Why Middletown
Middletown is a city situated along the Connecticut River in central Connecticut, located 16 miles south of Hartford. Serving as the largest municipality in the Lower Connecticut River Valley Planning Region, it is the southernmost city in the Hartford-Springfield Knowledge Corridor metropolitan area. Once a major river shipping port and industrial center, the community is now primarily residential, with an active commercial district centered on Main Street near the campus of Wesleyan University.
The region was historically inhabited by the Wangunk, an Algonquian-speaking Native American tribe whose local village was known as Mattabesset. English colonists settled the town in 1650 and renamed it Middletown in 1653 because of its position halfway between Windsor and Saybrook along the river. Over the centuries, the community grew through waves of immigration, including major populations of Irish, Italian, Polish, and German arrivals, followed by African American migrants from the American South. Subsequent arrivals of Cambodian, Tibetan, and Indian residents established Connecticut's first Hindu temple in Middletown and helped create a varied, widely recognized international dining scene.
Following its 18th-century peak as a thriving trade port, Middletown developed into a manufacturing hub during the 19th century. The city initially specialized in firearms production during the War of 1812 before expanding into marine hardware, typewriters, automobiles, silverware, and hammocks, followed later by aircraft engine manufacturing in the Maromas district. Historic institutions located in the city include Wesleyan University, established in 1831, and the Connecticut Valley Hospital in the South Farm neighborhood, which opened in 1868 as the state's first public mental health institution.
Visitors to Middletown can explore a downtown area that features a broad collection of retail shops, diverse eateries, a multi-screen cinema, and the Inn at Middletown, a boutique hotel set within a former National Guard Armory. Cultural offerings include the Oddfellows Playhouse on Washington Street, a youth theater founded in the 1970s. The city is also home to one of Connecticut's largest annual pride events and is connected to Portland across the Connecticut River by the Arrigoni Bridge, completed in 1938.
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