“Monuments Of New Haven” Documented

You may know the Connecticut state bird (the American robin). And perhaps the state flower (the mountain laurel).

You may even know the state fish (correct: the shad).

How about the official Connecticut state hero? Who even knew we had one!

You will learn it’s Nathan Hale and you’ll also see at least two statues of him if you consult the just published ​“Monuments of New Haven,” an informative booklet hot off the presses from the Elm City Parks Conservancy (EPCP).

The group’s president unveiled the booklet, funded in part by the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven, at the monthly meeting of the Quinnipiac East Management team convened Tuesday night at the Ross/Woodward School on Barnes Street.

ECPC President Marge Ottenbreit said the project began as a compilation to identify and describe only the important monuments in and around the city parks. It grew to be more comprehensive when she realized, in talks with city officials, that there is no complete or recent listings of all the monuments in our historic city.

“My brother was active in the vets in Hamden,” Ottenbreit, who’s 80, said following the meeting. Years ago he had asked her to speak at an event about the World War Two monuments in the area. ​“I tramped through the snow” trying to locate those memorials. No one could tell her where they were.

That inspired an earlier publication — a hand-out, really — describing a portion of the city monuments. Ottenbreit, who grew up on Welcome and Lewis streets in Fair Haven and recalls kayaking as a little girl on the Quinnipiac, said producing a fuller publication had always been one of her goals for ECPC.

“I knew this information wasn’t readily available,” she said.

She enlisted local history writer Priscilla Searles and photographers Jacob Epstein and Mark Slater. They produced a handy and useful booklet.

The compilation reveals information — like Nathan Hale’s being the state official hero — that many amateur history buffs may not know.

The booklet gives you locations, architects, funders, and in many instances a history of how a memorial came about. Ottenbreit said that in her many decades in New Haven she had seen all the monuments. In the process of doing the project, she learned, for example, about who the artists were.

The booklet is organized alphabetically. It begins with the Timothy Ahearn Memorial — he’s the redoubtable World War One Doughboy in West River Memorial Park by Ella Grasso Boulevard — and ends with the World War Two Memorial Monument in Wooster Square.

The crew ending up not going around the corner on Jefferson Street to add local hero Joseph Lenzi, in Lenzi Park. He’s the young Marine who died in 1945 on Iwo Jima and whose simple cenotaph is in the center of that vest pocket park.

Reaction to the publication thus far has been very positive, Ottenbreit said, although some folks have indeed noted omitted plaques and monuments. ​“Yes, we’ll get feedback. I call it constructive criticism,” she said.

The booklet, which sells for five dollars, will have its formal debut when it goes on sale at the ECPC table at the upcoming Cherry Blossom Festival in Wooster Square. You can order a copy through the ECPC website or by calling (203) 466‑1596.

Copies are also going to be sent to every city middle school and high school teacher of history and social studies, she added.