128 Fun Facts About Connecticut

Hartford is the capital, but which city was Connecticut's most populous at the 2020 census?

Bridgeport counted about 148,600 residents in 2020, some 13,000 more than its nearest rival; Hartford, the capital, came only fourth.

Connecticut's nickname, the Constitution State, honors which colonial document?

The Fundamental Orders of 1639 grew out of a sermon in which Thomas Hooker argued that authority rests on the free consent of the people; the nickname became official in 1959.

Which spice gives Connecticut its unofficial nickname?

Connecticut is the Nutmeg State; one tongue-in-cheek origin story says its peddlers sold carved wooden nutmegs as the real spice to unsuspecting customers.

Which song is Connecticut's official state song?

Yankee Doodle became the state song in 1978; British officers first sang it to mock ragged colonial troops, who turned the joke around and marched to it themselves.

Connecticut takes its name from a Mohegan-Pequot word usually translated as what?

Long tidal river is the usual rendering of quinnehtukqut, the name of the river that splits the state; the colony was named after the river, not the other way round.

Connecticut's high point sits on the slope of which peak, whose summit lies across the state line?

Mount Frissell peaks in Massachusetts, so Connecticut's highest ground is a marker on its south slope at about 2,380 feet; the state's highest true summit is a different mountain nearby.

Which lake, created behind a hydroelectric dam in the 1920s, is the largest in Connecticut?

Candlewood Lake, Connecticut's largest lake at about 5,400 acres, was created when Connecticut Light & Power dammed the Rocky River and pumped Housatonic water into the valley from 1928.

Which state borders Connecticut to the west?

New York agreed in 1683 to let Connecticut keep its southwestern corner on the Sound; in return it took the Oblong, a strip nearly two miles wide along the rest of the border.

Long Island Sound, along Connecticut's southern shore, is which kind of coastal feature?

Long Island Sound is an estuary, where fresh water from the Connecticut, Housatonic and Thames rivers mixes with Atlantic salt water behind the shelter of Long Island.

Which long-distance hiking trail crosses Bear Mountain, the highest summit entirely within Connecticut?

The Appalachian Trail climbs Bear Mountain, at 2,316 feet the state's tallest peak, just before crossing into Massachusetts; Connecticut's highest ground is on the flank of a mountain over that line.

Which units of local government did Connecticut abolish in 1960, though all eight still appear on its maps?

Counties survive in Connecticut only as lines on the map: the state ended county government in 1960 after nearly 300 years, leaving its 169 towns to run local affairs.

The Connecticut Compromise of 1787 gave every state an equal vote in which body?

The Senate gives every state two seats while House seats follow population: Connecticut's delegates proposed the split, and the convention adopted it in July 1787 after large and small states had deadlocked.

Which Dutch navigator became the first European to explore the Connecticut River, in 1614?

Adriaen Block sailed up the Connecticut River in 1614 and left his name on Block Island; the Dutch followed with the House of Hope, a trading fort on the site of Hartford.

Thomas Hooker led his followers from which colony to found the Connecticut Colony?

Thomas Hooker left the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1636 and led about a hundred followers overland to found Hartford, the heart of the new Connecticut Colony.

By legend, colonists hid Connecticut's 1662 charter in the Charter Oak in 1687 to keep it from which official?

Sir Edmund Andros, governor of the Dominion of New England, demanded the charter in October 1687; legend says the candles went out and Captain Joseph Wadsworth slipped away with it.

The Charter Oak was commemorated on Connecticut's coin in the 50 State Quarters program in what year?

Connecticut's quarter was released in 1999, early in the state quarters series, showing the Charter Oak, which was toppled by a storm in August 1856.

What species of tree was the Charter Oak, now honored as Connecticut's state tree?

The Charter Oak was a white oak; after a storm brought it down in 1856, its wood was carved into keepsakes, among them a ceremonial chair still used in the State Capitol.

The world's first telephone directory, issued in New Haven in February 1878, listed about how many subscribers?

The single sheet listed 50 subscribers and no numbers: every call went through an operator at the central office, who connected callers by name.

How does New Haven's Louis' Lunch, claimed birthplace of the hamburger, serve its burgers?

