“Five Generations of Yankee Ingenuity
The Gault Family” and “Tracy Sugarman, Citizen-Artist”

What is Yankee Ingenuity? And is it possible to be an artist, a patriot and an activist for social change at the same time? From May 24 to September 2, two new Westport Historical Society Exhibits explore these questions through the life experiences of local residents.

Five Generations of Yankee Ingenuity: The Gault Family, in the main Sheffer Gallery, follows a mid-19^th century Northern Irish family’s move to Westport, seeking “an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay” and how the family and its businesses have evolved since, in remarkable tandem with the town. Vintage photos, documents, tools and artifacts from the Gault Family Archive greatly enrich this Exhibit. (Thankfully, the frugal Gaults “never threw anything away”).

Each generation’s ingenuity—making “something” out of nothing–was the knack to recognize what their neighbors needed next and adapting services to provide it. The pattern begins in 1863 when Robert, the youngest, sees opportunity in closing the delivery gap between Saugatuck’s new railroad station and upstream factories. Most other coastal CT towns located their train station in the town center, but Horace Staples persuaded Morris Ketchum, Westport’s key New York-New Haven Railroad investor, to build the station at the shortest bridge span, “The Narrows,” closer to Long Island Sound and contiguous to Horace’s lumber yard, but miles from Lee’s Manufacturing at Richmondville and Kemper’s Tannery on the Post Road.

Robert bought a horse team and wagon, announced hauling, plowing and rock and stump pulling services, and was busy immediately. Later, Robert’s three sons—Leonard Hamilton, Robert Samuel and John Kirk—joined, too, as the fleet of horse-drawn wagons and services grew, along with facilities to house them.

Now, the company was “Gault Brothers.” With demand growing for lumber, stone and, especially, coal for home heating, and greater profits from owning and delivering commodities, the Gaults added these businesses and acquired a river frontage for receiving and storage. Meanwhile, they continued home-based farming, chicken and livestock raising and even ice harvesting well into the 20^th century. NOTE: In 2013, the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation added the three landmark Gault barns on South Compo Road to the new Connecticut Barn Trail.

By the early 20^th century, coal had largely replaced wood-burning fireplaces for home heating. Supplies of coal and sand arrived by barge and rail to Gault’s 15 Riverside Ave. depot. Robert Samuel left to join a Saugatuck foundry as a mold designer, with Gault as a major customer for wagon wheels, coal caddies and shovels; he died not long after. John Kirk remained, and later served as Second Selectman. Leonard’s son, Howard, left Staples High School after 9^th grade to join what soon became L.H. Gault & Son. His cousin and classmate Robert Franklin (Robert Samuel’s son) stayed in school and became an artist, inducted into the American Watercolor Society. During 1918’s Great Flu Epidemic, Gault provided horse-drawn hearse services. In 1919, diesel-powered trucks began to replace horse-drawn operations, and the Gaults bought the Taylor-Richards Coal, Feed and Grain business and dock on Main Street. On Imperial Ave., their Bald Mountain property was a busy rock quarry and gravel-crushing site. In 1929, Gault moved downstream from 15 to 563 Riverside, affording deep-water docking for larger coal and sand barges, and soon, for oil tankers.

Howard married Georgiana Taylor and had two children, Judy and Bill.  In 1936, in the middle of the Great Depression, Leonard passed. Julia and Howard took charge, began delivering home heating oil in 5-gal. cans, and added oil storage tanks to the Riverside Ave. site. One day, after finding young Bill playing baseball in the middle of Imperial Ave., Howard created Gault Field, where thousands of Little League practices and games gave lifelong memories to a generation of Westporters.

Following World War II, with home building and baby boom under way, Howard purchased a large tract of the former Morris Ketchum estate, Hockanum, on Cross Highway. He subdivided it into building lots, taking care to preserve the Frederick Law Olmsted-designed landscape and carriage roads. Daily, after school at Staples High, son Bill paved the roads, using Gault sand, gravel and—another short-term business venture–asphalt.

When I-95 construction bisected Saugatuck in the mid-1950s, the Gaults lost half their riverfront land, including oil storage tanks, to eminent domain. Their new 350,000-gal. tank–rare for a small family company to own–became a landmark for all traveling the Gov. John Davis Lodge Tpke. bridge.

