Stafford

STAFFORD This is the home of the famous mineral springs where the Indians met to drink the iron and sulphur waters to make them "lively" and to which the future President John Adams came for his health in 1771. Later the elite of the Nation gathered here for pleasure. The region, originally Mohegan Indian land, was bought in a questionable transaction by Major James Fitch of Canterbury, who had acquired large tracts of eastern Connecticut land. His claim was not completely accepted by the General Assembly, which ordered in 1718 that a town be laid out "... of seven mile square ... eastward of Enfield." This was the beginning of legal settlement. Bog iron was discovered and furnaces were built to smelt the ore for iron castings and tools. Endowed with abundant water power, the various early mills gave way to a thriving textile industry, of which a portion has continued to the present day.