Black Rock as the Center of Commerce

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1808 FIRST LIGHTHOUSE BUILT 

Recognizing the harbor's importance as a trading center, the federal government paid $200 for 9.5 acres on Daniel Fayerweather's island. The first Black Rock Harbor Light, better known as Fayerweather Lighthouse, was a wooden octagon built by Abiah Woodward to guide the growing number of ships navigating its waters. A storm destroyed it after only 13 years of service. 

  

1808 Earliest Mention of a Village School 

For nearly two centuries village children were home schooled, walked to Fairfield for classes, or paid to attend a private "select" school. Though many history books cite 1841 as the date of the first public school in Black Rock, the first mention of a village school building appeared in the account books of local merchant Thomas Bartram from 1808 to 1811, when Bartram's accounts list expenses for a lock and planks for school benches for a one-room school located on the "school lot," now the location of the pocket park on the corner of Grovers Avenue and Brewster Street. The school existed until 1860, when the building was sold and moved to 272 Brewster Street. The bones of the original school still exist as part of a private home. Two private schools requiring tuition existed too, The Select School, on the upper floor of Ransome's Carriage Shop on Calderwood Court, and The Auxiliary School, in Capt. Caleb Brewster's barn on Hackley Street.  

  

1812 War Begins 

"Free Trade and Sailors' Rights" became the battle cry of Connecticut's maritime community during the War of 1812, a nearly three-year conflict waged between the United States and Britain when US interests were damaged by British and French attempts to block the US from trading with the other. "Free Trade" was a cry to eliminate tariffs imposed by the US government, Britain and France, and tit-for-tat blockades between France and Britain. "Sailors Rights" referred to US outrage over "impressments," the kidnapping of American sailors at any time or place by British ship captains. Some 8,000 American sailors are estimated to have been "impressed."  

 

1812 BATTLE ON THE GREAT LAKES 

Fascinated by the action in the harbor as a young man, Isaac went to sea at age 13 in 1785. Serving in the Navy and commanding his first ship in 1791, he became a hero of the Great Lakes battles  of the War of 1812. Awarded a sword for "Gallantry in Action," Chauncey later became the first commandant of the Brooklyn Navy Yard. The Chaunceys were one of the earliest families to join the Wheelers at Black Rock. The tiny home of his father, Wolcott, still stands on today's Seabright Avenue, a rare example of an 18th century worker's cottage whose fine view of the harbor makes up for its size. 

  

1814 CALEB BREWSTER GATHERS MILITARY INTELLIGENCE 

Among the busiest and most effective maritime intelligence gathering tools of the war were the speedy revenue cutters -- precursors to US Coast Guard ships. In January 1814 Capt. Caleb Brewster and the crew of his revenue cutter Active, detained a merchant vessel bound for Liverpool found to be carrying undocumented Americans hidden in the hold, men of wealth masquerading as seamen, and bills, orders and financial drafts for supplying the British on the US coast, in Canada and the West Indies. Stopping smuggling of supplies to the enemy, protecting American ships, reporting names and locations of enemy ships, by-passing the British blockade to deliver and receive dispatches from US Commodore Stephen Decatur's squadron -- all were part of a day's work for this Black Rock hero of the American Revolution. 

   

 1814 FORT UNION ON BATTERY ROAD 

In August 1814, two years after requesting a fort to protect the harbor from British attack, local citizens took matters into their own hands. "After furnishing at their own individual expense the ground affording a site" ... the people "from a principle of patriotism" contributed "more than 500 days of voluntary labour ... in erecting a fort" on Grover's Hill. Only then were two cannon and a militia unit provided to protect the harbor.   

  

1823 NEW LIGHTHOUSE BUILT 

After a storm destroyed the first Fayerweather Light in 1821, the US Congress authorized a far stronger lighthouse. Today's tower, built of locally quarried brownstone and crowned by a cast iron lantern, began operating in 1823. Its oil-based lighting system required constant maintenance and vigilance. Seven lighthouse keepers, including the legendary Kate Moore, worked the light during the 115 years of its operation. A recently launched US Coast Guard cutter bears Kate’s name, in honor of the twenty-plus lives she saved during her tenure. Fayerweather Light ceased offering navigational aid in 1933, when it was decommissioned. But as the third oldest lighthouse along the Connecticut shore, it remains an enduring symbol of Black Rock’s rich maritime history, and its most recognizable emblem.