Part 5

The People Behind The Names Of Newtown's Roads

By Nancy K. Crevier

I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I '" I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.

-Robert Frost

There are no two thoughts when crossing a road, turning a corner, or traversing the 200-plus miles of roads that make up Newtown. Road signs are there to point the way from one side of town to the other. Whether looking at a paper map or following GPS directions, the names of the roads are important to discern a lane from a drive from a boulevard, to guide the traveler confidently from place to place. Who thinks much beyond the fact that these signs are called by a specific designation?

Maltbie Road

According to a bit found in town historian Dan Cruson's

A Mosaic of Newtown History, David Maltbie settled in Newtown in 1798, quickly building up his holdings to 5,000 acres in the Hattertown section of town. Less than ten years later he died, and his son sold off the property in parcels. Although the Maltbie family lived only briefly in the area, the property that had once made up his estate continued to be known as Maltbie Land and it is not surprising that Maltbie Road, running between Castle Meadow and Huntingtown Road, is named for this long-ago land holder.

Wiley's Lane

Mr Cruson also makes a brief reference to Harry Wiley, who owned property on Taunton Hill and Great Hill Road, where a quarry was located in the 1920s. Possibly, it is for this gentleman that Wiley's Lane, a tiny dead-end path off of Hattertown Road near Key Rock, is named.

Birch Hill Road

Lamson Birch owned property adjacent to 90 Birch Hill Road, according to Mary Mitchell, who with the late Albert Goodrich authored

Touring Newtown's Past. Despite the fact that Lamson Birch was born and lived his whole life in a home near the center of town, as Newtown's first town historian E.L. Johnson wrote in Newtown 1705 to 1918, it is not improbable that Birch Hill Road off of Great Hill in the Taunton District could have been named for his land holdings.

He was a leading member of the Sandamanian society in Newtown, a split off sect of the Congregational Church that originated in Scotland, said Mr Cruson. The members met in a church located originally on the east side of Main Street until about 1820, Mr Cruson said, when membership dwindled. Lamson Birch's wife, Mary Ann, gained notoriety in the town by living to the age of 102. Born in 1771 and 1776, respectively, they came from Tory families and their recollections of the Revolutionary days are found in Mr Johnson's book.

Scudder Road

The Newtown League of Women Voters shows an "impassable" road running from Sugar Street (Route 302) to Birch Hill Road in a 1950s map. By the time the map was reissued in 1968, Mine Hill Road had been renamed Scudder Road. Scudder Road runs uphill from Route Sugar Street as far as the intersection with Birch Hill Road near Taunton Hill.

Scudder Smith, publisher of

The Newtown Bee, recalls his maiden great-aunts Susan and Elizabeth Scudder who lived in part the home at 17 Main Street built by his grandfather, Arthur Smith. Arthur Smith was married to Frances Scudder, the sister to Susan and Elizabeth. They were descendants of Captain Isaac Scudder born in Newtown in 1776. According to E.L. Johnson's book, Capt Scudder was a "leading carpenter and builder of the country in his day. The first Methodist church dedicated in 1831 was constructed by him."

Susan Scudder's name appears in several books recounting Newtown's past. She was the clerk of the Newtown Congregational Church for 28 years and the unofficial church historian, as well as publisher of the history of the church in 1914 for its bicentennial. She was the first female on the Newtown Board of Education, serving from 1917 to 1920, and was instrumental in organizing the local Visiting Nurse Association.

The 1905 map of Newtown notes the estate of an S. Scudder near what would today be the intersection of Rock Ridge and Birch Hill - right where Scudder Road now ends.

"That would most likely be Captain Samuel Scudder, who lived at the top of Mine Hill," said town historian Dan Cruson. It appears from genealogical information gathered by E.L. Johnson that Capt Samuel Scudder was the father of Susan, Frances, and Elizabeth.

Capt Samuel Scudder owned a large piece of property there in the 19th Century, Mr Cruson said, including an extensive flagstone quarry beyond the backyard of the Rock Ridge homestead.

"This quarry would have been a rock outcropping that was mined for flagstone, a type of gneiss that was used for hearthstones and pavings," Mr Cruson said. A fairly reliable rumor exists, Mr Cruson went on to say, that it was flagstone mined from Mine Hill Quarry (also called Scudder Quarry) that was used for the front steps of the Newtown Meeting House. It is no doubt for Capt Samuel Scudder that the road was named, he said.

Ferris Road

Ten generations of Ferrises have left their mark on the farming '" and most recently, the ice cream '" history of Newtown, beginning with Peter Ferris, who bought a farm in Newtown in 1711, according to E.L. Johnson's records. In 1864, the Ferris family bought the farm off of Route 302 from the Shepard family, said Charles D. Ferris III, one of the descendents of Peter Ferris. The family has farmed the land continually since then. That farm includes property that extends in one direction as far as Ferris Road, a dead-end street about half way up Scudder Road, and the power lines that run behind it.

