George Fowler released his annual report as First Selectman to the press

1. The report listed work that had been done toward establishing the new town farm:

• Plans for and construction of the “pest house”;
• Plans for and construction of the “hospital, barn, shed, boiler house, etc.”;
• Installation of pipes; and
• Installation of sewers.

2. The report also stated that, despite boring to a depth of 87 feet, they had been unable to find a source of water on the new town farm property.

• The Town Board of Selectmen struck a deal with the City Board of Water Commissioners to pay for the installation of pipes from “the connection on Vine street to the town line.”
• The Board of Selectmen installed the pipes.
• The Board of Water Commissioners reimbursed the Board of Selectmen for that cost less the cost of “digging and filling.”

3. The Board of Selectmen then added additional pipes and a fire hydrant on the grounds of the new town farm.

1. The Courant used the passive voice – the report “was issued” – and so the report could have come from Fowler directly or from someone working in his office.
2. All of the numbers given in the article – about the number of people the town farm served and the expenses incurred in running the almshouse – are, unfortunately, illegible. Best guesses are that

• the cost to date for the planning and construction of the new town farm was over $19,000, and
• anticipated sales of the building lots on the old town farm would top $120,000.

In any event, the Board of Selectmen believed that the anticipated sale of the old town farm buildings would raise more money than the buildings at the new town farm would cost.”

On September 29, 1885, the committee on the sale of the town farm ordered improvements be made to the town farm property.

The report also included accounts on:

• The number of people seeking assistance during the previous year;
• An almoners’ conference held in January 1885;
• Expenditures and revenues related to the Town Farm’s wood yard;
• Collections and disbursements of funds related to the Town of Hartford’s regular annual activities;
• An operating budget presented by Charles C. Strong;
• An operating budget presented by the high school committee;
• Expenditures and revenues of the Hartford grammar school; and
• Expenditures and revenues of the Zion’s Hill cemetery committee.

On October 26, 1885, an adjourned town meeting was held, at which the sale of the old town farm property was debated.

1. “During the month of January, at the earnest solicitation of numerous prominent citizens, the first selectman invited a conference of all the Almoners in the city. … Among the results attained by these frequent meetings was a better acquaintance with each other, a knowledge of the condition and wants of many of the applicants for charity, and the various methods of obtaining it – but that they have resulted in any practical benefit to the town, by reduction its disbursements for out-door alms, is not conspicuously apparent.”
2. “Among those seeking relief were included men of almost every mechanical pursuit, who were driven by lack of employment, to do that which they were never compelled to do before, ask the town to tide them along until business should improve and they could earn enough to support themselves and families.”

1. “The annual report of First Selectman George W. Fowler was issued from the press yesterday and will be presented at the adjourned town meeting Monday.”
2. “Such a course will not only enable the committee to get the land of the old farm into the necessary condition to sell, but will do away with the necessity and expense of running to institutions.”

1. A survey, ordered by the committee on the sale of the old town farm property, was appended to Fowler’s report.
2. Charles C. Strong was the Town of Hartford treasurer.

“Owing to the large number of applications for employment [at the town farm wood yard] from men with families, we were unable to employ any of the inmates of the almshouse this year, therefore the expense for sawing was much larger than heretofore.”

Unattributed.  “The selectmen’s report,” Hartford Daily Courant, October 23, 1885, page 1.