On toasted white bread, as in 1900: the Lassen family says a customer in a hurry was handed broiled ground steak between two slices of toast, the first hamburger sandwich.

Louis' Lunch in New Haven, which claims to have invented the hamburger, refuses to serve which of these?

Ketchup is barred along with every other condiment: the Lassen family, grilling since 1895, allows only cheese, tomato or onion so that the taste of the burger stays simple.

Which New Haven pizzeria is credited with inventing the white clam pie?

Frank Pepe's, founded on Wooster Street in 1925, is credited with creating the white clam pie, topped with fresh clams, garlic, oregano and grated cheese instead of tomato.

Which dish did the Connecticut House vote in 2021 to make the official state food, in a bill that never became law?

Pizza passed the House in May 2021, but the bill died on the other chamber's calendar; the statute book, revised to 2026, lists a state candy, the lollipop, and still no state food.

PEZ candy's US factory and visitor center are in which Connecticut town?

PEZ has been made in Orange since the 1970s; it began in Vienna in 1927 as a peppermint for adults, sold as an alternative to smoking, and its name is cut from Pfefferminz.

Wiffle ball was invented in 1953 in which Connecticut town?

David N. Mullany invented the Wiffle ball in his Fairfield backyard in 1953, perforating a plastic ball so his 12-year-old son could throw curves without straining his arm.

ESPN broadcasts from studios in which Connecticut town?

Bristol got ESPN almost by accident: its founders first rented offices in nearby Plainville, but the town's ban on satellite dishes sent them next door, where they bought a plot of their own.

ESPN went on the air from Connecticut on September 7, 1979, with the first edition of which show?

SportsCenter opened ESPN's first night with Lee Leonard and George Grande at the desk; the network now known for the big leagues followed it with a slow-pitch softball game.

Lake Compounce, opened in 1846, is the oldest continuously operating what in the United States?

The oldest amusement park still running began with a flop: in 1846 Gad Norton hired a scientist to stage experiments with explosives by the lake, and though they failed, the crowds kept coming.

Foxwoods Resort Casino stands on the reservation of which Connecticut tribe?

The Mashantucket Pequot opened a high-stakes bingo hall on their reservation in 1986 and grew it into Foxwoods, which opened as a full casino in 1992.

Who became head coach of the UConn women's basketball team in 1985?

Geno Auriemma took over a team with one winning season in its history; ten years later his 1995 side went 35-0 and won UConn's first national title.

UConn's record 111-game winning streak ended in the 2017 Final Four with an overtime loss to which team?

Mississippi State won 66-64 on a shot at the overtime buzzer, a year after UConn had beaten the same team by 60 points in the tournament.

Yale was founded in 1701 under what original name?

The Collegiate School became Yale in 1718, after Elihu Yale, a Boston-born merchant who had made a fortune in India, sent nine bales of goods, 417 books and a portrait to fund a building.

What is the name of the live bulldog that serves as Yale's mascot?

Handsome Dan began in 1889 as a student's pet who followed his owner to football games until the whole college adopted him; every bulldog since has inherited the name.

In 1861 Yale became the first American university to award which degree?

A PhD was a German idea: Americans had to cross the Atlantic to earn one until Yale's graduate school began awarding the degree at home in 1861.

Which schoolteacher turned Continental Army captain is Connecticut's official state hero?

Nathan Hale volunteered in 1776 to gather intelligence behind British lines, was caught and was hanged as a spy at the age of 21.

Which teacher, now Connecticut's official state heroine, opened a school for Black girls in Canterbury in 1833?

Prudence Crandall kept teaching after the legislature passed a 'Black Law' aimed at her school; she spent a night in jail, and only a mob attack in 1834 made her close it.

After the 1839 slave revolt aboard La Amistad, the ship was towed into which Connecticut port?

The federal brig Washington seized La Amistad off Long Island and towed her into New London in August 1839; the Mende captives were jailed in New Haven until the Supreme Court freed them in 1841.

USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered vessel, was built in which Connecticut town?

Groton's Electric Boat yard built USS Nautilus; First Lady Mamie Eisenhower christened her in January 1954, and the boat came home in the 1980s to become a museum.

In August 1958, USS Nautilus became the first watercraft to reach what?

