LAKEVILLE — When Columbia University awarded Eleanor Jackson Piel an honorary doctor of law degree Wednesday, May 11, they recognized her decades-long career fighting for civil rights and against injustice. But Piel is still surprised by the honor.Small, elegant, soft spoken and modest, Piel sits in her Fifth Avenue apartment with its incomparable view of the Central Park reservoir and its continuous geyser, across the park the fabled buildings of Central Park West — and spins stories from her 68-year career as an activist lawyer.Piel, who has owned a house on Lake Wononscopomuc for nearly half a century, graduated from the University of California’s Berkeley Law School in 1943, the only woman in a class of a dozen men.“Women weren’t supposed to go to law school then,” she says, “but I was stubborn, and my father wouldn’t pay for me to go to journalism school at — ironically — Columbia.”When no law firm in San Francisco would hire her, Piel got a clerkship with the federal district judge who ruled that Japanese-American men interned in camps who refused to appear for draft physicals could not be prosecuted by the same government who had interned them as “disloyal.” It was Piel’s first experience with legal discrimination and the might of government.After spending two years in Japan working with General Douglas MacArthur’s efforts to rebuild the Japanese economy, she returned to Los Angeles to open her one-woman office. At a party, she met Gerard Piel, publisher and co-owner of Scientific American. They were married on an afternoon in 1955 after Piel had spent the morning in court successfully defending three young men. Piel moved to New York City where she soon became noted for defending political radicals. On a fact-finding trip to Mississippi, where Andrew Goodman, the son of a friend, was one of three young men murdered by white supremacists, she met a young white woman who had been denied service at a Kress lunch counter because she had her black freedom-school students with her. Piel filed suit against Kress and won the case before the United States Supreme Court, her only victory in four appearances there.In 1982 Piel took her first case of federal habeas corpus — in which a federal district court agrees to review a prisoner’s imprisonment or capital conviction. Along the way she freed two wrongly convicted brothers facing execution in Florida and a New York man who spent 16 years in prison for a rape he never committed. In both cases Piel used her own money for DNA testing and investigators.Although she no longer handles these cases, Piel is horrified by the restrictions placed on federal habeas corpus by a Republican Congress in 1996. Prisoners are allowed only a single appeal and that must be made within one year of conviction, an almost impossible deadline to meet. Finding herself at an event with President Bill Clinton, she asked him if he would sign the bill. “It’s a very bad bill,” he said without answering her question. Yet it became law.Gerard Piel died in 2004, and Piel has been “at sea” ever since. She rarely comes to the Lakeville house anymore because of the memories and because, at 90, she no longer drives. Her daughter is a physician in Austin, Texas, and the mother of nine children including triplets and twins.Piel beams at a photograph of her granddaughter, Joy Womack, who studies with the Bolshoi Ballet in Moscow. “She began teaching herself Russian at 12 and moved there on her own at 15,” Piel says proudly. “She is now one of their young stars, and she danced in Washington, D.C., last year.”High above Central Park, there seems little doubt where Joy got her spunk.
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One systemic consequence of slavery is the loss and obscuring of the histories of those who were enslaved. Records were often not kept about where Africans had been stolen from or who they were related to. Families were torn apart, leaving nothing but the faintest traces of the past. The delineation point, where genealogists can no longer trace histories back, is refered to this as the “document wall.”
Today, 250 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence and more than 160 years since the Emancipation Proclamation, there is a growing effort to restore some of the history stripped from enslaved people and their descendants. Among the leaders of these efforts is Mills, president of the Alex Breanne Corporation, a nonprofit organization that works to identify previously anonymous Black Americans from history and connect them with their living relatives.
The work began with Mills’ sister, who started digging into their family’s past in the 1990’s and introduced him to this emerging world of genealogy. Through that process, the Mills family discovered their great-great-grandfather, Ned Mills, who had been enslaved in Texas. His last name came from his final enslaver and remains the family surname. Through their research, they found that the document wall directly affected their ancestor, who learned of his liberation on June 19, 1865, now commemorated as Juneteenth.
“For the first time,” Mills writes on his website, “American slavery wasn’t something that had happened to anonymous people in a history book. It had happened to my family.”
The discovery gave Mills a familial pride he had been missing for years. That pride fueled his desire to help others find their own history. In 2023, Mills received his certificate in genealogical research from Boston University. He has used his expertise to help descendants of enslaved people uncover histories they never dreamed of learning.
To do this, he uses a process called “reverse genealogy,” identifying a person from the past and working forward to discover their descendants. Along the way, Mills has found some remarkable people who fought for freedom on American soil, some of whom were never freed.
Pay Bill for Robin Starr’s service in the Continental Army.Courtesy the Alex Breanne Corporation
At the Cornwall Historical Society event, Mills will present the stories of four Connecticut families: Job Lathrop of Norwich, the son of Pirmus Armes, about whom Mills has published a book; Prince Mortimer of Middletown, also the subject of a book by Mills;, the three sons of London Wallace of Simsbury; and Robert “Robin” Starr of Danbury, who later lived in Cornwall and Sharon.
