Two Centuries of New Milford Connecticut: An Account of the Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the Town Held June 15, 16, 17, and 18, 1907, With a Number of Historical Articles and ReminiscencesVarious
History
Two Centuries of New Milford Connecticut: An Account of the Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the Town Held June 15, 16, 17, and 18, 1907, With a Number of Historical Articles and Reminiscences
Various
New Milford (Conn. : Town) -- History
in intent, as those who seek to escape the processes of the law always
are.
“No, be it said to the glorious memory of the Pilgrims of New Milford
and Western New England, they did not follow in the wake of many of the
larger institutions in the East, and cringe and whimper and grovel under
the crack of the whip of the slave-holding aristocracy. Open and free
and manly, they stood out for the defense of freedom, whether applied to
the person of black man or white man. It was the highest type of
educational training which any institution can furnish. It was not
tamely to learn axioms or to demonstrate mathematical problems, but to
know, to believe, to defend that which was best and truest. These worthy
Pilgrims who went out in the early part of the nineteenth century into
this western forest, stood for this with all the sturdy strength of
these mighty trees that shadowed their homes. It is because they went,
and others like them, that the Buckeye State has risen to and maintained
her dominant influence in the nation’s life. It is due to these
Pilgrims, more than to any other one force, that the whole Northwest was
from the first saved the disgrace of slavery. Institutions of learning
in which women as well as men had the right to the best education were
planted. They maintained the school, the church, the home in every
hamlet and city and village; and, to-day, this region they settled
presents the finest, largest, and most comprehensive type of Christian
civilization that the earth affords. All glory, then, to these Pilgrims
from New Milford! They, like one of old, ‘went out not knowing whither
they went.’ They dared and suffered and died, but always achieved. Well
may this village, a beautiful gem set in the midst of these rolling
hills, rejoice in its own noble development and progress and prosperity.
Your life here is almost ideal. The conditions are as fine as the world
affords. But, as you rejoice in this Bi-Centennial of your own founding,
forget not, O brave and true men and women of this generation; forget
not, O Christians of these churches; forget not, O patrons of this
redeemed nation, that the Pilgrims that went out from your firesides and
homes into the great West inaugurated the tremendous forces that have
moved on in increasing power and breadth until the whole nation has been
made the richer by their mighty power.”
Dr. Bennitt’s address at Saint John’s Church was as follows:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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