The Westport that the Gaults had known for 100 years was changing rapidly. Howard and son Bill focused on keeping pace with business growth, adding burner installation and expanding service beyond Westport, Weston and Wilton. Meanwhile, nephew Bob (Robert Franklin’s son, an architect) and daughter Judy Gault Sterling focused on historic preservation. Beneficiaries included Westport’s Historic District Commission, the Westport Historical Society (Bob, an HDC activist and 4-year WHS president, was a force in the WHS procurement of Wheeler House, inspired his uncle to build “the Gault Vault,” and served 10 years as architect for Bradley-Wheeler Cobblestone Barn restoration) along with Art Rescue and the Westport Schools Permanent Art Collection (Judy). Meanwhile, Bill and his wife Nancy have kept the Gault Family Archive, and daughter Ginger Gault Donaher continues the tradition.

Today, led by Bill Gault, his son Sam and son-in-law Jim Donaher, Gault’s growth proceeds with sensitivity to the environment, energy conservation and responding to climate change. The riverfront depot is gone, replaced by attractive retail and residential space. Newer services include oil tank removal, biofuel, propane and standby generators. And, as avid gardeners, the families still are connected to the land farmed by their great grandparents.

Tracy Sugarman, Citizen-Artist

The second exhibit, Tracy Sugarman, Citizen-Artist, follows the life and work of a reportorial artist who used his eyes and his hands to heal his heart after D-Day Naval service in England and France. After World War II, he became a successful commercial illustrator/designer and settled his family in Westport. But assignments for corporations, magazines and record album covers never diminished his real love for on-the-spot drawing, “striving to capture a reality that was unvarnished, authentic and unrehearsed.” He initiated or sought assignments of struggling Americans: the last labor strike of the ILGWU on New York’s Seventh Ave., textile mills, research labs, glassmaking studios, Wall Street offices, Broadways actors and French Quarter life in New Orleans.

Meeting Dr. Martin Luther King in 1964 at Temple Israel was life-changing, prompting  him to travel South to document government-backed resistance to non-violent black voter registration initiatives. Through 115 drawings, two books (Stranger at the Gate: A Summer in Mississippi and We Had Sneakers, They Had Guns: The Kids Who Fought for Civil Rights in Mississippi) and—in partnership with filmmaker Bill Buckley and Rediscovery Productions—over 40 African-American history and educational videos, he used his skills and objectivity as an artist, writer and scriptwriter to advance the cause of Civil Rights. He also documented poverty in Appalachia, the Malcolm X murder trial, life in Rikers Island prison and, for NASA, the Kennedy Space Center. At Tanglewood he sketched what he called “The Music I See.” His fluid pen and ink drawings of Alvin Ailey dancers in rehearsal are a featured part of the exhibit, along with photographs and other examples of his work. Original Sugarman work resides in the Library of Congress, NASA Smithsonian Collection, Mississippi Archive and New Britain Museum of American Art. His murals at Norwalk Hospital bring daily joy to patients and care-givers.

The Westport Historical Society is a private, member-supported, non-profit 501(c)(3) organization that receives no taxpayer subsidies. Major support for Five Generations of Yankee Ingenuity: The Gault Family and Tracy Sugarman, Citizen Artist comes from annual sponsors, including lead sponsor, BNY Mellon Wealth Management, along with the Betty R. & Ralph Sheffer Foundation, Janet & Fred Plotkin/The Ruth and Adoph Schnurmacher Foundation, Berchem Moses Devlin, Sachs-Walsh Insurance, Thomas & Jeanne Elmezzi Foundation, Weichert Capital Properties & Estates, and Fountainhead Wines.

Additional Exhibit sponsors include the Gault Family Archive and Bank of America/U.S. Trust. Special lectures and programs will enhance these exhibits at various times to be announced through the summer at the Westport Historical Society.

In collaboration with Carrie Aikenhead from Wakeman Farm,  we will explore Westport’s rich farming history and learn about the earth beneath our feet and how to plant and grow your own veggies.   Meet and play with some of the animals that live on farms.  Make healthy and delicious snacks, create minitatre farms from recycled material, Paint like Grandma Moses, play outdoor games and engage in hands-on fun farming activites.  Visit the Westport Farmers Market for tasting tour and have lots of home-spun fun. To Register, click on:  Farm ‘n Fun

Where the Wild Things Are…Do you love animals? Animals as pets, animals in art and literature and conservation will all be explored with our special guest, Amanda Chisholm from Earthplace introduces a new wild animal each day.  Make bug catchers and butterfly nets, construct recycled art, conduct experiments with magnifying glasses and play outdoor games.  Our program culminates with a trip to Earthplace where we will experience more wildlife and understand the importance of preserving, protecting and enjoying our natural habitat. To register, click on: Crazy ’bout Critters