A few years ago, Cornwall Consolidated School social studies teacher Will Vincent reached out to Mills for research guidance on a local history project his students were undertaking. Together, they learned about Naomi Freeman of Cornwall. After purchasing an acre of land on Great Hollow Road in 1828, Naomi Freeman became the first Black female landowner in Cornwall.
The students petitioned the town to rename a road after the historic Cornwall resident In April 2025, Great Hollow Road was officially renamed Naomi Freeman Historic Road. U.S. Rep. Jahana Hayes joined Mills and the Cornwall Consildated School students for a presentation of their research.
Since then, Mills has guided the students in their quest to learn more about Starr’s story. Starr was a Revolutionary War soldier who joined the Continental Army to earn enough money to buy his own freedom, receiving the Badge of Merit in the process. The stories of his descendents’ services are equally worthy of their own books.
In recognition of Mills and the students’ work, First Selectman Gordon Ridgway proclaimed Feb. 8 as Robin Starr Day.
Preregistration is required for the event at the Cornwall Historical Society. To learn more about Mills’ work, visit
alexbreanne.org.
John Mills speaking at Quinnipiac University.Courtesy the Alex Breanne Corporation
Stephanie Saetta runs Charlie Chicken Bones, a sanctuary in Salisbury.
Dogs have been at the center of Saetta’s life since childhood. She remembers going to the library to research different breeds and trying to convince her parents the family needed a dog. She had her heart set on an Irish Wolfhound, but she was more than happy when her mom brought home a West Highland terrier.
After college, she adopted Charlie as a puppy from a rescue on Long Island. He was a hound-shepherd-Rottweiler mix who suffered from intense seizures. Some veterinarians recommended euthanasia, but Saetta wasn’t ready to give up on him.
When Charlie would have an episode, she would sit with him, nose to nose, talking him through it. She learned to look for the moment he began to come around — when he could smell her again and his tail started to wag.
“You only get one or two of these soul connection dogs, so I do this in his honor,” Saetta said. “I like to think that all the dogs that come through are going to have that person that they connect with just the same.”
Through a network of women working to rescue animals in Texas, she learned about the desperate situations facing many dogs.
With limited space, some public pounds euthanize even healthy animals to make room. Limited access to veterinary care leaves sick dogs or unvaccinated puppies especially vulnerable.
Saetta saw that reality firsthand with a puppy named Gus, a Labrador mix she fostered who has since been adopted. Gus and his sisters had been dumped beside a road, where they were living under an abandoned car. People would leave food for them, but no one would take them to the pound.
“Even the people who rescue animals down there were like, ‘sadly, the best place for them to be is on the side of the road,’” she said. “That’s safer. Someone might actually help them that way.”
Saetta knows that there are far more dogs than any one person can save, but she also knows that helping one dog means one fewer on the street.
Stephanie Saetta,with her rescue dog George and Blue (left), a shepherd mix awaiting his forever home.Madi Long
Charlie Chicken Bone Sanctuary operates entirely through foster homes, a model that Saetta believes is best for the dogs and the humans hoping to adopt them.
Rather than moving directly from a difficult environment into a permanent home, the dogs have a chance to settle into a quieter setting. They can learn what it’s like to live with a family, sleep somewhere comfortable and receive affection without fighting for attention. Fostering also allows the rescue to really get to know each dog.
“As fosters, we’re honest,” said Saetta. We’ll tell you everything that’s been bad, everything that’s been good. What their temperament is and how they’ve responded to all the things they’ve experienced.”
A successful adoption is not just about finding a dog a home; it’s about finding the right home where the dog and family can thrive together.
Saetta is looking for more people willing to open their homes to foster dogs. She understands that the thought of growing attached and eventually saying goodbye can feel daunting. But she sees that goodbye a little differently.
Fostering means being part of a dog’s journey, even if only for a short time. It gives dogs a safe place to rest, the chance to trust again and the love they have gone without for much of their lives. And when the time comes for them to leave, it is not really a loss. It is the reward of knowing they are moving on to a forever home.
Blue, Saetta’s current foster, is hoping to find his perfect home.
Blue, a 7 year-old Shepard mix, is waiting for his forever home. Madi Long
Now around 7 years old, Blue spent most of his life wandering the streets of Texas. People sometimes left food out for him, but his mangy, dirty coat kept them from stopping to pet him. Today, he has a chance to experience something different.
Blue is still waiting for his forever home. Saetta believes he would do best as the only dog in a household or alongside another senior dog. He will need someone willing to continue working with him on his training and understand that a dog with his history needs patience.
But what he gives in return is a whole lot of love.
“He’s so enthusiastic, he’s so excited for life, he’s so friendly, and he’s got such a good heart, and he loves to cuddle,” Saetta said. “He’s a good, good, good dog.”
For more information on adopting Blue or how to foster, visit ccbsanctuary.org.
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