Every time I looked into making a Beyond Hartford trip to Meriden, I dropped the effort because it seemed like a train ride . . . and then what? Hubbard Park felt too obvious, and both that and the Giufrrida Park area took too long to get to from the train station — which I was not magically arriving at, but already spending time to reach. Anyway, I didn’t want to volunteer to spend time close to one highway or another.

Then, a friend reminded me that the Quinnipiac River existed, as did trails alongside it. This was something I even wrote about before, in 2022. Two years ago I explored an area of Wallingford that was visually interesting, yet loud because of the nearby highway. Before looking on a map I worried if this would be a repeat of that — but even louder with an autumn trip meaning less vegetation to buffer traffic noise.

It isn’t.

The Quinnipiac River Gorge Trail is part of the Meriden Linear Trails system. It’s paved. It’s impossible to get lost on — Quinnipiac River to one side, hill on the other. Because it was formerly the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad bed, it’s flat.

A good rail trail is one that has a fair amount of interpretative signs/kiosks covering a range of interests from the geologic history to industrial history to recent improvements made; this is a good one.

Before this was a spot for joggers, dog walkers, and cyclists, it was part of a railroad connecting Meriden to both Waterbury and the Connecticut River in Cromwell. The desire for this alternate train route is traced back to the 1870s when Horace C. Wilcox — man of many interests and roles, including starting a silver company and serving as mayor, whose name is found on the tech school near the trail — and likely, others, expressed dissatisfaction with what they thought were too high of rates charged by the existing Hartford and New Haven Railroad.

Wilcox spent $1 million of his own money to help fund the bulding of the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad. The segment ending at the Connecticut River opened in 1885 and the one to Waterbury in 1888. Another bit of track in Waterbury connecting to the New York and New England Railroad opened in 1889, but after only one year, that last portion was switched to freight only because of the slowness of travel on it.

In 1890 the Courant published an article of speculation, literally titled “A Railroad Rumor,” in which they opined about the fate of the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad. This was not the first or last time the paper would have articles by that same name. In this case, they wrote that the return of Wilcox’s investment was only “indirect,” though “the place and its industries are said to have benefitted. […] [The railroad] itself has been a financial burden to its backers.” Months later, Wilcox died. His son, George H. Wilcox, would take over as president of the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad.

One sign along the path describes the 1888 “Wreck at Red Bridge,” one of several incidents on the route. The derailment and coal spill was dramatized by some sources. The Hartford Courant, however, almost seemed to downplay it with the headline “A Slight Accident,” noting that Engine No. 1 “was not running over five miles an hour” and that “nobody was hurt to any extent.” They wrote: “One hundred and fifty Italians were put to work running the temporary track around the wreck and trains will be running in the morning.” One wonders if that would have been the same response had the collision happened on a Sunday rather than on a Friday. In January 1891, the train plunged through the Westfield Bridge, which was thought to be weakened from flooding, and into the river below. Nobody died, but a few people were tossed into the river and another broke his wrist. Other incidents had more severe consequences, like the 1890 death of a brakeman in a derailment at the Honey Pot Brook Bridge. Ever classy, the Courant‘s noted that the railroad superintendent estimated that the calamity was a “loss at $1,000.”

By 1892, the move for the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad to merge with the New York and New England Railroad had begun. The leasing situation became a full merger in 1895. Here comes the drama. Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad’s bondholders wanted to foreclose, and did, in 1896. The expectation was that the railroad would be electrified and neatly woven into the existing New York and New Haven Railroad system. Instead, the Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad line was shut down the next month and would remain so for over two years. The State of Connecticut threatened to revoke the New York and New Haven Railroad’s charter, pushing them to restore service in late 1888/early 1889 for the Meriden-Waterbury section. Service on the Meriden-Cromwell portion was never fully renewed, and that closed in 1903.