In collaboration with Rindy Higgins, Director of the Sherwood Island Nature Center, learn all about marine life on our Long Island Sound. Assemble salt water aquariums, add snails, oysters, crabs and other mystery creatures each day.  Conduct experiments  and learn how each species adapts to its environment.  Construct wire fish sculptures and sculpt clay critters.  Paint beachscapes and play lots of outdoor games.  The week’s finale is an action-packed trip to the Sherwood Island Nature Center where we will release our creatures back into their natural habitat.  We’ll swim, use nets and interact with sea life. To register, click on:  Aqua-mazing

It’s your life, and you can learn how to turn it into a living legacy that can be passed down from generation to generation Saturday, June 8, at the Westport Historical Society. Suzanne Sheridan and Rozanne Gates of the Westport-based Legacy Project USA will share their expertise on how to tell your life story using readily available technology. “We are all eyewitnesses to history as it unfolds before us,” Gates said, “and we can leave it as a legacy.”

It’s a project people can easily do themselves with consumer audio and video recording equipment, according to Gates. She says it works best if the sessions are informal and relaxed and the subject is speaking as if having a conversation with a friend. “We are all standing on the shoulders of a lot of people,” Gates said, and it is important to know who they were and what they did.

In a recent Legacy recording interview, Gates said a woman told her she was raised by “a tough Irish grandmother, and I’m tough, too. That’s what I grew up with.”Legacy recordings can not only tell future generations what kinds of experiences and character traits an ancestor had, but also reveal important pieces of health information that otherwise might not be known to descendants.

And once a life story has been recorded, it can be transferred to different formats as technology evolves.

Don’t let the tide take you by surprise. Inventor Alan Winick’s whimsical “tidepieces,” which will be on sale Sunday, June 2, during the Westport Historical Society’s 22^nd annual “Hidden Garden Tour” celebration, will keep you apprised of the daily ebb and flow.

Winick’s creations – no, they’re not your grandfather’s tide clocks – are just some of the many products that will be displayed during the all-day Garden Marketplace on Veterans Green next to the Historical Society, 25 Avery Place.

In all, some two dozen vendors will be set up from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. selling plants, garden tools and accessories, jewelry, lavender-scented pillows, beach blankets and apparel, olive oils, antiques and more.

The tour itself will feature five gardens, three in Westport and two in Wilton. The locations of the gardens are not announced until the morning of the event, according to Kathy Winter, coordinator for the event.

“We lived and died by the tide,” remembers Winick of the days when he lived at Saugatuck Shores. “Everyone needed a tide clock.” But most of them were boring, the inventor adds, which can’t be said of his handmade creations, which stand almost a foot tall and include “amusing graphic depictions” just above the clock face itself. One shows a sunbather under an umbrella on a beach; as the tide goes out, the water recedes to reveal a stunning sandcastle with towers.

Downtown store owner Kimberly Cole of KC Westport, 68 Church Lane, will have a table of bikinis and sandals plus duvets, quilts, sheets and pillowcases from the collection of Laguna Beach designer Kerry Cassill.  All the articles in Cassill’s line, which includes summery tops, are cut from “luxury weight Indian fabrics” made by a family in India. Cole says the things she sells are a few of “my favorites things” and that the store’s offerings “keep evolving.” Her little shop could pass for a designer creation itself. The interior includes a display table and cases built by her husband Charlie, who directs TV commercials. Hanging from the ceiling is a light with an artistic cardboard shade, also made by Charlie. The shade is covered in foil that has been painted to give a patina effect.

Ticketholders for the Hidden Garden Tour will see firsthand how the owners of showplace plantings have coped with such challenges as climate change, this year’s late spring and the devastation from Irene and Sandy. The gardens were created in several styles, some informal, others high concept.

One covers part of a sloping, four-acre property first occupied by a house dating to the 1740s. The home has been expanded over the years, and the current owner has added color-dappled, terraced beds reminiscent of gardens she visited in England. The terrace walls, as well as the stone work for a fish pond near the garden shed, were built by her father, a stone mason.  The blooms are mainly blues, pinks, whites and purples in varying textures, with some oranges and reds as accents. Bird houses, trellises, fountains and rain barrels dot the garden, which “is designed to be attractive spring, summer and fall.”

Other stops on the tour are:

• A property that was once home to a Christmas tree farm and now boasts stunning beds of iris and peonies, a pool circled by weeping hornbeam and Japanese maples, and a knockout display of climbing roses.

• An English garden set in a glade of specimen trees and shrubs, with a brook running through it. This magical landscape features a large birdcage gazebo, terraced “rooms” of perennials and annuals, and a walled, fountain-fed rose garden.

