The Stamford Way, Our Own Way

Stamford received a $25k grant to commission a mural that will be displayed on the side of the new train station parking garage, which means this mural will be the first (and potentially only) thing people learn about Stamford when they get here. Now the hard part: what is it going to be?

I’ve written at length about my critique of Stamford’s lack of culture, but I think there is a real opportunity for this mural project to be the bedrock of the city’s defined identity. If for no other reason than avoiding an embarrassingly hollow piece of art.

The Board of Finance stipulated the mural cannot be “divisive” or “controversial,” which is good direction. When you live in a community with so little going on, the natural inclination is to hire someone who will make an impression. For example, when the town of Dover, N.J., hired a television show for their mural it resulted in a piece that simply read “Dover Sucks.”

On the other hand, when the only parameters given to art is it can’t make too much of an impression then you quickly veer toward something you might see in a hotel lobby rather than at the center of a city’s identity. This is how you get a slogan such as “Innovating Since 1641,” which I don’t think anyone in the city can tell you what that means but it doesn’t stop them from plastering it on every municipal sign.

Stamford’s slogan is a good place to start when researching Stamford’s identity. Our city has gone through a number of slogans. The most recent is the commonly derided “The City That Works.” It was introduced in 1996 and its original meaning was meant to reflect Stamford’s status as a working class city. This was unique for our region because all our neighboring towns are mostly affluent communities serviced by workers living in Stamford.

Stamford has changed a lot since then and the working class community isn’t as prominent. Now “the city that works” is only used by irate residents as a perceived rhetorical slamdunk when complaining about their road not being paved. “More like the city that doesn’t work!” It’s very clever.

Stamford has had other nicknames — such as “Lock City” when Yale & Towne Manufacturing was a prominent employer — but none of them have lasted as the city has changed.

So, what is the lasting characteristic of Stamford? I would say it is our persistent independence from trends — both regionally and culturally. We have a culture of going our own way.

Stamford is unique in the region, because we continue to house workers for the neighboring towns. Even if the “working class” picture is different today than it was in the 1990s, it’s still true that Stamford is the most affordable community compared to our neighbors. On a literal level, Stamford has more affordable housing inventory than all our neighbors combined (this remains true even if you include Norwalk). We do things that need to get done even if no one else is doing it.

Stamford is unique in the state, because our successes and challenges are different from all the other power brokers in Connecticut. To paraphrase one of my former employers, the cities of Bridgeport, New Haven, Hartford, and Waterbury all have similar problems. Stagnant growth, high crime and school funding problems. These four communities get all their representatives to lobby for the same thing and they often get it. Stamford doesn’t typically get support from the state and it’s likely going to stay that way. We have to do things on our own.

This independence is reflected in our political leaders. Mayor Dannel Malloy gained a reputation for his single-minded ferocity. Mayor Michael Pavia was a political outsider — as was Bobby Valentine, who unsuccessfully sought the office in 2021. Mayor David Martin was endorsed by the local Democratic party over William Tong specifically because Martin wasn’t friendly with the Hartford political sphere. Martin was “no one’s rubber stamp,” wrote the representatives who endorsed him in 2013. Even when Martin had two successful terms, the local party endorsed his opponent — who is now Mayor Caroline Simmons. This town doesn’t care who your friends are, it cares about what you can do for Stamford.

If you talk to people “born and raised” in Stamford and tell them how this place could be better if we did things like other cities — they genuinely do not care. What other communities such as Norwalk, New York, or anywhere else in New England do has no impact on Stamford locals. Stamford does things its own way.

That’s the direction I would provide the artist for this mural. They can certainly capture all the surface-level aesthetics of Stamford. The diversity of the community (specifically the origins of the Italian, Irish, and Polish in the city), the numerous green spaces across town, the waterfront properties, the historical working class demographic, and the various industries that have come and gone through Stamford. That’s all fine, but that’s not really Stamford. The thing that ties this place together is the persistent independence to do things our own way.

Either that or take one of those James Daugherty murals and pin it up there.