The North Pole fell to Nautilus on August 3, 1958, weeks after a setback: in June, deep ice in the Chukchi Sea had forced the boat to turn back and wait at Pearl Harbor.

Sikorsky Aircraft, the helicopter maker founded by Igor Sikorsky, has its headquarters in which Connecticut town?

Stratford is where Igor Sikorsky took the controls of his VS-300 himself: a tethered hop of a few seconds in September 1939, then free flight in May 1940.

Who in 1974 became the first woman elected governor of a US state without following her husband into office?

Ella Grasso won Connecticut's governorship in her own right and kept it: her hands-on handling of the Blizzard of 1978, when she closed the state's roads, brought a landslide re-election.

Joe Lieberman in 2000 was the first person of which faith on a major-party presidential ticket?

Joe Lieberman, an Orthodox Jew and Connecticut senator, was Al Gore's 2000 running mate, the first Jewish candidate on a major-party ticket; the ticket won the popular vote but lost the Electoral College.

As of 2026, which Hartford-born actress holds the record of four Academy Awards for Best Actress?

Katharine Hepburn won for films from Morning Glory in 1933 to On Golden Pond in 1981; her third award came in a dead heat, when she and Barbra Streisand tied in the 1969 vote.

Which Bethel-born circus showman served as mayor of a Connecticut city in 1875?

P. T. Barnum won a one-year term as mayor of his adopted home city in 1875 and spent it campaigning for a better water supply and against the city's brothels.

Mark Twain's next-door neighbor at Hartford's Nook Farm was which fellow author?

Harriet Beecher Stowe lived beside Twain with no fence between; he recalled that in her last years she would wander into his house and startle people with a war whoop.

Hartford's Wadsworth Atheneum, founded in 1842, is the oldest continually operating what in the United States?

The oldest public art museum in continuous operation began as a shared roof: Daniel Wadsworth's 1844 building also housed the Connecticut Historical Society and the forerunner of the city's library.

Founded in 1764, which Connecticut paper is the oldest continuously published US newspaper?

The Hartford Courant first appeared on October 29, 1764, as printer Thomas Green's weekly Connecticut Courant, a dozen years before independence, which is why its motto runs 'Older than the nation'.

When the Hartford Whalers left Connecticut in 1997, which NHL team did they become?

The Whalers became the Carolina Hurricanes, playing in Greensboro for two seasons before settling in Raleigh; owner Peter Karmanos moved them after arena talks with the state collapsed.

WWE's global headquarters is in which Connecticut city?

Stamford is where WWE grew from a regional outfit staging shows in school gyms into a global brand; Titan Towers, its offices beside Interstate 95, was its base from 1991 to 2023.

A 17-year-old's sandwich shop, opened in Connecticut in 1965 with a $1,000 loan, grew into which chain?

Subway began when physicist Peter Buck suggested the shop to Fred DeLuca as a way to pay for college and lent him the money; the first store carried Buck's name, not the one it has now.

Which gunmaker built a Hartford armory crowned by a blue onion dome to mass-produce his revolvers?

Samuel Colt finished the armory in 1855 and set a gilded rearing colt on its dome; machinists who met there, Francis Pratt and Amos Whitney, went on to found a famous toolmaking firm of their own.

Home to Royal and Underwood, Hartford was known in the early 1900s as the world capital of what?

Typewriters made Hartford's name after Underwood moved its works there in 1901 and Royal followed from Brooklyn within a decade, putting the trade's two great rivals in one city.

The Turtle, built by David Bushnell in 1775, made history's first attack by what kind of vessel?

Bushnell's Turtle was a one-man submarine: American accounts have Sergeant Ezra Lee steering it against the flagship HMS Eagle in September 1776 without success, though British records never mention the attack.

New-Gate Prison in East Granby held its first inmates underground in a former mine that had produced which metal?

Copper had been dug there since the early 1700s; the colony turned the tunnels into a prison in 1773, and its first inmate, John Hinson, escaped after 18 days up a rope lowered down a shaft.

William Gillette, builder of Gillette Castle, was famous for playing whom on stage?

Sherlock Holmes owes his curved pipe to Gillette, who played the detective about 1,300 times and called his castle estate above the Connecticut River the Seventh Sister.

