926–1934
• Newton C. Brainard, president 1953–1963

• Connecticut Museum of Culture and History (official site)

41°46′23″N 72°42′19″W / 41.77293°N 72.70525°W / 41.77293; -72.70525