Darien to celebrate its 200th anniversary one year later
The Mather Homestead’s new education center. Darien’s bicentennial subcommittee of the town’s Monuments & Ceremonies Commission is discussing the revisiting of plans to celebrate the town’s 200th anniversary.
DARIEN — Two hundred and one years is just as much of a celebration for Darien, as the town resumes plans to celebrate its bicentennial in 2021.
The bicentennial subcommittee of the town’s Monuments & Ceremonies Commission is discussing the revisiting of plans to celebrate the town’s 200th anniversary after most of last year’s plans were canceled due to COVID-19.
To start, the Weed Beach Fest, which was changed to virtual last year, will be back in person this year as a bicentennial bash on a Friday in June. This year, it will be a later afternoon outdoor picnic with music; families can bring their own picnic or boxed lunches may be available for purchase.
The beach will be closed to the public for the event.
On June 12, which will be celebrated as Anniversary Day, town officials and historians will gather at Slawson Cemetery, the burial place of Revolutionary War soldier, patriot and Darien’s town founder, Thaddeus Bell Jr. A prisoner of war and a surveyor of highways, Bell served as a private and sergeant in the Connecticut Line of the Continental Army and is buried beside his wife, Elizabeth Howe.
Committee Chairman Al Miller said both Darien Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts would be invited to participate, as well as the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Museum of Darien Exectutive Director Margaret McIntire said the Anniversary Day event would be toned down and celebrate the town’s resilience, given
everything the state and the country have been through over the last year.
“Thaddeus Bell was the living embodiment of virtues like resilience, determination and stick-to-itiveness that this community has accomplished in the last year. When he set out to do something, he saw it through,” McIntire said.
The event will be outdoors, and how the public will be able to participate is still in planning.
Heritage Day will be celebrated in late October. During this event, the Museum of Darien will team up with the First Congregational Church and the fifth Connecticut Regiment.
The fifth Connecticut Regiment has been around since the 1970s as a reenacting unit. As part of the event, the regiment will reenact the kidnapping of the Rev. Moses Mather.
Mather was a graduate of the Yale Divinity School hired as minister of Middlesex Parish Church, now the First Congregational Church of Darien, in 1744, according to town monument historian Karen Polett. He held that position for 64 years. At that time, the minister was the preeminent leader in the town. During the war, Mather preached against the British, resulting in the capture of he and three of his sons who were held by the British for five weeks until they escaped. Mather also made the case that part of Stamford would become Middlesex Parish, a case championed by Bell, and in 1820 it became an official town on the map, Polett said.
McIntire said Mather’s outspoken support for the revolution and charismatic energy made him a target for the British. Mather’s kidnapping is one of the various historical murals featured throughout Darien Town Hall.
Much like the original night of the kidnapping, the fifth regiment will camp at the Mather Homestead the night before the event.
Other events on Heritage Day will include stations from the FCC to the YWCA Darien/Norwalk area for colonial cooking, games and other colonial traditions. After the kidnapping reenactment, a reenactment will be held on the grounds of the historical Mather Homestead.
Though the skirmish that happened related to the Mather Homestead didn’t happen on the actual grounds, a re-enactment of the type of engagement that would have occured during the war will be held with the fifth regiment on Heritage Day.
Also front and center during the bicentennial celebrations will be the Whaleboat Middlesex, recently restored and returned to the Museum of Darien. Intended to educate the community about the Whaleboat Wars on Long Island Sound during the American Revolution, the boat was built the boat in the 1970s, and eventually donated to the Maritime Center, where it had been displayed for years outdoors.
The committee also intends to involve Darien schools in the various events and hold an essay contest. The History Kids of Darien are going to be involved as well.
To kick off the celebration of Darien’s bicentennial, the community is invited to celebrate a book by Ken Reiss, historian for the Museum of Darien, titled “Darien, 1820 – New Town, New Time.”
The book is the Museum’s April book club choice. Readers will learn about the town’s past and discover how Darien gained its independence from Stamford in 1820.
Based on extensive research by Reiss, the commemorative book and the accompanying exhibition at the museum investigates the forces blocking the town’s path to independence and the hero who persisted with the effort and gave the town its name, according to the Museum of Darien.
On April 15 at 7 p.m. the museum and the Darien Library will offer a virtual question-and-answer session with Reiss about the book.
Those interested in volunteering for the events can email info.darien2020@gmail.com or call 203-656-7338.