1. What do you suppose this ad in the February 22, 1895 issue of The Windsor Locks Journal was promoting?
“In these days of telephone, telegraph, electricity and steam, people cannot afford to wait days or as many hours for relief. This is our reason for offering you…”
a. A bank loan
b. A one-minute cough cure
c. Forgiveness of sins
2. What is this Revolutionary War flag called?
a. Grand Union Flag
b. First Flag
c. Continental Colors
3. What was the meaning of the pine tree on a flag with the motto “An Appeal to Heaven” or “An Appeal to God”? The motto was a reference to John Locke’s treatise on the right to revolution. The flag was flown by six schooners commissioned by George Washington to intercept British ships entering the Boston harbor at the start of the Revolutionary War.
a. It commemorated the Pine Tree Riots.
b. It symbolized New England.
c. It symbolized independence.
4. From 1701 through 1878, the Colony (and later State) of Connecticut had not one, but two capital cities. What were they?
a. Hartford and Bridgeport
b. Hartford and New London
c. Hartford and New Haven
5. One iconic symbol of the American Revolutionary War was constantly on tour throughout the nation during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. It appeared at countless state fairs, expositions and patriotic celebrations. It made stops in Connecticut in 1903. What was this symbol?
a. The Betsy Ross flag
b. Fragments of the Liberty Tree
c. The Liberty Bell
6. What happened to the Liberty Tree, a famous elm tree, planted around 1646 in Boston? It stood near the Boston Common in the years before the Revolutionary War, under which many protests against the British were held.
a. It was felled and used for firewood by Loyalists in August 1775.
b. It fell down in a windstorm just before the Battle of Bunker Hill.
c. It was tarred, feathered and burned by occupying British soldiers in early 1776 just before the British evacuated from Boston.
7. Yo ho ho! There be pirates in the Connecticut River. David Marteen was a Dutch pirate and privateer, associated with the famous pirate Henry Morgan. In 1665, Marteen reportedly sailed up the Connecticut River and deposited treasure consisting of $20 million in coins from a Spanish galleon. In what town was the yet undiscovered treasure supposedly buried?
a. Suffield
b. East Granby
c. Windsor
8. On December 31, 1865 through February of the next year, A.W. Putnam and his crew of treasure hunters, were led by Miss Caswell, a clairvoyant, who had a vision of pirate treasure (maybe Marteen’s) buried in another area close by Suffield. Where did the clairvoyant lead the treasure hunters?
a. Agawam
b. Somers
c. Enfield
9. “The Lost Washington Dollars” is yet another tale (true or not) of buried treasure which occurred during the Revolutionary War in our local area. A large cache of gold coins, ammunition and supplies belonging to the Continental Army were stolen by Loyalists from a tavern in 1779. The coins were buried but when the Loyalists attempted to recover the cache, they were attacked by Native Americans and all but one of the Loyalists were killed. The sole survivor fled to England without recovering the treasure. Where was this treasure supposedly buried?
a. Suffield
b. Windsor
c. East Granby
10. Benjamin Franklin’s son William who was the Royal Governor of New Jersey at the start of the Revolutionary War, broke with his father when he sided with England. Beginning in June 1776, William was imprisoned in Connecticut in four different locations. The first two prisons were in Wallingford and Middletown but William somehow continued to gather intelligence for the Loyalists. In 1777, he was transferred to another town where he was placed in solitary confinement in a filthy cell containing only a straw mat. He told Connecticut’s governor Jonathan Trumbull that he would rather be shot. Seven months later, after losing his hair, teeth and desperately ill, he was imprisoned in a house in another town. What were the last two towns where he was imprisoned?
a. Simsbury (Newgate Prison) and Suffield
b. Simsbury (Newgate Prison) and East Windsor
c. Litchfield and East Windsor
Answers:
1. b. A one-minute cough cure
2. All three answers are correct. It is considered the first flag of the United States. The flag was first flown on December 3, 1775 by John Paul Jones, then on New Year’s Day January 1776 by George Washington at his Cambridge, Mass. headquarters.
3. All three answers are correct. The Pine Tree Riots were various acts of resistance by the northern colonists to British rule starting in 1734. The most famous one occurred in 1772. The cause of the riots was a royal decree which mandated that the largest of the white pines, one of the most popular trees used by the colonists, could only be used for Royal Navy masts. Colonists rebelled and continued to cut the tall pines for their own use.
4. c. Hartford and New Haven. The Connecticut General Assembly, met in Hartford and New Haven in alternating years. In the early 1870s, the General Assembly decided that the costs and logistical headaches of maintaining government operations in two cities were too high, and declared Hartford to be Connecticut’s sole capital city in 1873.
5. c. The Liberty Bell
6. a. It was felled and used for firewood by Loyalists in August 1775.
7. b. East Granby and maybe also c. Windsor. Or maybe it never happened! From the Connecticut River, he sailed up the Farmington River and deposited the treasure near Salmon Brook. Another version is that he lived for a time in Windsor, burying the treasure in that town, until he was told to vacate. He dug up the treasure and moved it to East Granby. Stones with markings were found near Salmon Brook in the 1950s but no treasure was found.
8. c. Enfield in the Scitico section. The clairvoyant said that the pirates entered the mouth of the Scantic River from the Connecticut River.
9. c. East Granby. Again! The treasure was stolen from the Bates Tavern and buried near Salmon Brook.
10. c. Litchfield and East Windsor.