| Southington, Connecticut | |||
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| — Town — | |||
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| Motto: The City of Progress | |||
| Location within Hartford County, Connecticut | |||
| Coordinates: | |||
| Country | United States | ||
| State | Connecticut | ||
| NECTA | Hartford | ||
| Region | Central Connecticut | ||
| Incorporated | 1779 | ||
| Consolidated | 1947 | ||
| Government | |||
| • Type | Council-manager | ||
| • Town manager | Garry Brumback | ||
| • Town council | Edward S. Pocock III R, Chairman. John Dobbins R, Vice Chm. John Barry D Cheryl Lounsbury R Dawn Micelli D Albert Natelli R Christopher Palmieri D Peter Romano R Stephanie Urillo R |
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| Area | |||
| • Total | 36.6 sq mi (94.8 km2) | ||
| • Land | 36.0 sq mi (93.2 km2) | ||
| • Water | 0.6 sq mi (1.6 km2) | ||
| Elevation | 154 ft (47 m) | ||
| Population (2005) | |||
| • Total | 42,077 | ||
| • Density | 1,169/sq mi (451/km2) | ||
| Time zone | Eastern (UTC-5) | ||
| • Summer (DST) | Eastern (UTC-4) | ||
| ZIP code | 06479, 06489, 06467, 06444 | ||
| Area code(s) | 860 | ||
| FIPS code | 09-70550 | ||
| GNIS feature ID | 0213508 | ||
| Website | http://www.southington.org/ | ||
Southington is a town in Hartford County, Connecticut, United States. It is part of Connecticut's 1st congressional district. It is situated about 20 miles southwest of Hartford, about 80 miles northeast of New York City, 105 miles southwest of Boston and 77 miles west of Providence. Southington includes the areas of Plantsville, Marion and Milldale, each of which has its own post office and distinct architecture. The town rests in a valley of two mountains on its east and west sides. The town is located along exits 28 through 32 of Interstate 84, exit 4 of Interstate 691, and bisected by Route 10. Southington has the nickname of The Apple Valley, due to the many orchards that still dot its landscape. The Quinnipiac River flows through the town. It is home to Mount Southington Ski Area which has continued to draw visitors from nearby towns.
Southington was named for best quality of life for a town its size in Hartford County.[1]
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Although Southington was formally established as a town in 1779, its roots go back to a much earlier time. Samuel Woodruff, Southington's first white settler, moved from Farmington to the area then known as Panthorne that was settled in 1698. The settlement grew, prospered, and came to be known as South Farmington and then later, the shortened version, Southington.
The town’s most important early visitor was General George Washington, who passed through the town in 1770 on his way to Wethersfield.
The Marion section of Southington is one of the most historic places in the town. It is the site of an encampment by the great French general, Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau and his troops during the American Revolutionary War. In June 1781, the French troops under Rochambeau's command left Farmington and marched 13 miles to their eighth camp through Connecticut, near Asa Barnes Tavern in the Marion section of Southington, now the Marion Historic District (Cheshire and Southington, Connecticut). They camped there for four days. Rochambeau and his officers took shelter in the tavern, and the troops set up camp on a hill on the other side of the road. The area of the encampment has since become known as French Hill, and a marker on the east side of Marion Avenue commemorates the French campsite. According to Rev. Timlow's Sketches of Southington (1875), "Landlord Barnes gave a ball at his tavern, at which a large number of the young women of the vicinity were present; and they esteemed it something of an honor to have had a 'cotillion' with the polite foreigner." The celebrations-infused with spirits provided by Landlord Barnes-spanned the four nights they were in Southington . Rochambeau revisited Barnes's Tavern again on the return march on October 27, 1782. According to Timlow's, coins, buttons and other things have been picked up in the vicinity many years after the two encampments. The Asa Barnes Tavern is now a private residence very near the camp site at 1089 Marion Avenue.
