Easton, Connecticut
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Easton is a town in
Fairfield County, Connecticut Fairfield County is a County (United States), county in the southwestern corner of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is the List of counties in Connecticut, most populous county in the state and was also its fastest-growing from 2010 to 2020. ...
, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 7,605. Easton contains the historic district of Aspetuck and the Plattsville
census-designated place A census-designated place (CDP) is a Place (United States Census Bureau), concentration of population defined by the United States Census Bureau for statistical purposes only. CDPs have been used in each decennial census since 1980 as the counte ...
. It is a part of the Greater Bridgeport Planning Region, the New York metropolitan statistical area, and is bordered by the towns of Fairfield to the south, Redding to the north,
Weston Weston may refer to: Places Australia * Weston, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb of Canberra * Weston, New South Wales * Weston Creek, a residential district of Canberra * Weston Park, Canberra, a park Canada * Weston, Nova Scotia * W ...
to the west, and
Monroe Monroe or Monroes may refer to: People and fictional characters * Monroe (surname) * Monroe (given name) * James Monroe, 5th President of the United States * Marilyn Monroe, actress and model Places United States * Monroe, Arkansas, an unincorp ...
and Trumbull to the east. In March 2023, Easton established a sister city relationship with Sviatohirsk, Donetsk, Ukraine.


History

New York was first settled in 1757 by men and women from Fairfield. In 1762 a congregation called the North Fairfield Society was established, and it gradually evolved into Easton. In 1787 Weston, then including lands now defined as Easton, was incorporated out of Fairfield. The area was slow to develop because of the rough hills along the Aspetuck River, and so it was not until 1845 that what is now Easton separated from Weston. Today, half of the town's property is owned by the Aquarion Water Company of Connecticut, the major supplier of water in the area. The deaf and blind activist
Helen Keller Helen Adams Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) was an American author, disability rights advocate, political activist and lecturer. Born in West Tuscumbia, Alabama, she lost her sight and her hearing after a bout of illness when ...
lived the last several years of her life in Easton. Her house is still intact today and has been owned by several families since her death. The local middle school is named for her. The 2009 Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree was a
Norway Spruce ''Picea abies'', the Norway spruce or European spruce, is a species of spruce native to Northern, Central and Eastern Europe. It has branchlets that typically hang downwards, and the largest cones of any spruce, 9–17 cm long. It is very clo ...
donated from a private residence in Easton.


Geography

According to the
United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...
, the town has a total area of , of which is land and (4.2%) is water.


Demographics

As of the census of 2010, there were 7,490 people, 2,465 households, and 2,077 families residing in the town. The population density was . There were 2,511 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the town was 96.74%
White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...
, 0.22%
African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...
, 0.04% Native American, 2.02% Asian, 0.01%
Pacific Islander Pacific Islanders, Pasifika, Pasefika, Pacificans, or rarely Pacificers are the peoples of the list of islands in the Pacific Ocean, Pacific Islands. As an ethnic group, ethnic/race (human categorization), racial term, it is used to describe th ...
, 0.41% from other races, and 0.55% from two or more races.
Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...
or Latino of any race were 1.76% of the population. Of the 2,465 households, 42.3% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 75.8% were married couples living together, 6.3% had a female householder with no husband present, and 15.7% were non-families. 12.4% of all households were made up of individuals, and 6.2% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.95 and the average family size was 3.23 individuals. In the town, the population was spread out, with 21.7% under the age of 18, 5.5% from 18 to 24, 24.7% from 25 to 44, 37% from 45 to 64, and 16.6% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 47 years. For every 100 females, there were 94.3 males. The sex ratio is 94.3 males per 100 females. The median income for a household in the town was $132,000, and the median income for a family was $155,227. Males had a median income of $101,636 versus $83,333 for females. The per capita income for the town was $59,546. About 2.2% of families and 3.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 3.4% of those under age 18 and 2.6% of those age 65 or over.


Arts and culture

Places within Easton listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
include Aspetuck Historic District, Ida Tarbell House, and Bradley-Hubbell House. The annual Easton Fireman's Carnival is an event run by the Easton Fire Department that occurs every summer. It features games and food in addition to rides provided by the Stewart Amusement Company. The carnival's proceeds help pay the yearly operating costs, improvements to house and equipment, and high priority gear. In 2020, the carnival was canceled for the first time in 63 years due to the
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...
. Easton's centuries-old Union Cemetery is a well-known ghost-hunting site, called one of the "most haunted" sites in the United States.


