Newhallville is a neighborhood in the city of
New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134,02 ...
,
named for
industrialist
A business magnate, also known as a tycoon, is a person who has achieved immense wealth through the ownership of multiple lines of enterprise. The term characteristically refers to a powerful entrepreneur or investor who controls, through perso ...
George Newhall.
As delineated on
city planning
Urban planning, also known as town planning, city planning, regional planning, or rural planning, is a technical and political process that is focused on the development and design of land use and the built environment, including air, water, ...
maps,
[ Newhallville is bordered on the north by the town of Hamden, on the east by Winchester Avenue, on the south by Munson Street, on the southwest by Crescent Street, and on the northwest by Fournier Street. The main through routes are Dixwell Avenue, Shelton Avenue, Winchester Avenue, and Bassett Street. Once home to several industries, the neighborhood is now almost entirely residential.][Sara E. Thomas (2008)]
My Maps, My Neighborhood
Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute Curriculum Unit 08.03.07 The route of the Farmington Canal
The Farmington Canal, also known as the New Haven and Northampton Canal, was a major private canal built in the early 19th century to provide water transportation from New Haven into the interior of Connecticut, Massachusetts and beyond. Its Mass ...
runs through the middle of the neighborhood. The former Winchester Repeating Arms factory
A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...
complex in Newhallville occupies in the neighborhood. It is now the site of Science Park at Yale, an initiative started in 1981 by Yale University
Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
, the City of New Haven, and the Olin Corporation
Olin Corporation is an American manufacturer of ammunition, chlorine, and sodium hydroxide. The company traces its roots to two companies, both founded in 1892: Franklin W. Olin's Equitable Powder Company and the Mathieson Alkali Works. Olin che ...
to utilize and redevelop the sites and buildings where the former Winchester Repeating Arms
The Winchester Repeating Arms Company was a prominent American manufacturer of repeating firearms and ammunition. The firm was established in 1866 by Oliver Winchester and was located in New Haven, Connecticut. The firm went into receivership ...
factory was once located. The southern part of the neighborhood (south of Hazel and Highland streets) and the northern part of the adjacent Dixwell neighborhood are listed on the National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
as the Winchester Repeating Arms Company Historic District
The Winchester Repeating Arms Company Historic District is a historic district in New Haven, Connecticut that was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988. It includes 867 properties, which "include 858 major structures and 13 ...
, bounded on the south by Charles, Admiral, and Sachem streets.
History
The Newhallville area was a rural farming
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...
area until the middle of the 19th century. The Farmington Canal
The Farmington Canal, also known as the New Haven and Northampton Canal, was a major private canal built in the early 19th century to provide water transportation from New Haven into the interior of Connecticut, Massachusetts and beyond. Its Mass ...
was built through the area in the late 1820s, but it did not bring the development that its promoters had hoped for. In the early 1850s the canal was converted to a railroad
Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...
line, and George Newhall established a small factory
A factory, manufacturing plant or a production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. T ...
near the railroad where he manufactured carriage
A carriage is a private four-wheeled vehicle for people and is most commonly horse-drawn. Second-hand private carriages were common public transport, the equivalent of modern cars used as taxis. Carriage suspensions are by leather strapping an ...
s. Other small factories followed, along with workers' houses and a boarding house that Newhall built in 1860 for his unmarried male employees.
In 1870, the Winchester Repeating Arms Company began operations in Newhallville, which became its headquarters and center of production. By 1887, Winchester's factory employed more than 600 people. By the early 20th century, the plant covered more than six city block
A city block, residential block, urban block, or simply block is a central element of urban planning and urban design.
A city block is the smallest group of buildings that is surrounded by streets, not counting any type of thoroughfare within t ...
s and employed more than 1,000 workers.[ The manufacturing complex reached its peak of activity during ]World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, when it employed more than 19,000 people.[Associated Press]
'Gun that Won the West' becoming just part of history
''USA Today
''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...
'', January 18, 2006
As Winchester continued to expand during the late 19th century and early 20th century, the land surrounding the Winchester plant was developed as housing for industrial workers, primarily in one-, two-, and three-family tenement
A tenement is a type of building shared by multiple dwellings, typically with flats or apartments on each floor and with shared entrance stairway access. They are common on the British Isles, particularly in Scotland. In the medieval Old Town, i ...
homes. Population density
Population density (in agriculture: standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geographical term.Matt RosenberPopul ...
near the factory was high because close-in housing was preferred by workers who typically walked to and from their places of work. Many houses in the area were built by real estate
Real estate is property consisting of land and the buildings on it, along with its natural resources such as crops, minerals or water; immovable property of this nature; an interest vested in this (also) an item of real property, (more general ...
investors who built houses for rental or to be sold on speculation. During the period 1870 through 1920, some 65 to 75 percent of the household
A household consists of two or more persons who live in the same dwelling. It may be of a single family or another type of person group. The household is the basic unit of analysis in many social, microeconomic and government models, and is im ...
s in the vicinity of the Winchester plant had at least one primary breadwinner working for Winchester, while workers in another five to eight percent were employed in other neighborhood industrial concerns, and workers in roughly two to three percent of households were engaged in ancillary commercial business activities (such as butcher
A butcher is a person who may Animal slaughter, slaughter animals, dress their flesh, sell their meat, or participate within any combination of these three tasks. They may prepare standard cuts of meat and poultry for sale in retail or wholesal ...
s, grocer
A grocery store (American English, AE), grocery shop (British English, BE) or simply grocery is a store that primarily retails a general range of food Product (business), products, which may be Fresh food, fresh or Food preservation, packaged ...
s, and barber
A barber is a person whose occupation is mainly to cut, dress, groom, style and shave men's and boys' hair or beards. A barber's place of work is known as a "barbershop" or a "barber's". Barbershops are also places of social interaction and publi ...
s).[
Industrial activity in Newhallville was reduced drastically after 1965, when Winchester, at that time the largest employer in New Haven, decided to move its main production line to ]East Alton, Illinois
East Alton is a village in Madison County, Illinois, United States. The population was 6,301 at the 2010 census.
History
East Alton was incorporated as a village in 1893 (some say 1894).
William Cobb, namesake of Cobb Street, was one of the fir ...
. After a machinist
A machinist is a tradesperson or trained professional who not only operates machine tools, but also has the knowledge of tooling and materials required to create set ups on machine tools such as milling machines, grinders, lathes, and drilling ...
s' strike
Strike may refer to:
People
* Strike (surname)
Physical confrontation or removal
*Strike (attack), attack with an inanimate object or a part of the human body intended to cause harm
*Airstrike, military strike by air forces on either a suspected ...
in the late 1970s, the plant was sold to U.S. Repeating Arms
The U.S. Repeating Arms Company (USRAC) was an American manufacturer of firearms. It was established in 1981 and operated as an independent company until 1989, when it went bankrupt and was taken over by Fabrique Nationale Herstal. The company t ...
.[ The neighborhood's long history of arms production finally ended completely in 2006, when the U.S. Repeating Arms factory closed, laying off 186 workers.][Tess Wheelwright]
The Last Good-Bye
''The New Haven Independent'', March 30, 2006, and Paul Bass
The Earth Moves On Winchester
''The New Haven Independent'', August 11, 2009
References
External links
Photos of part of the abandoned Winchester Repeating Arms factory
Photo of one of the abandoned Winchester Repeating Arms factory buildings
{{Neighborhoods of New Haven
Neighborhoods in New Haven, Connecticut