CLINTON, CT -- Rain delayed Arbor Day is being observed at 1:30 p.m. this Friday on the front lawn of the Clinton Town Hall by the Town Tree Committee, with the planting of a white oak, the Connecticut state tree. The program includes a walking tree tour for Pierson Elementary School students, led by Committee chair Carol Geiser. The public is welcome.
This year the national holiday fell on April 27, the same day its founder, Rev. Birdsey Grant Northrop, died in Clinton in 1898. Clinton had to postpone the observance, due to rain.
Rev. Northrop, who lived the last eight years of his life in Clinton, was the son of a farmer, and is known as the Father of Connecticut’s Arbor Day celebrations for school children and for establishing New England’s Village Improvement Societies.
Find out what's happening in Clintonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Born July 18, 1817 in Connecticut, Birdsey Northrop often told the story of planting a maple at age 6 with his mother in the front yard.
A graduate of Yale Divinity School, Rev. Northrop began his ministry in Massachusetts, soon becoming the director of the Massachusetts’ public schools and then the newly formed Connecticut Board of Education.
Find out what's happening in Clintonfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
In 1871, fascinated by the established forestation programs of Europe, he traveled as the emissary of the state of Connecticut, touring England, Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, Egypt and Turkey.
In designing the observance of the nation’s centennial in the Connecticut schools, Rev. Northrop introduced the concept of Arbor Day to Connecticut’s school children in 1876. Concerned about how much the state had been stripped of forests by farming and the charcoal industry, Northrop purchased 5000 trees to plant throughout Clinton, primarily Norway spruce and larch.
At the time of his death, he was living in Clinton with his daughter Harriet Holbrook and her family, in a house located where Pierson is now.
At the 1:30 Friday observance, First Selectman Christine Goupil will lead the pledge of allegiance and read an Arbor Day proclamation. The 2018 Clinton tree is donated and will be planted on the front lawn of Town Hall by former tree warden Gary Bousquet, assisted by newly appointed tree warden Kim Syrel. The observance is open to the public.
Photos: Downtown Clinton, circa 1880, Rev. Northrop lived in house on far left (torn down with school when Pierson Elementary built); Rev. Birdsey Grant Northrop. Courtesy of Clinton Historical Society.