Southington originally was a small, rural farming community. In the early 1900s, Southington developed as a manufacturing center, but still maintained a very small population of a few thousand residents. Some of the products invented there include the first cement that was able to harden under water, the first carriage bolt cutting machine, the break-neck rat trap, and a new tinware process.
With the overall decline of industry in New England, and the construction of Interstate 84 in the mid 1960s, Southington developed into a bedroom community of which the town saw explosive growth and a population that has surged to over 42,000 today. 28% of the workers in Southington are still employed in manufacturing, most of them in the production of fabricated metal and aircraft.
In May 1942, during World War II, the town was selected by the War Department to be highlighted in a defense booklet called Southington, CT—Microcosm of America. Photographers roamed the community taking photos of residents at work, at play and in their homes and churches. The final publication was intended to show friends and foes alike in Europe the typical American citizens and families, their traditions and values. Thousands of copies were dropped from military airplanes over Europe during Nazi German Occupation.
Each year, Southington is home to the Apple Harvest Festival, an effort to bring together local businesses and denizens from the area and surrounding cities. This has been a tradition of the town since 1969, generally spanning six weekdays and two weekends. Its highlights include a town parade, carnival rides and games, musical performances, and a wide selection of unique recipes and foods served by community cornerstones including the Boy Scouts of America, local churches, the Southington Fire Department and Police Department, the Southington Rotary Chapter, and the Southington Jaycees.
Two of Southington's main roads are named for notable residents. Southington's portion of Route 10 is named the Louis G. Tolles Memorial Highway for the late state Grange leader and legislator (1885–1956). The road was dedicated on Aug. 6, 1960 and rededicated with new signs on Oct. 6, 2007. A section of Rte. 364 (Oakland Road and Berlin Street) was dedicated as the Officer Timothy Foley Memorial Highway on Sept. 11, 2009 in honor of the first (and to date the only) Southington police officer killed in the line of duty. He died six days after being struck by a vehicle on Dec. 30, 1937.
In January 2011, John Weichsel retired as town manager after 44 years. He was hired by the first Town Council when the council/manager form of government was established in town in 1966. His tenure as a town manager in the same community is one of the longest in the United States.
Southington is located at geographical coordinates 41° 35′ 48" North, 72° 52′ 40" West (41.596588, -72.87767). According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 36.6 square miles (95 km2), of which 36.0 square miles (93 km2) are land and 0.6-square-mile (1.6 km2) (1.72%) is water.
The Metacomet Ridge, a rugged trap rock mountain ridge that extends from Long Island Sound to the Massachusetts/Vermont border, passes through Southington. Notable peaks along the ridge form the eastern edge of town: Bradley Mountain, Ragged Mountain, Short Mountain, and part of the Hanging Hills. The ridge is traversed by the 51 mile Metacomet Trail.
Southington's west ridge is home to an extremely rare geological formation called the Great Unconformity.
| Bristol, CT | Plainville, CT | New Britain, CT | ||
| Wolcott, CT | Berlin, CT | |||
| Southington | ||||
| Waterbury, CT | Cheshire, CT | Meriden, CT |
As of the census[2] of 2000, there were 39,728 people, 15,083 households, and 11,282 families residing in the town. The population density was 1,103.8 people per square mile (426.2/km²). There were 15,557 housing units at an average density of 432.2 per square mile (166.9/km²). The racial makeup of the town was 96.45% White, 0.86% African American, 0.09% Native American, 1.04% Asian, 0.01% Pacific Islander, 0.57% from other races, and 0.98% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 2.02% of the population.
There were 15,083 households out of which 33.0% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 62.9% were married couples living together, 8.9% had a female householder with no husband present, and 25.2% were non-families. 20.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 9.7% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.59 and the average family size was 3.02.
In the town the population was spread out with 23.8% under the age of 18, 5.9% from 18 to 24, 29.3% from 25 to 44, 26.3% from 45 to 64, and 14.7% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 40 years. For every 100 females there were 94.1 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 90.1 males.