Government

Historically, Easton has been a reliably Republican stronghold. In
1964 Events January * January 1 – The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is dissolved. * January 5 – In the first meeting between leaders of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches since the fifteenth century, Pope Paul VI and Patria ...
, it was one of only eleven Connecticut towns to vote for
Barry Goldwater Barry Morris Goldwater (January 2, 1909 – May 29, 1998) was an American politician and major general in the United States Air Force, Air Force Reserve who served as a United States senator from 1953 to 1965 and 1969 to 1987, and was the Re ...
. Easton also gave Goldwater his biggest margin in the state, being the only town to give him more than 60% of the vote. However, in
2016 2016 was designated as: * International Year of Pulses by the sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly. * International Year of Global Understanding (IYGU) by the International Council for Science (ICSU), the Internationa ...
, town residents voted for Democrat
Hillary Clinton Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, lawyer and diplomat. She was the 67th United States secretary of state in the administration of Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, a U.S. senator represent ...
with a plurality. In
2020 The year 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of even ...
,
Joe Biden Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. (born November 20, 1942) is an American politician who was the 46th president of the United States from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he served as the 47th vice p ...
improved upon the Democratic margin in the town.


2019 municipality election

Easton was seen as a shifting- liberal town in the wake of the 2019 municipality election. In the First Selectman election, Democrat David Bindelglass won, defeating Republican Wendy Bowditch. It was an upset, as Easton is known to be a solid- Republican stronghold.


Presidential elections


Education

Easton has three schools: Samuel Staples Elementary school, for children in grades from kindergarten to 5th grade, Helen Keller Middle School, for children in grades 6 through 8, and the private school Easton Country Day for children K–12 (formerly Phoenix Academy). High school students attend Joel Barlow High School in Redding.


Media

Easton is served by multiple TV stations,
New York City Metropolitan Area The New York metropolitan area, also called the Tri-State area and sometimes referred to as Greater New York, is the List of cities by GDP, largest metropolitan economy in the world, with a List of U.S. metropolitan areas by GDP, gross metropo ...
stations because the town is in that area. Easton also is in the radius of many
radio stations Radio broadcasting is the broadcasting of audio signal, audio (sound), sometimes with related metadata, by radio waves to radio receivers belonging to a public audience. In terrestrial radio broadcasting the radio waves are broadcast by a lan ...
. Most notably WSHU, WFOX,
WEBE WEBE (107.9 FM) is a commercial radio station licensed to Westport, Connecticut, carrying an adult contemporary format known as "WEBE108". Owned by Connoisseur Media, the station serves both the Greater New Haven and Fairfield County areas. T ...
, and WEZN.


Newspapers

Easton has many local
newspaper A newspaper is a Periodical literature, periodical publication containing written News, information about current events and is often typed in black ink with a white or gray background. Newspapers can cover a wide variety of fields such as poli ...
s of its own, but most of them are not well documented, with almost no info on them online. Despite this, these newspapers are printed and physical.


Easton Courier (1978–2018)

The Easton Courier began production in 1978. It was a print newspaper, different than its successor in 2020. It stopped publication in 2018 due to a lack of advertisements.


Easton Courier (2020–present)

The successor to the Easton Courier began work in 2018 after its closure. It began when Jim Castonguay, Director of the School of Communications, Media and the Arts at
Sacred Heart University Sacred Heart University (SHU) is a private, Roman Catholic university in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States. It was founded in 1963 by Walter W. Curtis, Bishop of the Diocese of Bridgeport, Connecticut. Sacred Heart was the first Catholi ...
, reached out to former Easton Courier chief editor Nancy Doniger via
LinkedIn LinkedIn () is an American business and employment-oriented Social networking service, social network. It was launched on May 5, 2003 by Reid Hoffman and Eric Ly. Since December 2016, LinkedIn has been a wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft. ...
, proposing the idea of a news publication created by students and faculty partnered up with the citizens of Easton. Local leaders embraced the idea after being presented with it. The newspaper began publication on February 29, 2020, as an online source with involvement from the town government. Since the newspaper is a
nonprofit A nonprofit organization (NPO), also known as a nonbusiness entity, nonprofit institution, not-for-profit organization, or simply a nonprofit, is a non-governmental (private) legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public, or so ...
, it runs on
donation A donation is a gift for Charity (practice), charity, humanitarian aid, or to benefit a cause. A donation may take various forms, including money, alms, Service (economics), services, or goods such as clothing, toys, food, or vehicles. A donati ...
s from the public. An article asking for your donation remains continuously on the newspaper's website due to that fact. A new article about donations appeared on December 18, 2021, but it isn't continuously being featured.


Infrastructure


Emergency medical services

Easton Volunteer Emergency Medical Service was established in 1946 and currently has two ambulances, a staff of three Chief officers, two career technicians and 29 volunteers.


Fire department

Easton is protected by eight paid firefighters of the Easton Fire Department (EFD) and the volunteer firefighters of the Easton Volunteer Fire Company # 1. Founded in 1921, EFD operates out of one fire station, and runs an apparatus fleet of three engines, one attack engine, one haz-mat unit, one brush unit, and one command vehicle. The Easton Fire Department responds to over 500 emergency calls annually. In 2015, the fire department responded to 539 incidents.


Police department

The Easton Police Department includes a K9 unit, D.A.R.E, and an animal control unit. The Easton Police Explorer Post 2001 is an affiliated with the department. Easton Police are also first responders for all EMS calls in town. They are all certified EMR's or EMT's and can provide oxygen, perform basic first aid, and defibrillation.


