The secret history of Cornwall’s near neighbor

CORNWALL — As part of a Getting to Know Our Neighbors program, the Cornwall Association and the Cornwall Historical Society presented a talk on Saturday, Aug. 13, with Liz Shapiro, executive director of the Sharon Historical Society. David Cadwell, president of The Cornwall Association, introduced her, and noted that there is a special relationship between Sharon and Cornwall: A small part of Sharon is actually served by the West Cornwall post office (those Sharon residents who have West Cornwall mailing addresses still pay taxes to Sharon) and use the 672 Cornwall telephone exchange.The towns have such a close relationship, Cadwell said, that the Cornwall fire chief actually lives in Sharon (the part with the West Cornwall addresses).Shapiro said this was the first time she had given such a presentation outside of Sharon. She joked that she had been working on her presentation for 18 years but had never given it before. “I have declined every invitation and opportunity to give a presentation on the history of Sharon until now. Over the years I have given talks on various parts of Sharon’s history. But putting the entire history of a town into a 45-minute presentation is tricky. Today is the first time.”There has been no comprehensive written history of Sharon since 1841, she said, so she was going to talk about “bits and pieces” in the hope of generating some kind of overall picture.The first slide she showed was a map of Sharon from 1874. The long border between the two towns is the Housatonic River. Shapiro spoke about how close the two towns are, in more than just geography. She pointed out the old American Indian trails on the map and how they correspond to today’s modern roads, including Route 4 and Sharon’s West Cornwall Road, which today crosses through the Covered Bridge and continues east on Route 128 (which is another old trail).People have been living in this area for about 12,000 years, Shapiro said. Before the Dutch and English came to what we call the Northwest Corner there was a substantial community of Native Americans living in clusters, especially around Indian Pond (which stretches into New York state) and Mudge Pond.She also observed that new research is showing that — 200 or 2,000 years ago — people moved around more than had previously been believed.She pointed out that Salisbury and Sharon were the last undeveloped parts of the colony, and before being incorporated, were referred to as the Far Northwestern Highlands.Cornwallians who attended were very happy to have learned new things about their neighbor to the west across the Housatonic River.