The median income for a household in the town was $60,538, and the median income for a family was $70,789 . Males had a median income of $48,828 versus $35,298 for females.Households in Southington are relatively affluent with 30.1% of its households earning above $100,000. The per capita income for the town in 2005 was $32,485.[3] About 2.2% of families and 3.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.0% of those under age 18 and 5.6% of those age 65 or over.
As with the decline of industry in the area, many old factories and buildings were left vacant. The latest to close was Ideal Forging, which filed for bankruptcy in 2001. This factory is located in the town center in the central business district. Meridian Development Partners (www.meridiandp.com) of New York City became interested in the property in late 2003. This project, which has been in the works for over three years, will create upscale homes, condominiums, store fronts, and parks on the former factory site. The factory parcel is contaminated and must be remediated before construction can begin. As of late, Meridian has accomplished adding zoning text to the town's regulations, rezoning the land, acquiring ownership of the property, applied for permits, and received approval for demolition from the Wetlands Commission.
Southington has taken initiative to spur its own revitalization. In 2002, the town completed the downtown renaissance project. This project replaced the sidewalks on Main St. and Center St. with granite curbing and brick pavers. Life-long resident philanthropist, Robert Petroske donated $50,000 to the revitalization effort, which lead to the installation of decorative iron lamp posts, benches, and rubbish bins. Flowering trees were planted and a former fountain and light fixture was restored and relocated from Recreation Park (where it had been moved in 1961) to the town center. A renaissance zone was created to where private business owners in the zone could apply to the town to continue the project of granite, brick pavers, and lamp posts, of which the town would pay the difference of replacement concrete sidewalks versus the more expensive brick. The extension of brick pavers from Center Street to a section on the east side of Liberty Street was completed in July 2008 to connect with the pavers installed outside the new Liberty Square office building.
The town water department, which built a new facility on West Queen Street in 2002, demolished its former facility located between Mill and High streets in June 2008 and developed the land into a landscaped park, along with a continuation of the sidewalks, iron fences and decorative lamp posts. The old water facility abuts the linear walking trail.
The linear trail opened to the public in the summer of 2003. This trail was built over the town's old rail line which had ceased operation several years earlier. Dubbed the Farmington Canal Greenway, when completed it will stretch from New Haven, Connecticut to Northampton, Massachusetts, following the route of the historical Farmington Canal. The town has only completed 1.9 miles of the trail, running from Hart St. to the center of the village of Plantsville. This trail has brought landscaping, iron benches, and intersections of brick pavers where the trail crosses roads. This is seen as a major link for the further revitalization of downtown Southington and the town's village of Plantsville. Southington is in the process of expanding the trail further to the Cheshire, Connecticut town line, of which Cheshire will have to expand their trail to connect to Southington.
Southington is widely involved in the arts. Articles around town include murals and sculptures. The most widely know of these is inside the Pepper Pot on Center Street. It captures the different time periods of Southington with depictions of events and places that all ages can reflect upon.
Southington has eight public elementary schools, two middle schools and one high school. It also has an alternative school for children in grades 8-12 called ALTA. Southington also has three parochial schools; one is pre-kindergarten through eighth, one is kindergarten through fifth, and the last is pre-kindergarten through twelfth. Southington schools rank well, outperforming state and reference district averages, and rank among the top 16% of all public schools nationwide. Approximately 6,500 students are enrolled in Southington public schools, making it one of the larger districts in the state of Connecticut. Southington High School has a growing enrollment exceeding 2,200 students, of which 90% of graduates attend post-secondary education.
Due to Southington's popularity as a family suburb, the town has undertaken plans to expand all schools to accommodate the growing enrollment. Three elementary schools have been completed and a new building and second cafeteria has been added to the High School campus. Voters recently approved expansion and renovations to two other elementary schools (with one to be demolished and rebuilt), of which construction should start soon.
Southington boasts a fair share of large parks and open land, each serving several outdoor activities, and as a whole, a vast array of them.
Public
Recreation
There are numerous houses and districts in Southington that are listed on the National Register of Historic Places, including:[5]
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