SILENT GROUNDS COLLECTIVE · THE CONNECTICUT ARCHIVE
Familiar streets. Forgotten places. The people who made them.
Explore local history, one photograph at a time.
1,180 images · 162 collections · All 8 counties
Browse all collections ↓THERE'S ALWAYS ANOTHER STORY
Windham County · September 1998
A nineteenth-century iron bridge, a church, an academy and historic houses connect transportation with the everyday landscape of Plainfield.
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![Mark Twain’s Hartford house, c.1900–1910 — [between 1900 and 1910]](/county-images/e2b0a9568f38e01933103c3512736a0a3e25c70b47e4ad792d8736b3205f6065.jpg)
Hartford County · [between 1900 and 1910]
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Explore mapped markers and the burial register.
MORE OF CONNECTICUT IN PICTURES
Hartford · Windsor
Waterbury
Groton
Windham
Mansfield
WinstedTHE COLLECTION CATALOG
Counties follow the historical geographic boundaries used in these records.
Hart–Jarvis House, October 2017 · 2017-10-15COLLECTION 016Hospitals & historic homes
Portland, Connecticut · related Colt sites in Hartford
Trace the homes that preceded Elmcrest and the documented connection between the Hart–Jarvis House and Elizabeth Jarvis Colt.
Opening / first recorded · Hospital founding: 1938 in preservation nomination
Cedarcrest in August 2010 · August 13, 2010. Josh Michtom, Flickr; CC BY-NC-SA 2.0. Reproduced for this noncommercial nonprofit archive under the same license.COLLECTION 025Health and public institutions
Newington, Connecticut
Newington’s state tuberculosis institution and its later psychiatric role, documented through original state reports, campus recreation photographs and archival leads.
Opening / first recorded · 1910
Spectators escaping the burning circus tent · July 6, 1944COLLECTION 111Disasters & remembrance
Hartford · Windsor
The fire, rescue work, compensation and Northwood burials: explore the 1944 disaster through photographs, first-person records and a carefully dated source trail.
1944–2019, with later remembrance
![Colt’s Armory in the early twentieth century · [between 1900 and 1906]](/county-images/86c1048ec1d98d9b1ae53fe058591087f5113e4355c6d34114efab4195d6bc5b.jpg)
Colt’s Armory in the early twentieth century · [between 1900 and 1906]COLLECTION 112Industry & labor
Hartford
The armory’s famous dome belonged to a much larger landscape of manufacturing, worker housing, family wealth and memorial architecture.
1855–1907
Bushnell Park panorama, 1905 · 1905.COLLECTION 113Parks & civic life
Hartford
Public landscape, Civil War remembrance and state government reshaped the center of Hartford over nearly a century and a half.
1854–1995
Mark Twain’s Hartford house, c.1900–1910 · [between 1900 and 1910]COLLECTION 114Homes & cultural life
Hartford
A celebrated writer’s house also preserves the history of family life, domestic work and the long effort to conserve an intricate Victorian building.
1874–1995
Hartford during the March 1936 flood, aerial view · March 22, 1936COLLECTION 115Disasters & waterways
Hartford · East Hartford
Street-level photographs and aerial surveys reveal the flood’s reach and the engineering works that changed the city’s relationship with its rivers.
1936–1981
Young worker beside a wagon at the Cheney mills · 1924.COLLECTION 116Industry & labor
Manchester
Lewis Hine’s 1924 photographs open a window onto the people and machinery behind Manchester’s silk industry and its transformation into a preserved mill district.
1855–1990s
Inspecting bullet jackets at the Stanley plant · 1943 May.COLLECTION 117Industry & labor
New Britain
Factory inspection, transport, childcare and street life reveal the home front beyond the assembly line in the Hardware City.
1942–1943
Workers leaving the East Hartford aircraft plant · 1941 May.COLLECTION 118Industry & labor
East Hartford · Hartford
Pratt & Whitney’s expansion appears in photographs of precision production, shift changes and the everyday movement of a wartime workforce.
1925–1944
South Windsor tobacco workers, view 1 · 1917 August 3.COLLECTION 119Agriculture & labor
Windsor · South Windsor · Windsor Locks
The prized cigar leaf depended on intensive hand labor. Hine’s 1917 photographs preserve evidence of children’s work alongside the larger history of migration and agriculture.
1875–1984
Thompsonville carpet mill, September 1940 · 1940 Sept.COLLECTION 120Industry & labor
Enfield
A textile landscape along Freshwater Brook passed through expansion, corporate mergers, wartime production and industrial closure.
1850–1971
Hill-Stead house and pond, documented in 2006 · 2006 — later documentationCOLLECTION 121Homes & cultural life
Farmington
Architecture, art collecting and a working landscape came together in a family home that became a museum in 1947.
1898–1991
Collins edge-tool trademark registration, 1878 · 1878 Mar. 19.COLLECTION 122Industry & labor
Canton
Trademark records, company history and a worker’s preservation effort trace the tools and people of Collinsville.
1850–1970
1. VIEW, LOOKING SOUTH, SHOWING PROXIMITY OF RAILROAD DEPOT TO FREIGHT DEPOT - Hartford & New Haven Railroad, Depot, 35 Central Street, Windsor, Hartford County, CT · October 1985 (individual day not consistently specified in the caption index)COLLECTION 107Railways, roads & rivers
Windsor
Two neighboring railway buildings show how travel and commerce met in Windsor Center. The survey follows their façades, working spaces and relationship across the tracks.
c. 1865–20th century
1. Historic American Buildings Survey Everett H. Keeler, Photographer March 1, 1937 EAST ELEVATION - Old State House, Main Street & Central Row, Hartford, Hartford County, CT · March 1, 1937COLLECTION 108Places & community
Hartford
The same Hartford building served state and city government. HABS photographs preserve its elevations, stairs and public rooms during the 1930s and in 1967.
1796–20th century
1. Historic American Buildings Survey (Fed.) Stanley P. Mixon, Photographer July 29, 1940 (B) EXTERIOR GENERAL VIEW FROM SHORE (EAST) END - Old Warehouse, Wethersfield, Hartford County, CT · July 29, 1940COLLECTION 109Places & community
Wethersfield
A small group of federal photographs connects three different kinds of place: the Cove Warehouse, First Church of Christ and Simeon Belden House.
1890s–1962, with earlier context
1. WEST PORTAL, VIEW EAST - Walnut Street Railroad Bridge, Walnut Street over AMTRAK, Hartford, Hartford County, CT · May 1991COLLECTION 110Railways, roads & rivers
Hartford
An engineering photo essay records a Hartford road crossing over the railway. Portals, trusses and connections reveal the structure behind an everyday journey.
1907–20th century
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Earlier editions: Town history research bundle · Health, transit and recreation bundle. Source links identify material held elsewhere; image credits explain dates and reuse terms.
