Danbury (Town of) Records

Series I Financial Records contains audit reports for the town, budgets, and various financial reports regarding prospective expenditures.

Series II: School Board contains ledgers accounting for School Board expenditures and the Board's meeting minutes.

Series III: Town Clerk contains various records primarily from the 1930s. This series remains partially unprocessed and also contains "old age" vouchers and miscellany.

Series IV: Town Counsel

The collection spans from 1893 to 1963 with the bulk of the collection ranging from 1940-1962, and is arranged chronologically by year or in groups of years. Most of the 1950s and forward correspondence is to Charles A. Hallock (Judge Hallock), the Town Council and Board of Selectmen. James A. Hallock was an attorney in Danbury who lived at 6 Pleasant St.

Of particular interest are the purchase of land for the development of Danbury Airport (box 9, folders 12-13, 21-25, 62-63), and the proposed Algonquin Gas pipeline through Danbury (box 1, folders 46-50).

Researchers should also see the Truman Warner Collection, a) Energy and Evolution, b) Air Travel, and c) Area Schools; the June Goodman Collection regarding education issues in Danbury; and, the City and Town of Danbury Records--Selectman Correspondence files for additional information concerning the development of Danbury Airport, Algonquin Gas Transmission Company, and school building and bonding issues.

The Algonquin Gas Transmission Company files contain correspondence, which includes the controversy surrounding their proposal, and maps indicating the proposed crossings of their pipeline through the Town of Danbury. The crossings include Saw Mill Road, Ridgebury Road, Driftway Road, Westville Avenue & Filmore Road, Franklin Street, Kohanza Street, Overlook Terrace, Terrace Road, Hayestown Road, Circle Drive, Great Plain Road, Rock Well Road, Hady Lane, Proposed Right Of Way for Pipeline Across the Property of Town of Danbury, East Hayestown Road, Oak Lane, and East Pembrook Road.

These records also contain correspondence and legal papers concerning the conveyance, by the State of Connecticut to the Town of Danbury, of a portion of the land on Roberts Avenue that was to be used to construct a laboratory school for the students of Danbury Teachers College (box 9, folders 33-36, 40-41, and blueprint of site OS 1).

This series was first described as the Town/City of Danbury Legal Papers; however, the name of the collection was modified to encompass the fact that most documents involve the Town Counsel, Danbury Board of Selectmen and the Danbury Town Council.

Series V: Registered Physicians contains a list of physicians in the Danbury area.

Series VI: Selectmen, Board of 1914-1960/DG179 and DG 209

This is a small collection of the Town of Danbury Selectmen records. The first series is comprised of correspondence directed to the First Selectman. In the years encompassed by this series, those selectmen were: Joeseph E. Sauer, Marquis Schlitter, and Charles Sweeney. Materials document the 1955 Danbury flood, the agreement between Town and AFSCME/AFL-CIO, 1934 project for sewers, drains and a treatment plant, and 1950s fallout shelters.

The second subseries contains files concerning the development of Danbury Airport (box 13, folders 4-9; box 14, folders 73-78, 82-91; box 7. folder 332; and oversized drawer 8; and, the proposed Algonquin Gas Line (box 13, folder 12, box 3, folder 177). Researchers should also see the Town and City of Danbury-Legal Papers Collection for additional information on the Danbury Airport and Algonquin Gas Transmission Company.

Information concerning Danbury during WW II can be found in the following folders: Box 13, folders 1-3, 53; box 14, folder 70a, 93-94, 97; box 16, folder 185-186, 214-215; box 17, folder 291; and box 19, folders 315-323, and 331-332). Additional information concerning the Danbury Airport, Algonquin Gas Line Transmission Company, and World War II are scattered among the alphabetical miscellaneous files.

Dating back to the colonial era, Danbury assumed responsibility, to varying degrees for its citizens who were destitute, sick, homeless, or otherwise unable to care for themselves. The files concerning the operation of Broadview Farm, the town's almshouse, between 1869-1962 can be found in Box 13, folders 14-15, 22-23, 46-47, 50-51, and 55-58. Researchers should also see Broadview Farm, 1869-1962 by Gladys B. Hammond, located in the Truman Warner Collection, Student Theses #31, which contains photographs and blueprints of the farm.

Series VII: Justice Docket (Aaron Bates)

The series is comprised of ledgers listing cases presumably overseen by Aaron T. Bates and civil cases held in the Danbury court house (in which Bates is listed as an attorney appearing before the court). Names, nature of charges and costs are indicated but the disposition of the case is not always noted.