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Compiled by Jeffery L. Gougeon
Planes, trains, and automobiles? You bet! But how
about bicycles, steamboats, trolleys, sailing vessels, canal-boats,
horse-drawn wagons and buggies—and sleighs? All modes of
transportation, including your own two feet. Additionally, how
far would we get without bridges and ferries? Without them, travel
over even short distances would be nearly impossible.
For most of Connecticut’s history, its waterways
have been a primary means for moving people and goods from place
to place, to harvest products from local and distant shores, and
to gather information from outside the local communities. But
Connecticut’s rich maritime history also has a landed counterpart.
From some of America’s earliest road systems, to rail travel,
to urban mass transport, to the rise of personal mobility in the
bicycle and the automobile, for over 100 years Connecticut has
had an important place in the story of invention and innovation
in transportation. This important place can be located where different
modes of historical transportation intersect, where older forms
combine with and give way to new forms, to create an interweaving,
almost seamless ‘system’ of transportation.
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