Which Connecticut shoreline village is home to the Seaport Museum that keeps the 1841 ship Charles W. Morgan?

Mystic Seaport Museum took in the Charles W. Morgan in 1941, and in 2014 sent the restored ship on her 38th voyage, a summer tour of New England ports.

Which creature was designated Connecticut's state animal in 1975?

The sperm whale became Connecticut's state animal in 1975, honoring the state's 19th-century whaling fleets and the species' endangered status at the time.

Which insect, a predator that hunts garden pests, is Connecticut's official state insect?

The praying mantis became state insect in 1977 even though the species meant, the European mantis, is no native: it came to Connecticut from southern Europe, North Africa and Asia.

What is Connecticut's state bird?

The American robin became Connecticut's state bird in 1943; Michigan and Wisconsin chose the same bird, Michigan as early as 1931.

Which flower is Connecticut's state flower?

Mountain laurel won the title in 1907; its Latin name, Kalmia, honors Pehr Kalm, the explorer who sent specimens of the shrub home to Linnaeus around 1750.

Which shellfish did Connecticut adopt as a state symbol in 1989?

The Eastern oyster, Crassostrea virginica, became Connecticut's state shellfish in 1989, honoring an industry that has worked the beds of Long Island Sound since colonial times.

Which dinosaur, shown spitting venom in Jurassic Park, did Connecticut name its state dinosaur in 2017?

Dilophosaurus got the title because the Eubrontes footprints at Dinosaur State Park in Rocky Hill were probably left by a similar meat-eater; the venom and neck frill were the film's invention.

Which gull-winged World War II Navy fighter, built in Connecticut, is the official state aircraft?

The Corsair's bent wings solved a design problem: they lifted its huge propeller clear of the deck while keeping the landing gear short. Connecticut named it state aircraft in 2005.

Which Danbury-born composer, an insurance executive by day, is Connecticut's official state composer?

Charles Ives waited decades to be heard: his Third Symphony had its first performance in 1946, won the Pulitzer Prize in 1947, and he is said to have given the prize money away.

How does Connecticut's Latin state motto translate into English?

He who transplanted still sustains may echo Psalm 80, in which God brings a vine out of Egypt and plants it; three grapevines stand above the motto on the state seal.

Which federal service academy trains its officers on the Thames River in southeastern Connecticut?

The US Coast Guard Academy sends its cadets to sea on the barque Eagle, built in 1936 for Hitler's navy and taken by the United States after the war as reparations.

Yale's trustees voted in 1716 to move the school to New Haven from which town?

Saybrook held the school by deed: Nathaniel Lynde gave land and a house in 1707 on condition it stay, yet in 1716 the trustees voted to leave after New Haven outbid rival towns.

A Plymouth Colony trading post of 1633, often counted Connecticut's first English settlement, grew into which town?

Windsor began when William Holmes and his party set up a fur-trading post where the Farmington River meets the Connecticut; John Oldham's settlers reached Wethersfield the next year.

Which lexicographer, born in West Hartford, published his landmark American dictionary in 1828?

Noah Webster studied more than twenty languages to trace where words came from, and finished the dictionary in England in 1825, three years before it reached print.

Eli Whitney, who ran an arms factory near New Haven, is best known for inventing what in 1793?

Eli Whitney invented the cotton gin in 1793, a machine that pulled seeds from short-staple cotton; patent lawsuits ate most of his profits, and he later championed interchangeable parts.

New Haven-born Charles Goodyear received an 1844 patent for which process?

Charles Goodyear patented vulcanizing rubber in June 1844, heating rubber with sulfur to make it stable; the Goodyear tire company, founded in 1898 long after his death, merely borrowed his name.

Which Connecticut delegate signed the Declaration of Independence?

Roger Sherman began as a shoemaker and taught himself law; he went on to sign all four founding papers, from the 1774 Association to the Constitution, the only person to do so.

Which high-wire family was just beginning its act when the 1944 Hartford circus fire broke out?

The Wallendas got out unhurt as bandleader Merle Evans struck up 'The Stars and Stripes Forever', the circus signal for disaster; at least 167 people died under the burning big top.

Connecticut is the third-smallest state by area, behind Rhode Island and which other?

