1. Frederick Munn died on November 28, 1898. He was one of two Connecticut residents and lots of people from other states who died that day in a tragedy that affected towns throughout Connecticut. What happened?
a. He died because of salmonella poisoning from infected turkeys cooked on Thanksgiving Day.
b. A freak fog and ice storm caused massive accidents on coastal roads in Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts and Maine.
c. A massive snowstorm sank a steamship off Cape Cod.
2. The Lewis-Zukowski house and property on South Grand Street is significant for several reasons. Are any of the following statements about its significance untrue?
a. The house is made of brick.
b. The barn shows the impact that tobacco growing had on Connecticut Valley agriculture.
c. In 1905, Michael Zukowski was the first Polish landowner in Suffield.
3. The oldest barns found in Connecticut are simple rectangular gable-roofed structures large enough for one family owning 100 acres. It was a multi-purpose building with three bays used for threshing, hay storage and animals. Several of these barns are located in Suffield. What are they called?
a. Dutch barns
b. Monitor barns
c. English barns
4. Suffield has a bridge, completed in 1929, which was listed on the National Historic Register in 2004. It is one of only six surviving open spandrel concrete bridges in the state. Where is it located?
a. Boston Neck
b. Suffield Street
c. East Street
5. Seth Pease was asked to help deter the alleged Aaron Burr conspiracy. Burr was arrested in 1807 for planning to establish an independent country in the southwestern portion of the United States. What did Pease do?
a. He was sent by Thomas Jefferson to kill Aaron Burr.
b. Gideon Granger, the postmaster general, sent Pease along a route to New Orleans to replace postal employees whose loyalties could not be counted on.
c. He infiltrated Burr’s band of conspirators to spy on them.
6. Edson D. Bemis is a case study in a six-volume set published between 1870 and 1888. Who was Bemis?
a. A veteran of the Civil War who survived a traumatic brain injury while in battle.
b. He was a former slave who was documented in his attempts to vote as granted by the 15th Amendment.
c. He was thought to be a vampire during the New England vampire panic in the 19th century.
7. In 1951 and 1952, Suffield entered a float for a parade and festival which took place in Hartford. The festival expanded from three days to six in 1952 when Ed Sullivan, Yul Brynner, Jimmy Dorsey and other celebrities made appearances. What was the festival?
a. The Cigar Harvest Festival
b. Hartford Celebrates Its History
c. The Constitution State Festival
8. A famous photographer came to Suffield in the 1940s to photograph rural America. Three of the photographs are exhibited at the Kent Memorial Library. Who was the photographer?
a. Dorothea Lange
b. Gordon Parks
c. Walker Evans
9. The Connecticut Western Reserve, now northeastern Ohio, was claimed by the Colony of Connecticut and later by the state of Connecticut in a charter by King Charles II. By order of Congress in 1786 after the Revolutionary War, Connecticut ceded most of the land to Pennsylvania but kept a 120-mile strip of land bordering Lake Erie and Pennsylvania. Connecticut governed this land until…
a. 1800
b. 1795
c. 1820
10. Were all of these items used for currency in colonial New England?
a. Brass buttons
b. Iron
c. Corn and tobacco
Answers:
1. c. The Portland Gale, an intersection of two large storms, paralyzed land transportation and wrecked hundreds of ships. The S.S. Portland, a luxury steamship, which gave the storm its name, sank, killing all 193 persons aboard. Snowfall records from the storm still stand today in New Haven and New London. The storm stimulated better transportation planning for future storms in the state.
2. All statements are true. When the farmhouse was built in 1781, brick was an uncommon building material. The circa 1900 tobacco barn indicates a turn away from generalized farming to specialized tobacco farming. Zukowski was the first Polish farmer in Suffield to own land.
3. c. English barns. They are named for the grain warehouses of the English colonists’ homeland. English barns are also called Yankee barns, Three-Bay barns, Connecticut barns and 30 by 40-barns based on its measurements in feet.
4. c. Stony Brook Bridge on East Street. The state used open spandrel structures over ravines and for exceptionally long spans. They were frequently built because they were less costly and aesthetically pleasing.
5. b. Gideon Granger was Pease’s brother-in-law. Granger dispatched Pease to replace disloyal postal employees. Perhaps to reward Pease for this service, Thomas Jefferson appointed him surveyor of lands south of Tennessee in 1807.
6. a. His case was detailed in the Medical and Surgical History of the War of the Rebellion. Despite a serious injury to his temple in 1865, Bemis married and fathered three children but his health ultimately deteriorated from the effects of his wound and he died in 1900.
7. a. Cigar Harvest Festival
8. b. Gordon Parks
9. a. 1800
10. Yes. Specifically, iron was voted as currency in a Suffield town meeting on December 3, 1725.