Apparently, from 1909-1917, service between Meriden and Waterbury was down to one round trip daily. Then, service stopped. It didn’t “just” happen. Shortly after the United States entered World War I, the Railroad War Board of the National Council of Defense made recommendations about reducing civilian railroad use, and the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad published its plans to discontinue dozens of train trips, including service between Meriden and Waterbury. The war ended over a year later, but train service Meriden-Waterbury never resumed.

There’s a lot to think about here, including how the abandoned railroad bed in Waterbury was eventually replaced by I-84 when it could and should have been replaced by an electric railroad, which was seemingly what people wanted in the day. We came so close to dodging the incessant grumbling about the Mixmaster!

There is also the thread about profit. People got into the railroad-building business hoping to make money, and when it looked unprofitable, switched horses. Eventually, part of this abandoned transportation system would become a recreation space that people could use without paying a fee.

What would happen if we stopped heavily subsidizing highways? In that light, viewed as not turning a profit, would people abandon highways as well, opening up new possibilities for recreation trails? How much would we all gain if I-84 was reduced by half its width, statewide, and the excess space turned into a kind of express route for people cycling, skateboarding, and walking, who could use it for exercise alone, or have a more direct connection to job centers while benefitting from a space separate from automobiles? Cars have not existed forever, and if we have any vision, could begin preparing for a better future where they are not centered.

Things change.

There was a time in Connecticut when it was illegal to have public entertainment on Sundays.

You can blame the Puritans for that — historical or more modern versions.

In 1930, the Hartford Courant published quite the spread about those Blue Laws. They explained how in 1774, Rev. Samuel Peters, a Tory minister who was born in Hebron, was essentially pushed out of the state. What does one do whilst spurned? Peters shitposted about Connecticut on Proto-Twitter. From England, he published his list of Blue Laws in 1781. It is still debated if these laws were ever in existence and/or enforced. Among his gems: “whoever brings cards or dice into this Dominion shall pay a fine of five pounds.” He observed (or “observed”) that “on Saturday evenings [once the Sabbath has begun] the people look sour and sad.” He called the religion of early New England to be “fanaticism turned mad.”

One recent description of Connecticut’s Blue Laws reminds us that progress is not a straight line: “Against a backdrop of social and ethnic change (largely brought about by periods of increased immigration), religious reformers sought to impose stricter moral and social codes in an effort to regulate the populations’ Sunday activities.”

Peters’ Connecticut burn book may have been exaggeration for his time, but by the 20th century, it did seem like some fanaticism had taken hold.

In 1895, Meriden’s Hanover Park — claimed by management to be the “most desirable park in all New England for picnics and Sunday School excursions — was hosting an orchestra, hot air balloon demonstrations, and a merry-go round. They bragged of “50 pleasure boats” at Hanover Pond, a roller coaster, galleries where people could pose for photographs, and a parachute drop from a trapeze. There were baseball games. That level of excitement was maintained for a few years, but then the only mention of Hanover Park was for picnicking and sportsball.

There had been Sunday entertainment in parts of Connecticut, but by 1913, even live theaters in Hartford had stopped holding performances on Sundays. At this time, motion pictures (early movies, no sound) were being shown at some live theaters, and with gains in popularity came a touch of moral panic. In 1914, for the first time at a Connecticut State Prison, inmates in Wethersfield were shown two movies on Christmas; that same year, an Episcopal rector in West Hartford leased and ran a theater, basically so he could do quality control. While the Courant claimed that “New Britain’s mayor has been much censured for allowing motion picture shows in that manufacturing town on Sunday,” the fact was that there was demand for this. In November of 1913, when the weather was what we used to think of as standard November weather — gray, bitter, snowy/slushy — young people in particular were flocking to New Britain for one reason: Sunday pictures. It was said that the 7 PM train from Hartford had barely an empty seat, and the one coming in from Meriden equally demonstrated demand for secular entertainment.