Delaware and Rhode Island are the only smaller states, yet Connecticut counted 3.6 million people in 2020, well over the two of them put together.

Bradley International Airport is in which Connecticut town north of Hartford?

Bradley International sits in Windsor Locks on land the state bought for an Army air base; it is named for Lieutenant Eugene Bradley, a young pilot killed in training there in August 1941.

Which Connecticut town was home to America's first independent law school, which closed in 1833?

Litchfield lawyer Tapping Reeve began by tutoring his brother-in-law Aaron Burr in 1774; the school that grew from those lessons went on to train two vice presidents, Burr and John C. Calhoun.

What was the strip of land Connecticut kept across northern Ohio after 1786 called?

The Western Reserve was sold to the Connecticut Land Company, whose surveyor Moses Cleaveland laid out a town on the lakeshore that kept his name, minus one letter: Cleveland.

CTfastrak, a bus rapid transit line opened in 2015, links Hartford with which city, nicknamed the Hardware City?

New Britain earned the nickname from tool makers such as Stanley; since 2015 a bus-only guideway, laid partly on an abandoned railway, has run between its downtown and Hartford's.

Which toy takes its name from a Connecticut pie company?

Frisbee comes, by the usual account, from the Frisbie Pie Company: college students tossed its empty tins for fun, and Wham-O borrowed the name for its plastic disc in 1957.

Which future US president was born in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1946 while his father was a Yale student?

George W. Bush left Connecticut for Texas as a toddler, then came back to earn his own Yale degree in 1968.

Which toy grew from a 1943 wartime experiment credited to General Electric's New Haven lab?

Silly Putty later left the planet: Apollo 8 astronauts took it into lunar orbit in 1968 and used it to hold their tools in place.

How is the lobster meat served in a Connecticut-style lobster roll, the version credited to Perry's in Milford?

Hot with melted butter is the Connecticut way, while the better-known Maine roll is served cold with mayonnaise.

What did a bulldozer operator uncover in Rocky Hill, Connecticut, in 1966 while digging a state office building site?

Dinosaur tracks turned up by the hundred, and the site became a state park where about 500 prints sit under a geodesic dome.

Which metal construction toy, with real nuts and bolts, did A. C. Gilbert first sell from New Haven in 1913?

Erector Set came to Gilbert on a train to New York, as he watched steel girders being raised to carry the railroad's new power lines.

Which 2000s TV series about a fast-talking single mother and her daughter is set in fictional Stars Hollow, Connecticut?

Gilmore Girls found its setting when its creator stayed at the Mayflower Inn in Washington, Connecticut, and drew Stars Hollow from the village.

Which hit Broadway musical had its world premiere at the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, Connecticut, in 1976?

Annie changed villains on its way to Broadway: the first Miss Hannigan was recast after the Goodspeed run because her performance was judged too mean.

Which abolitionist, born in Torrington, Connecticut, in 1800, led the 1859 raid on the federal armory at Harpers Ferry?

John Brown was hanged for treason against Virginia about six weeks after the raid, and the Torrington house where he was born burned down in 1918.

Which Norwich, Connecticut native was a hero of the Battles of Saratoga before becoming America's most infamous traitor?

Benedict Arnold even came home as an enemy: in 1781 he led a British raid on the Connecticut coast that burned much of a port near his birthplace.

What kind of animal is Jonathan, the University of Connecticut mascot named for the state's Revolutionary War governor?

A husky won a student poll in the 1930s, after the kidnapping of rival Rhode Island's ram mascot stirred interest in a live animal.

How is the beef cooked in the signature cheeseburger of Ted's Restaurant in Meriden, a central Connecticut specialty?

Steamed in a steel cabinet, the patty sheds its fat while a chunk of cheddar melts in a tray of its own and is poured over the meat.

Which famous footpath runs about 50 miles through Connecticut's northwest corner, above the Housatonic River valley?

The Appalachian Trail crosses 14 states between Georgia and Maine, and its Connecticut miles lie almost entirely along ridges on the west side of the valley.

Which New Haven gunmaker produced the lever-action Model 1873 rifle, nicknamed the Gun That Won the West?

Winchester took its name from Oliver Winchester, a clothing manufacturer who moved into firearms by buying a struggling repeating-arms company.

