Connecticut – a small state with a lot to offer
My family’s background is based in Connecticut. On both sides of my family there are deep roots in Connecticut and even though as a military family, we moved all around the country and the world, we still thought of Connecticut as our home base. My parents were from the Cromwell, Middletown area with family ties in Meriden as well as having a little family cottage in Old Saybrook on the Connecticut shore where four kids and my mom lived as my Dad was on tour in Vietnam.
Later in my high school years we settled into East Haddam, Connecticut with the Goodspeed Opera House and the singing bridge. I don’t think I truly appreciated the beauty of the Connecticut River Valley until I went off to Boston for college and returned with a photographer’s eye years later.
Connecticut is a mix of coastal cities and rural areas dotted with small towns. Mystic is famed for its seaport filled with centuries-old ships, and the beluga whale exhibits at Mystic Aquarium. On Long Island Sound, the city of New Haven is known as the home of Yale University and its acclaimed Peabody Museum of Natural History.
Middletown was well know to us growing up as the place to get blue jeans at “Bob’s” discount store with its “jeans machine”. You’d tell the sales person your size and they’d drop down the jeans from the second floor.
After retiring, my parents sold the house in East Haddam and the little beach cottage in Old Saybrook and bought a shore front home in Westbrook where the family enjoy many years of good times introducing our young kids to life at grandma and grandpa’s at the beach.
More recently I spent a summer helping my parents pack up, clean out and move down to Florida permanently. Between trips to Goodwill and the dump, I managed to explore the area with fresh eyes and see things that I never saw as a teenager – more interested in socializing, dating, going to movies, and basically escaping small towns for the big city.
For the photographer, Connecticut has a lot of offer from the shoreline communities along the Long Island Sound, to the rural farm land in the western part of the state to museums, steam trains and history.
Fine Art Photography from around the state of Connecticut
Sunset at Chalker Beach, Old Saybrook Connecticut looking towards Westbrook in late September. The sun sets on the final days of summer over a beach on Long Island Sound in Connecticut.
An old wooden boardwalk leading down to a river with a tree in the background lit from the sun breaking through the clouds. Pratt Cove, Deep River Connecticut.
Clinton Town Beach is a sandy beach facing the entrance to Clinton Harbor with views of Long Island Sound. Enjoy the beach at high tide, and walk out to the sand bars in Clinton Harbor at low tide. There is a car-top boat access area for sea-kayaks and car-top boats, and a walkway for fishing off an old stone bridge that crosses the Hammock River at the entrance. In season, sanitary facilities and a food concession are open to the public. A pavilion is available for picnic lunches as well as a viewing platform with interpretive signs to enjoy wildlife in adjacent tidal marshes.
The hallmark of the north end of Middletown, Connecticut’s main street, O’Rourke’s Diner.
Wadsworth Mansion at Long Hill Middletown Connecticut by fine art photographer Edward M. Fielding.
Full steam through Essex Road. The Essex Steam train of the Valley Railroad, Deep River, Connecticut.
Seeing double, mirror image beach cottages in Chalker Beach Connecticut.
An old lobster shack on the Long Island Sound in Connecticut. This is one of those “lucky shots”. Driving around with my parents, showing me some places I hadn’t been before – photography gives one great excuses to explore. Timing just happened to be perfect. I just love all the junk around this place and the sunset was perfect.
A cozy little beach cottage at Chalker Beach, Connecticut in Old Saybrook on Fourth of July, with an American Flag and warm inviting light in the style of Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night.
A fisherman on the rocks at Clinton town beach, Clinton, Connecticut at sunset.