Bridge

The Route 59 bridge in Easton, which carries more than 10,000 cars and trucks every day over the Mill River, has a substructure rated in critical condition by state safety inspectors. In 2007, the bridge was one of 12 in the southwestern part of the state with "critical" safety inspection ratings.


Bridge Construction

In 2019, construction was conducted on a South Park Avenue bridge over Mill River which ended in the summer of 2020. In May 2021, construction on another bridge on South Park Avenue began which ended in December of the same year.


Notable people

*
Anne Baxter Anne Baxter (May 7, 1923 – December 12, 1985) was an American actress, star of Hollywood films, Broadway theatre, Broadway productions, and television series. She won an Academy Awards, Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, Golden Globe, and t ...
, actress *
Phoebe Brand Phoebe Brand (November 27, 1907 – July 3, 2004) was an American actress. Life Brand was born in Syracuse, New York in 1907 and raised in Ilion, New York, Ilion, Herkimer County, New York. Her father worked for E. Remington and Sons#Remington ...
,
blacklisted Blacklisting is the action of a group or authority compiling a blacklist of people, countries or other entities to be avoided or distrusted as being deemed unacceptable to those making the list; if people are on a blacklist, then they are considere ...
actress * Elise Broach, children's book author * Morris Carnovsky, actor *
Hume Cronyn Hume Blake Cronyn Jr. (July 18, 1911 – June 15, 2003) was a Canadian-American actor, screenwriter and playwright. He appeared in many stage productions, television and film roles throughout his career, and garnered numerous accolades, includ ...
, actor * Debrah Farentino, actress and journalist *
Edna Ferber Edna Ferber (August 15, 1885 – April 16, 1968) was an American novelist, short story writer and playwright. Her novels include the Pulitzer Prize-winning '' So Big'' (1924), '' Show Boat'' (1926; made into the celebrated 1927 musical), '' Cima ...
, playwright and novelist *
Eileen Fulton Eileen Fulton (born Margaret Elizabeth McLarty; September 13, 1933) is an American actress, singer, and author. She is known for her television role as Lisa Grimaldi on the CBS soap opera ''As the World Turns'', which she played almost continuo ...
, TV actress *
Helen Keller Helen Adams Keller (June 27, 1880 – June 1, 1968) was an American author, disability rights advocate, political activist and lecturer. Born in West Tuscumbia, Alabama, she lost her sight and her hearing after a bout of illness when ...
, blind and deaf author; the town’s middle school is named in her honor * Kevin Kilner, stage/television/movie actor * Gary Mendell, founder of the national non-profit Shatterproof * James Prosek, painter and author *
Dan Rather Daniel Irvin Rather Jr. (; born October 31, 1931) is an American journalist, commentator, and former national evening news anchor. He began his career in Texas, becoming a national name after his reporting saved thousands of lives during Hurrica ...
,
CBS News CBS News is the news division of the American television and radio broadcaster CBS. It is headquartered in New York City. CBS News television programs include ''CBS Evening News'', ''CBS Mornings'', news magazine programs ''CBS News Sunday Morn ...
anchor *
Igor Sikorsky Igor Ivanovich Sikorsky, (25 May 1889 – 26 October 1972) was a Russian-American aviation pioneer in both helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft. His first success came with the Sikorsky S-2, the second aircraft of his design and construc ...
, aircraft designer and founder of
Sikorsky Aircraft Sikorsky Aircraft is an American aircraft manufacturer based in Stratford, Connecticut. It was established by the Russian-American aviation pioneer Igor Sikorsky in 1923, and was among the first companies to manufacture helicopters for civilian ...
*
Jessica Tandy Jessie Alice Tandy (7 June 1909 – 11 September 1994) was a British actress. An icon in the film industry, she appeared in over 100 stage productions and had more than 60 roles in film and TV, receiving an Academy Award, four Tony Awards, a BAF ...
, actress * Ida M. Tarbell, "
muckraker The muckrakers were reform-minded journalists, writers, and photographers in the Progressive Era in the United States (1890s–1920s) who claimed to expose corruption and wrongdoing in established institutions, often through sensationalist publ ...
" known for helping to break up the Standard Oil monopoly" *
Johnny Winter John Dawson Winter III (February 23, 1944 – July 16, 2014) was an American singer, guitarist, songwriter, and record producer. Winter was known for his high-energy blues rock albums, live performances, and slide guitar playing from the late 1 ...
, blues guitarist


Sister cities

* Sviatohirsk"A Message From First Selectman David Bindelglass". Easton CT Government. Retrieved March 24, 2023.-95/


See also

* 1807 Weston meteorite. Fell in portion of Weston which is now modern-day Easton


Notes


External links


Town of Easton official websiteHistorical Society of Easton official website


of ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'', July 8, 2001 {{authority control Towns in Fairfield County, Connecticut Towns in the New York metropolitan area Towns in Connecticut Towns in Greater Bridgeport Planning Region, Connecticut