Which product has East Hartford's Pratt & Whitney built since 1925, beginning with a model called the Wasp?

Aircraft engines were a side bet for a Hartford machine-tool firm, which gave Frederick Rentschler its name, funding and floor space. His first Wasp was finished on Christmas Eve 1925.

Which Connecticut road, built in the 1930s, bans trucks and gave each of its original bridges a design of its own?

Merritt Parkway bridges all came from one designer, George Dunkelberger, who mixed Art Deco with neoclassical and modern touches so that no two looked alike.

Which Yale coach, called the Father of American Football, devised the line of scrimmage and the system of downs?

Walter Camp also chose the annual All-American team, and critics complained that his picks favored Ivy League players over those from Chicago, Michigan and Notre Dame.

Yale is named for Elihu Yale, a Boston-born benefactor who rose from clerk to governor with which trading firm?

East India Company service in Madras made him rich, largely from dealing in diamonds, and a gift of books, portraits and textiles put his name on the college.

Shade tobacco, grown under cloth tents in the Connecticut River Valley, is prized as which part of a premium cigar?

The wrapper leaf is the outside layer a smoker sees, so growers hang cloth over the fields to cut the sunlight and raise the humidity.

The Whiffenpoofs, formed at Yale in 1909, are the oldest American college example of what kind of student organization?

A cappella group membership lasts a single year: 14 seniors are chosen each spring, and they sing on Monday nights at Mory's, a tavern beside the campus.

Which consumer advocate, born in Winsted, Connecticut, took on the car industry in his 1965 book Unsafe at Any Speed?

Ralph Nader went back to his hometown in 2015 to open the American Museum of Tort Law, after a decade of planning.

Which doll craze of 1983, complete with adoption papers, was mass-produced by Coleco of West Hartford, Connecticut?

Cabbage Patch Kids sold so fast that parents fought in store aisles, and Coleco pulled its advertising while it shipped 3.3 million dolls that year.

Which 1988 Tim Burton comedy about a ghost couple is set in the fictional town of Winter River, Connecticut?

Beetlejuice won the Oscar for Best Makeup, and the name of its trickster ghost is really spelled Betelgeuse, like the star.

Which 1980s sitcom starred Tony Danza as a retired ballplayer who moves from Brooklyn to keep house in Connecticut?

Who's the Boss? flipped the usual sitcom household: the man ran the home while his employer, advertising executive Angela Bower, earned the living.

Which future star played waitress Daisy in the 1988 film named for a real restaurant in Mystic, Connecticut?

Julia Roberts was two years away from Pretty Woman, and the same film gave Matt Damon his screen debut in a tiny part.

Which actor, a longtime Westport resident, started a food company in 1982 that gives all its profits to charity?

Paul Newman began by bottling a homemade salad dressing with writer A. E. Hotchner, and the company kept giving its profits away after his death.

Which Westport caterer published Entertaining in 1982 and went on to build a television and magazine empire?

Martha Stewart restored an 1805 farmhouse on Turkey Hill Road there, and it later became the model for the studio of her television show.

Which actress was a Yale freshman in 1981 when a stalker obsessed with her shot President Ronald Reagan?

Jodie Foster stayed on to finish her Yale degree, and her videotaped testimony was played at John Hinckley's trial.

Which hockey legend spent his last NHL season with the Hartford Whalers, retiring in 1980 weeks after turning 52?

Gordie Howe skated in all 80 games that season and scored 15 goals, the oldest man ever to play in the league.

Which tick-borne illness, named for a Connecticut town, had its bacterial cause identified by Willy Burgdorfer in 1982?

Lyme disease was first recognized in 1975, when a cluster of children's arthritis cases in southeastern Connecticut turned out to be something new.

Which Yale president of the early 1980s later became baseball commissioner and banished Pete Rose for life?

Bart Giamatti, a scholar of Renaissance literature and the father of actor Paul Giamatti, died just eight days after the Rose ruling.

What happened on Interstate 95 at the Mianus River in Greenwich, Connecticut, in June 1983, killing three motorists?

A bridge span collapsed at 1:30 a.m. after rust forced a pin-and-hanger joint apart, dropping two cars and two tractor-trailers 70 feet into the water.