What provoked this fresh bit of government being in everyone’s business about how they spent their Sunday off? Why would it be scandalous that New Britain allowed Sunday motion pictures? Why would police show up to parks in Connecticut to prevent amateur baseball games on Sundays, when two decades before this was a known and ignored activity in Hartford? Why was it fine, for example, that at Hartford’s public Elizabeth Park the tennis courts were off-limits on Sundays, but a nearby private club in West Hartford was able to offer use of its tennis courts to paying members on this day when enjoying life was seemingly forbidden?

It wasn’t until 1890 that a Hartford baseball team decided to not play Sunday games that season because this part of the country was against it, even if they were profitable.

What the hell was going on?

Sometimes the answer is obvious. There was a major wave of immigration that began in the 1870s and lasted until World War I. Specifically, immigration of Catholics, Lutherans, and Jews into a state that was previously mostly Puritan-flavored Protestant. One group was going to early masses leaving lots of open time the rest of the day, another didn’t see the need for a somber Sunday, and then others had a Sabbath that ended before Sunday and would not have required abstinence from recreational activities, by and large, anyway. You don’t have to scratch too deep to know what this moral panic over Blue Laws was about. The letters to the paper from Connecticut residents feeling destroyed that boys were playing baseball on Sundays never failed to mention how this was the place where they grew up; I’m guessing their Mayflower heritage was not included because of word limits set by the paper.

Back to the 20th century, when the state had been discussing whether or not to lift the ban on Sunday entertainment like movies since at least 1913.

In 1916, a Hartford Courant piece announced “Meriden Wants Sunday Movies: Chafes Against the Old Blue Laws,” saying that “Meriden has never has Sunday movies like other large cities in the state, because none of the theater owners have been sure of their ground in taking such a step.” At that time, “Meriden’s liberal Sunday has been limited to [amateur] baseball and football games at Hanover Park and picnics in various groves.”

Hanover Park, which included access to Hanover Pond — viewable from the Hanover Pond Linear Trail — was accessible by the train and trolley. It’s how teams traveled to play football there. Discounts were offered for those traveling by train/trolley. The postcard below shows a rendering of this area around 1910 — a hotspot, even in winter.

It was thought that those who did not own private automobiles would most benefit from having movie theaters operating on Sundays. It was not spelled out, but I will: those with the privilege of high income could skirt Blue Laws by potentially joining private clubs that allowed more variety of sports on Sundays and by driving to more open-minded municipalities. Those without money were limited as to what was in their backyard or reachable by public transit. This became even more the case when train service dried up, as it did on this line in 1917.

It was acknowledged that in Connecticut, people were openly violating Sunday liquor and gambling laws. One argument made for Sunday movies was that those who were apt to already find their way to alcohol on Sunday would have a more wholesome and sober option for spending their time off. The folly of Prohibition was mere breaths away, and if we learned nothing else, it was that clamping down on individual actions does not lead to sobriety or improved morality (which are not necessarily connected).

From that same Courant article, a guess was made as to who would support legalizing Sunday movies: “organized labor, the sportlovers, and newly adopted countrymen to whom the New England Sabbath seems strange by contrast to their former continental Sunday.”

In 1917, the Hartford Federation of Churches and State Federation of Churches endorsed a bill that would, as reported by the Hartford Courant, permit theatrical plays, picture shows, concerts, dances and ball games of a ‘genuinely and purely amateur nature.'” This would have let individual municipalities decide what would fly there, but also allow amateur sporting events on Sunday afternoons, and motion pictures on Sunday evenings. They were specific about what time of day these events could occur. Although there were an estimated 66,860 Jews in Connecticut by 1917, religious diversity did not seem to figure into the public conversation about the state sanctioned Sunday Sabbath. A small acknowledgment was made of some Christians whose Sabbath was on Saturdays; though not named at the time, decades later in this ongoing discussion, it became clear that the Seventh-day Adventists were those trying to get some recognition from other Christians.

Some decision-makers had deliciously cutting remarks for those trying to maintain the Sunday killjoy laws. The Courant wrote that Corporation Counsel Charles Kleiner of New Haven accused the ministers of “trying to get a monopoly on commercializing Sunday,” and Representative Charles J. Martin of Orange said that “while the ministers object to the collection of money on ball fields, they were not at all averse to passing out plates for collection in their churches on Sunday.”

