Chairman's View: The Best Small Town in America (New Canaan Advertiser June 13, 2019)

New Canaan was just named one of the “15 Best Small Towns to Visit in 2019” by Smithsonian magazine. Every year their editors search the entire country for places that sing to our imaginations and offer a distinct sense of place. New Canaan is now recognized as the best of small town America.

That’s some well-deserved recognition at a time when we need it. Local news is often negatively focused on the slings and arrows directed at us from Hartford, our few self-imposed problems combined with certain wistfulness about the way life used to be in our small town. That can make us feel vulnerable and low.  Thank you, Smithsonian, for recognizing New Canaan is beautiful and vibrant and has much to be thankful for. We are not only a great place to live but also a great place to visit.

So, what did the Smithsonian editors find here to crow about? First, they began New Canaan’s story with architectural pioneer Walter Gropius and his influence on the Harvard Five architects who lived and built 80 extraordinary houses here.  The editors called our architecture an “unusual blend of modernism” that has continued with the “sleek” River Building at Grace Farms, and is juxtaposed with the “stunning” Waveny castle and our stone Carriage Barn. Most importantly the magazine recognized that architecture is alive here: the Glass House summer party, the Historical Society’s Mad for Modern gala, the New Canaan Library’s “Glass House Presents” lecture series and heck, just slowing down for afternoon tea with Frank at Grace Farms are just some of the ways we continuously celebrate and live with New Canaan’s uniquely great architecture. (By the way a new architectural foundation is opening its columned porch on God’s Acre and planning their first exhibition)

Second, the Smithsonian called our walkable downtown a “Fairfield County rarity”. It is. They noted the tented home of Summer Theatre of New Canaan on the way into town as well as the vibrant mix of boutique shops, high-end retailers, cozy breakfast eateries and Elm Restaurant which they called “high-end” but is only one of 50 first-class restaurant choices spanning the full range of family to formal.

We are beginning to appreciate the value of attracting visitors to our town and recently created a 15-person committee of experts (the TEDAC) to identify, cultivate and grow what is awesome about this town and begin to communicate it to others. 

I’d like to add one essential thing that Smithsonian failed to mention: the people. There are plenty of pretty, but mostly empty, towns across America. New Canaan’s fabulous downtown with its awesome architecture and all of those arts and non-profits wouldn’t be worth visiting if they weren’t full of the most interesting people. We are out shopping, spilling on to the sidewalks on restaurant row, waving out our windows at the crossing guard, beeping hello at baby carriages along South Avenue. We are out walking the Irwin paths, running the Waveny trails, biking the back-country, filling our pretty churches Sunday mornings and our bleachers on Friday nights. Thousands come to the Caffeine & Carburator car shows, picnic on the 4^thof July, light the menorah and carol on God’s acre. If you are a visitor to our town it’s the people you’ll meet who make up the foreground, behind whom a 200 year tapestry of fascinating architecture and commerce are only the physical record of the way New Canaan lives. It’s a great time to re-discover New Canaan.

Chairman's View: Advertiser, Hersam's Served New Canaan for a Century (Nov. 21, 2018)

Op-Ed: Advertiser, Hersams served New Canaan for a century

NOVEMBER 21, 2018 BY BY JOHN ENGEL

‘A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself’

— Arthur Miller

The New Canaan Advertiser has certainly come to embody that ideal. We are a community talking to itself through our local newspaper. Whether you see evidence of that at the Friday morning coffees, or in our spirited letters to the editor, in the many events and vigils and gatherings has promoted in the paper throughout our town, and in the editorials, the New Canaan Advertiser is part of the essential fabric of our town.

That is why I did not want to let this moment pass without recognizing the soul of a paper which has become the soul of our town, to take just one a moment during this period of transition to new ownership, and recognize the Hersam Family for their success and steadfast stewardship of a newspaper that has not only reflected but formed the soul of our community for well over a century. Since John E. Hersam’s single sheet in 1908 and his motto, “Grow or Go” both this town and our paper have grown beyond his wildest expectations.

Consider the changes that the Hersams have navigated. We may have had a railroad when the Hersams started this paper, but we were nothing special, just another simple shoe-manufacturing town connected to New York City by a branch of the main railroad. No port, no highway. Exactly one hundred years after the Advertiser started (2008) New Canaan would claim the highest median family income in the country, the best public school system in the state and 3rd best in the nation. So much has changed and yet since 1919 we still carol on Gods Acre every year, Rick Franco still shovels his own sidewalk and we all look for the Advertiser every Thursday. 

The Internet disrupted the news business and newspapers in particular, and yet New Canaan has always relied on the Advertiser as the best and most consistent source for local sports reporting. How many of us scan the pages each week for a mention of our children and the familiar names of our friends? So too for most of our lives we’ve relied on other sections School, Obituaries, Opinion, Around Town, Arts, Real Estate and Classifieds as the only way to really understand our community.

In this town you probably aren’t really dead until the Advertiser prints your obituary and the community that loved you can appreciate you and mourn your passing. Your Advertiser editorials have been our collective conscience, prodding us to action for over a century.

We are a community talking to itself and The New Canaan Advertiser, now in its 110th year is by any standard not just a good newspaper but an excellent one, both in the quality and depth of its reporting, the range of topics it covers, and the breadth of its influence on our town.

Thank you Hersam Family for an excellent first 110 years of the New Canaan Advertiser, and we wish the Hearst organization every success in following your example.