The road was named in the early 1960s, said Charles D. Ferris III. It was most likely for his father, Charles D. Ferris, Jr, who sold a piece of property there that abuts Scudder Road and what is now Ferris Road, that the road was named, he said.

Fairchild Drive

From Taunton Pond to Great Hill road, the map of 1854 is peppered with the Fairchild name, so it is no wonder that Fairchild Drive off of Taunton Hill Road bears that name. A long line of Fairchilds populated the village with educators, artists, soldiers, and deacons, and it was Edward Fairchild who was the first Fairchild to settle in Newtown in 1705. Mainly, though, the Fairchilds were farmers, according to the only Fairchild descendent now living in Newtown.

"The Fairchilds were a lot of simple farmers, very much into their faith and their family," said Christine Fairchild, who lives in the borough. Most of the family history with which she is familiar has come to light thanks to the effort of her cousin Jean Fairchild Peterson of Salt Lake City, Utah, who has spent several years researching the genealogy of the Fairchilds.

"My great-great-great grandfather Horace Fairchild was a farmer, born in Newtown in 1812, but he also owned a store in Bethel with P.T. Barnum of Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Bailey circus fame. It's not really clear why he got out of the business," she said.

By 1840, however, he had returned to Newtown and a life of agriculture. Oddly enough, said Ms Fairchild, although the Taunton Lake Road Cemetery is the resting place for many members of the Fairchild family, there is no indication of where Horace Fairchild is buried. Nor is there a marker for him near his wife and children in Elmwood Cemetery in Bethel. She wonders if the fact that her great-great-great grandfather was said to have died of "Southern Fever" that he was buried in an isolated grave somewhere.

Born in 1801, Cyrus Dibble Fairchild, brother to Horace, was a respected farmer and also served as a Newtown representative to the State Legislature in 1869.

Adoniram, a son of Horace Fairchild, traveled beyond the farm fields of Taunton District. 'He was born in 1839 and served in the Civil War,' Ms Fairchild said, 'and later became a treasure hunter off the coast of South America. He eventually became a submarine diver in New York City where he was killed by a dynamite explosion off of Pier 14 in 1892,' she said.

Touring Newtown's Past takes readers to the sites of several Fairchild residences, including 20 Taunton Hill Road where Edward Fairchild first built a home and eventually came to own 1,500 acres known as Fairfield Farm or Great Hill Grazing Farm. Edward's son, Zadok, inherited 20 Taunton Hill, and 38 Taunton Hill was built by Ziba, one of the ten sons of Zadok.

At 28 Great Hill Road, according to Ms Mitchell's book, stands another Fairchild homestead, as well as at 50 Great Hill Road where Wheeler Fairchild built his home.

Reuben Horace Fairchild was Christine Fairchild's great-grandfather, born in Newtown in 1842. He served in the Civil War and was one of the first of the Fairchilds to leave the Taunton Hill enclave, moving to Danbury where he took a job as a hatter, returning to the farming life sometime after 1880. Her grandfather was another Adoniram, and lived in Danbury in the Beaver Brook section, where he also served on the fire department as the first fire chief. Edgar Fairchild raised Ms Fairchild and her brother, Randy, in Brookfield, where he worked as a well digger. And finally bringing the family name full circle, 22 years ago she returned to Newtown.

'The Fairchilds were not really movers and shakers. They were just good, unassuming people who loved the land,' she said.

Sturges Road

At the corner of what would today be Taunton Lane and Taunton Hill Road, the residence of C. Sturges is indicated on the 1905 map of Newtown. It is likely that it is due to this landholder that the short, dead-end road there today is named in his honor, Sturges Road.

Irvin Lane

Irvin Lane off of Sawmill Road commemorates

The New Yorker's first art director and resident of Newtown, Rea Irvin, according to Dan Cruson. In The Cyrenius H. Booth Library & Earlier Reading Institutions: A History, by Mr Cruson, he notes that Mr Irvin, born in San Francisco in 1896, by 1924 had found his way to New York City were he "quickly established a local reputation for his cartoon art which was sufficient to earn him the position of art director for Life magazine when it was still a humor magazine."

The cover for the premier issue of

The New Yorker in 1925 was the work of Mr Irvin. The iconic monocled Victorian cartoon character known as Eustace Tilley is a trademark of the magazine. Mr Irvin's artwork was also one of the first exhibits at the C.H. Booth Library, in 1956.

Farrell Road

It appears that despite the number of Farrells living in Newtown and Sandy Hook now, none are descended from the Farrells who lived in the Taunton and Land's End Districts in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. The 1854 map of Newtown shows a J. Farrell living in Taunton District, but it is likely that the picturesque Farrell Road, off of Old Hawleyville Road, is named for the F. Farrell and Mrs J. Farrell shown as having residences just east of the railroad tracks on the 1905 Newtown map.

Behind the names posted at the corners were real people who played significant roles in the making of the town, or who added color or mystery to the makeup of the village. Sometimes, they were quiet individuals who peopled the streets long ago. Sometimes they taught the children, saved the souls, or provided merchandise. They were so much more than letters on a signpost.