In two years, Connecticut’s state senate would vote to allow local authorities to decide for themselves about “motion picture exhibitions,” but two years later, when another attempt was made to erode the Blue Laws, the governor vetoed. Governor Everett John Lake, a Republican who served for just two years, explained his veto of professional sports games: “the proposed law meant another step in commercializing the [Christian] Sabbath.”

Can you imagine?

Can you imagine having your personal recreational activities determined by the government’s endorsed religion, and a narrow interpretation of it at that? Can you imagine this in a country that was supposedly founded on the premise of religious freedom? Can you imagine being a person who observes a Saturday Sabbath voluntarily, and who is then forced to limit your activities the following day despite difference in belief? I have secondhand embarrassment about this entire era, and yet, just two years ago when I walked along a southern section of the Quinnipiac River, I was doing so in an attempt to calm down after the Supreme Court decided to undermine freedom of religion that day.

At time of publication, we still have Superbowl Sunday — something that would have been illegal when Meriden residents were fighting just to watch a movie on a Sunday. If we want to dance, shop, or sing on a Sunday, we can generally do so without a scandalized busybody neighbor sending an angry letter to the editor about how we are eroding this nation’s values.

We should take advantage of our freedom to do simple things, like enjoy fresh air in public spaces that anyone can use regardless of religion, finances, immigration status.

The Quinnipiac River Gorge Trail is 1.3 mile from the Meriden/Cheshire town line to the Red Bridge, where it then connects to the Hanover Pond Trail, a 1.1 mile segment of former railbed that found new life in 2013. The Meriden, Waterbury and Connecticut River Railroad had covered 30.2 miles; though some of this has been converted to autocentric use and other purposes, there remains some potential still for recreation.

As the Rails to Trails Conservancy says: “The ability to avoid congested streets and highways, and travel through natural areas on foot or by non-motorized means, is a large factor in a community’s ‘livability.'”

What makes our world livable? Besides clean water and air, stable temperatures, the correct amount of gravity? It’s not cultivating the appearance of piety, nor is it amassing wealth without regard to others.

Walking along these and most other rail trails strips away the useless veneer. It returns us to ourselves, whether through the practice of giving a friendly greeting to passersby or by listening to the surprising abundance of birdsong.

These two trails have benches every so often, and a Little Free Library and bicycle repair station by the pond. The pond is not naturally occuring, having been dammed in 1855 to benefit the Meriden Cutlery Company. Besides being host to Polar Bear Plunges, the pond was one time a site for ice harvesting.

Historic sites and uses are marked on the interpretative signs, showing how today’s Legion Field area is where Hanover Park once was, showing where dams were removed from the river.

Someone installed a picnic table for the squirrels and/or birds. A portapotty in the parking lot by Hanover Pond shows care for people using the trails.

From the Quinnipiace River Gorge Trail you can see Boy Scout Island, siltstone ridges, and tiptoe right up to the river.

And when you are tired of walking you can leave, and if you so choose, go to the theater. Even on a Sunday.

GETTING HERE: To use the  Hanover Pond Linear Trail and Quinnipiac River Gorge Trail, my suggestion is to take the CTtransit 564 bus from the Meriden Transit Center (Meriden Train Station). If it’s a weekday from 2:20-5:20 only, you can get off right by the path using the Oliver Platt High School stop, but any other time, use the Hanover & Highland stop and walk up Coe Avenue for 0.4 mile. (Can we talk about how weird it is that there’s no morning service to the high school? Or why this is only a one-way route, so a trip that would take five minutes by car ends up being 20 minutes because passengers are forced to go the long way?)

There is sidewalk for the distance from Hanover & Highland to the Hanover Pond Linear Trail entrance by the high school.

There is another trail segment that does connect from the train station, but it’s not an entirely separated trail; cyclists and pedestrians who are up for that can independently search for the Harbor Brook Trail.