Which company's West Hartford depot lost $7 million in 1983, at the time the largest cash robbery in US history?

Wells Fargo guard Víctor Gerena robbed his own depot for a Puerto Rican independence movement, then spent 32 years on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list.

Which game was the only one offered when Foxwoods opened in Ledyard, Connecticut, in 1986 as a high-stakes hall?

Bingo carried the place for six years before table games arrived in 1992, and Foxwoods was later reported to be the largest casino in the world.

After a truck with failed brakes killed seven people in 1983, what did Connecticut remove from its turnpike by 1985?

Toll booths had slowed the road since it opened in 1958, and the runaway truck had plowed into four cars waiting at one of the plazas.

Which coach took over the UConn men's basketball team in 1986 and won the NIT title two seasons later?

Jim Calhoun went 9–19 in his first season, then stayed 26 years and won three national championships.

Which Republican senator, famous from the Watergate committee, lost his Connecticut seat to Joe Lieberman in 1988?

Lowell Weicker bounced back two years later, leaving the Republicans and winning the governorship on the ticket of a third party, A Connecticut Party.

Which 1985 hurricane, hyped as the storm of the century, crossed Long Island and came ashore near Westport, Connecticut?

Gloria knocked out power across Connecticut, but it raced through at low tide, which kept the coastal flooding far below what forecasters feared.

Which band played a surprise hour-long show for 700 people at Toad's Place in New Haven in August 1989?

The Rolling Stones had spent six weeks rehearsing for a stadium tour at a shuttered girls' school in Washington, Connecticut, and called the gig a thank-you.

Which Yale undergraduate won the 1981 national competition to design the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington?

Maya Lin was 21, and her V-shaped wall of black granite was picked from more than 1,400 entries that the jury saw by number only.

Which Connecticut city, once America's hatmaking center, received Thomas Jefferson's 1802 letter on church and state?

Danbury, nicknamed the Hat City, was home to the Baptists who feared persecution and wrote to Jefferson, prompting his famous phrase about separation.

Which Connecticut city, nicknamed the Brass City, has a Latin motto asking what is more lasting than brass?

Waterbury was the country's leading center of brassware manufacturing through the first half of the 20th century, which gave it both the nickname and the motto.

Which Connecticut River city is home to Wesleyan University, founded as a Methodist men's college in 1831?

Middletown residents had paid to put up the first buildings for a military academy, and when that school moved back to Vermont in 1829 the empty campus became Wesleyan.

The University of Connecticut's main campus is in which village, named for two brothers who gave the land in 1881?

Storrs honors Charles and Augustus Storrs, who gave 170 acres and the seed money to start what was first an agricultural college.

In which Connecticut town did architect Philip Johnson build his see-through Glass House, finished in 1949?

New Canaan's Glass House put kitchen, dining and sleeping areas in one glass-walled room, and Johnson died there in 2005 at the age of 98.

Which eastern Connecticut mill community, nicknamed Thread City, has a bridge topped with giant frogs sitting on spools?

Willimantic's frogs recall the Windham Frog Fight of 1754, when villagers braced for an attack that turned out to be a pond full of noisy bullfrogs.

Which Connecticut town is home to Choate Rosemary Hall, the boarding school attended by John F. Kennedy?

Wallingford's Choate enrolled the future president in 1931, and he spent his first two years there in the shadow of his star-athlete brother Joe.

Which town in Connecticut's southeastern corner withstood a three-day British naval bombardment in August 1814?

Stonington refused a demand to surrender and fired back with two 18-pounder cannons, an episode the town marks in its Cannon Square.

Which Connecticut town east of Hartford grew up around the Cheney family's silk mills, once the largest in the world?

Manchester leaned on the mills so heavily that the Cheney family at one point employed a quarter of its residents.

Which Connecticut town, once famous for its red onions, is the 1687 setting of the novel The Witch of Blackbird Pond?

Wethersfield was the center of New England's onion trade for a century, and outsiders nicknamed the village Oniontown.

Which 1972 Ira Levin thriller takes place in a fictional suburb in Fairfield County, Connecticut?

The Stepford Wives was modeled on Wilton, Connecticut, where Levin lived in the 1960s, as he confirmed in a 2007 letter to The New York Times.