Kent, Connecticut, and Farming in New England:
some links and resources

For a mind-boggling, often startling, but very dense examination of the minutiae of farming in New England:
A Long, Deep Furrow: Three Centuries of Farming in New England
Howard S. Russell, University Press of New England, abridged edition, 1982.
Much of the work of artist, historian and illustrator Eric Sloane, who lived for many years in the neighboring town of Warren, offers a view of the local landscape and a feel for the farming community that has disappeared. He established a museum for his collection of early American tools, the Sloane-Stanley Museum, which lies just north of the village of Kent.
One of the “Rivers of America” series, which offers a gossipy, anecdotal history of the river valley:
The Housatonic: Puritan River
Chard Powers Smith, Rinehart & Company, 1946.
Democracy in the Connecticut Frontier Town of Kent
Chares S. Grant, W. W. Norton & Company, 1972.
One American Town
Donald S. Connery, Simon and Schuster, 1972.
Up on Preston Mountain: The Story of an American Ghost Town
John Polhemus and Richard Polhemus, Purple Mountain Press, 2005.
Elements of Kent’s topography fill in the town of New Winton in a 1933 novel, now out of print, by Kent School alumnus James Gould Cozzens:
The Last Adam, Harcourt Brace & Co., 1933. While “New
Winton” appears to be somewhat south of New Milford, the novel describes Cozzens’ view of small town life and class divisions in the early part of this century.
Narrative history and other items are also available from the Kent Historical Society bookstore
Farming and Ecology Today…
To protect our environment and give small farmers in Central America the tools to convert to sustainable land-use practices, please consider donating to Sustainable Harvest International, which assists communities in Honduras, Panama, Nicaragua, and Belize.
