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WINTER 2024-25: EAT UP! Welcome to your bi-weekly newsletter from Connecticut Explored with the latest stories, the newest Grating the Nutmeg podcast, programs and exhibitions from our partners.
Frozen in Time: A. C. Petersen Farms
Carving an ice cream sundae? You are in luck! A. C. Petersen Farms Restaurant in West Hartford has an entire menu of delightful specialty sundaes, classic ice cream flavors, and tasty toppings, guaranteed to brighten your day. From nostalgic grape nut ice cream to the Tin Roof Sundae, with hot caramel and malted milk, piled with hand-whipped cream, the restaurant has served devoted customers for 84 years.
A relic of the 1940s, the building A.C. Petersen Farms Restaurant is nestled in, is full of charming details and seeped in history. Donohue writes, “The exterior, intact after over 80 years, combines panels of glazed terracotta in an unusual design. The first floor is clad in large, mottled orange and white colored tiles and the upper floor in slightly smaller tiles in an ivory color. Strong vertical yellow bands of tile rise above each second-floor window.”
Read more about the A.C. Petersen Farms Restaurant by subscribing to Connecticut Explored!
Explore!
C. Petersen Farms Restaurant, 240 Park Road, West Hartford, acpetersenfarms.com
CT Visit Sundae Drives Ice Cream Trail, ctvisit.com/articles/sundae-drives-ice-cream-trail
Connecticut History for Kids: What’s for Lunch?
Curious about what kids ate for lunch over a hundred years ago, and how school lunches have shifted over time? In the 1940s, during World War II, lunches lacked protein to the extent President Truman signed a law called the National School Lunch Act. Fast forward to the 1990s and most schools served fast food lunches.
Do you have a favorite school lunch?
The Latest From Grating the Nutmeg
Miss Crandall’s School for Black Women
In this episode we’ll hear how a trio of like-minded women helped to get the academy off the ground, and the tremendous impact the school had in its short existence.
Mary Donohue talks to Dr. Jennifer Rycenga about her new book Schooling the Nation, The Success of the Canterbury Academy for Black Women.
Listen: Miss Crandall’s School for Black Women
Programs and Exhibitions to Enjoy This Month
Greenwich Historical Society
Greenwich Historical Society presents Greenwich During the Revolutionary War: A Frontier Town on the Front Line, an exhibition exploring the dangers and shifting loyalties in a small town on the frontier of the American Revolutionary War, on view in the Frank Family Foundation Special Exhibitions Gallery until March 9, 2025. Featured in the exhibition is a handwritten book of recipes kept by Greenwich resident Ann Hubbard Bush. She includes a recipe for “Washington Cake,” a cake traditionally made and served to celebrate Patriot General George Washington’s birthday, February 22.
47 Strickland Road, Cos Cob, CT, greenwichhistory.org
Connecticut Museum of Culture and History
Coffee: A Connecticut Story is a new multisensory exhibition at the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History that explores Connecticut’s coffee connections across time and place. Engage your senses as you travel through a series of settings inspired by moments in coffee history.
On view through January 2026
1 Elizabeth Street, Hartford, CT, connecticutmuseum.org
Stowe Center for Literary Activism
An immersive and thought-provoking experience: the Harriet Beecher Stowe Center shares a nuanced history of the 19th century by exploring Stowe’s legacy within the constellation of Black voices who influenced and inspired her to speak out against slavery.
Winter events include Salons at Stowe: Stowe Prize for Literary Activism Series and Reading for Change, a book group.
77 Forest Street, Hartford, CT, harrietbeecherstowecenter.org
Editor’s Picks:
Charles Zanor, “Borden Revolutionizes the Milk Business” Connecticut Explored, Fall 2007.
David Corrigan, “The Depression Gave Us — The Buffet Server?” Connecticut Explored, Winter 2010-2011.
Chris Dobbs with Nancy O. Albert, “Lunch Wagon to Space Age Diner: Connecticut’s First Fast Food Emporiums” Connecticut Explored, Spring 2006.
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