• A sunken sculpture garden surrounded by Rose of Sharon, French lilacs, hydrangea and roses. Before entering this dramatic amphitheater, which sits behind the home, facing a pool and tennis courts, visitors pass an Egyptian figure, a vintage white flower cart and a gathering of birdcages.

• Six rolling acres of former farmland whose bounty now includes groves of specimen trees and conifers, orchards, terraced vegetable beds, an Asian garden and meditation garden, all in arboretum-style rooms. Recently, a formal garden inspired by Versailles’ Trianon Palace sprouted on this formally arranged property.

The Garden Tour and Marketplace will be followed by a Toast the Tour party at Gilbertie’s Herb Gardens in Westport from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m. There will be wine, food and music during bidding at silent and live auctions. Tickets are $50. There is no admission charge for the marketplace.

The Toast will take place in a sunny, half-acre display garden with a large vine-covered pergola made of rustic timbers. In the event of rain, it will move under glass into an adjacent greenhouse.

Tickets for the Hidden Garden Tour can be purchased in advance online or by calling (203) 222-1424, or picked up June 2 starting at 9 a.m. at the Garden Marketplace.

The cost is $35 for members, $45 in advance for non-members, and $50 the day of event. Shuttle bus rides are available for an additional $15. The tour takes place from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., but the shuttle is available from noon to 4 p.m. only and seating is limited, so tickets should be purchased in advance.

Have you ever wondered why those cannons sit on Compo Beach? Where F. Scott Fitzgerald lived during that infamous summer in Westport? Who folks like Bedford, Coley and Staples really were?You’ll learn all that – and much, much more – on a tour of town with “06880” blogger/Westport News columnist Dan Woog.

He knows where most of the bodies are buried (figuratively and literally). You’ll see parts of Westport you never knew existed, and hear tales of places you’ve passed a thousand times. You’ll learn about the wharves of the Saugatuck River – and the tight-knit Saugatuck community. You’ll hear stories about islands like Gorham and Cockenoe (including the one about nuclear power plants). You’ll find out how Longshore was saved from becoming a housing development, and why the Minuteman statue has become a symbol of our town.

Whether you’ve lived here a few days or many decades, this is the tour of Westport you’ve always dreamed of taking.

When they gathered near their watch fires in the evening, many Civil War soldiers on both sides often turned to music for solace. If someone had a fiddle, they might sing a popular romantic ballad of the period. Or, if their unit had a marching band, as most did, they might sing an anthem like the Confederacy’s “The Bonnie Blue Flag.”

On April 28, baritone Jose Andrade will perform Civil War songs at Westport’s Unitarian Church.  The 7 p.m. concert jointly benefits the church and the Westport Historical Society.

The program will also feature a talk by Brian O’Leary of the Historical Society, who will show newspaper clippings telling how Westport voted in the pivotal 1860 election and discuss the 60 or so men from Westport who volunteered in the 17^th Regiment, based in Fairfield.

Among other favorites, Andrade’s performance will include the haunting Civil War love song “Aura Lee,” which even these 150 years later will sound familiar to most Westporters. Elvis Presley used the melody for “Love Me Tender.” Andrade will also sing “Dixie,” “Battle Hymn of the Republic” and the Stephen Foster classic “Jeanie With the Light Brown Hair.”

A resident of New York City, Andrade has performed with opera companies around the country. Though he had a relative who fought for a Florida regiment during the War Between the States, Andrade’s say his interest in the war was really piqued when his brother, Eduardo, was working on the film “Gettysburg” and he visited the set.

As a sad and moving end note, Andrade pointed out that as the defeated Confederates trudged away from the Battle of Gettysburg one of their marching bands played “Nearer My God to Thee.”

The church’s 25-year-old Steinway piano will be one of the beneficiaries of the concert. Music Minister Ed Thompson said the piano has gotten heavy use over the years and is in need of restringing.

Although Abraham Lincoln carried Connecticut in 1860, he achieved only a plurality in Westport, with about 48 percent of the vote. O’Leary said Lee’s twine manufacturing company, which relied on Southern cotton, was one of the town’s major employers at the time and that Westporters apparently voted “their pocket books” when they went to the polls.

His discussion will also touch on the individual Westporters who served in the war. He will show a photo of the Confederate officer who gave the order to fire on Fort Sumter and of the general who commanded the 17th.

Please join the Westport Historical Society and the Unitarian Church for this evening of history and music. Tickets are $15 at the door. For more information, contact the church at (203) 227-7205 or call WHS, 203-222-1424.