The following information is taken from the book The Turnpikes of New England by Frederic J. Wood, copyright 1919, and published by Marshall Jones Company, Boston.

The map below shows the Western half of Connecticut and the location of the four turnpikes that either ran through Watertown or alongside it.

    In many New England towns will be found an old road locally known as "the turnpike," or the "old turnpike," over which are hovering romantic traditions of the glory of stage-coach days, while perhaps a dilapidated old building, standing close beside its now grass-grown pathway, is reverently pointed out as having occasionally been the temporary resting place of men great in our country's annals. But aside from the charm of such old stories the inquirer will be able to learn but little for, strange to say, those old roads have not found their place in history, and what little is known about them seems to be fast departing with an older generation.

    In the hope of saving some of this information an effort has been made to compile such as is still available, and the result appears in the following pages.

    Turnpikes, as distinguished from the ordinary roads of the same time, were those on which gates barred the progress of the traveler, at which payments were demanded for the privilege of using the road. Such payment was called " toll " and the gates were known as " tollgates." The privilege of building such " turnpikes " and of collecting toll thereon was conferred by the legislatures of the several states upon various individuals under the form of turnpike corporations, and the roads were constructed by private capital, were privately owned, and were operated for the revenue derived from the collection of the tolls.

    In the eighteenth century the name " pike " seems to have been applied to anything terminating in a point and the form of gate now called a " turnstile," being made of four crossed bars sharpened at their outer ends and turning on a center, was called a " turnpike." As this was about the only form of gate in use the name was readily applied to the tollgates when they first appeared.¹ A reversion to ancient form is thus found in the entrances to our elevated and subway systems and many places of amusement where we enter through such " turnpikes " or " turnstiles " paying our toll as we pass. The dictionaries still define " turnpike " as a gate, and the early charters allowed the building of " turnpike-roads " and the erection of " turnpikes " across them. But the longer word soon became shortened and as " turnpikes " the roads themselves were commonly known.

    The thirty-six miles between New Haven and Litchfield were covered by the road built by the Straits Turnpike Company, which was incorporated in October, 1797, the franchise reading from courthouse to courthouse. Watrous, in his contribution to the "History of New Haven," says that the road ran through the westerly part of New Haven and the village of Westville, then called Hotchkisstown, where it was later joined by the Rimmon Falls Turnpike.

    The name of " Straits " was derived from a section along the road which had long borne that name and which was thus described by a writer in the early thirties.

    The first meeting of the corporation was held in the house of Irijah Terrill, in Waterbury, in November, 1797. Much controversy arose over the location of the turnpike as Waterbury citizens wanted it to pass through the center of their town, while the people of Watertown made similar demands for their district. Anderson's " History of Waterbury " tells that a great deal of bitterness was bred of the contention, which we can imagine was not appeased when the final construction left Waterbury well to one side. The turnpike crossed Naugatuck River on Salem Bridge, so called from its location in Salem Society, the early name of Naugatuck. The town of Salem is in a part of the state remote from the Naugatuck River and had no connection with the naming of this bridge.

    Bronson's " History of Waterbury " recites that the first bridge over the Naugatuck at Salem Society was built by the town of Waterbury in 1736 and was washed away in the winter of 1740-41. In 1743 the town, groaning under the expense of maintaining the structure, petitioned the assembly to be allowed to collect tolls for passage across the river. Whether that was allowed or not is not known, but if not, it was conceded later, for the bridge was a toll bridge in 1761. Repairs at a cost of eighty pounds were made in 1748-49The Salem Bridge, known as the Naugatuck Bridge in later years, soon became a bone of contention between the town of Waterbury and the turnpike corporation. First the company, tiring of waiting for the town to act, made some necessary repairs and then vainly tried to collect pay from the town for the same. After several years the bridge was washed away and the town, considering the fact that the turnpike company sent all its travelers over the bridge and collected its tolls on or near it, refused to rebuild and sought to put that expense on the corporation. But this was one of the old turnpikes, and its franchise had not placed the burden of bridges or land upon it, so the town was obliged to provide a new bridge. That in its turn soon followed its predecessor downstream, and again the town sought to shift the burden of rebuilding.

    Claiming that the cause of the last catastrophe was a dike which the corporation had built a short distance above the bridge for the purpose of protecting its road where it crossed the low ground, the town brought suit to compel the company to pay the damages. It was claimed that the dike had so diverted the current of the river that it had undermined one of the abutments, causing it to tip and launch the bridge structure into the river. But again the town was a loser and had to rebuild the bridge and pay the costs.

    It seems remarkable that permission should have been necessary for such an ordinary matter, but we find that in May, 1806 the company secured an act of the assembly allowing it to erect houses at its gates. Each house was allowed a lot of land not to exceed five acres, but the total cost of house and land was not to be more than seven hundred dollars in each case.

    The Straits Turnpike was operated in its entirety until May, 1821, when all that portion between Westville and New Haven was made free. How long the balance remained a toll road we have not ascertained.

Pages 340 and 341

    This road was originally projected "from Woodbridge through Plymouth . . ." to the Massachusetts line and was so specified in the charter, which also designated the crossing of the Waterbury River as in Plymouth, but in May, 1802, alterations in the route were allowed which placed the turnpike in 9, far different and more logical place.

    The Waterbury River Turnpike Company was chartered in October, 1801, and built its road from a point Dear Naugatuck Center up the east bank of the Naugatuck River through Waterbury and Thomaston as far as Thomaston Center, where it crossed the Naugatuck and continued up the west bank through Litchfield to Torrington. Thence it bore northerly across Torrington and Winchester to Colebrook Center, from which place it ran northwesterly to the Massachusetts line at the corner of Colebrook and Norfolk, where it joined the road of the Fifteenth Massachusetts Turnpike Corporation and opened another route to Albany. Orcutt's " History of Wolcott " speaks of a turnpike project to connect Torrington with New Haven, which was much favored by the town but did not succeed. Probably that refers to the Waterbury River proposition which was diverted from Wolcott to the more favorable location in the valley of the Naugatuck.

    Anderson tells, in the " History of Waterbury," that the turnpike was built through the cemetery above Salem (-Naugatuck) Bridge and that graves were ruthlessly opened and the bones scattered about. Tradition has it that all of the stock at one time was owned by Victory Tomlinson, a man so rich that he could be careless in his dress. Seated one day by the side of his turnpike he was arrested for vagrancy and haled before a justice who acquitted him upon his plea that he was occupying his own land.

    Boyd's " Annals of Winchester " describes this turnpike and says that it was given up in 1 850 That is true regarding most of the road, but about eight miles in Naugatuck and Waterbury remained subject to toll collections until July, 1862, when, upon representations that even that small section was out of repair and unsafe, the assembly repealed the charter of the corporation.

    An ancient highway between Plymouth and the Naugatuck Bridge was deprived of its public character and given to the corporation, and of it Bronson has this to say in his " History of Waterbury":

    The present turnpike from Plymouth to Salem [Naugatuck] bridge, there to unite with the Straits turnpike connecting New Haven with Litchfield by Watertown, was finished in 1702. It was an open highway and a great undertaking.

Pages 365 and 366

    Communication between Hartford and Danbury about the year 1802 must have been difficult and also desirable, for strenuous efforts were then made to secure a satisfactory road, a committee being appointed by the general assembly to lay out such a route and also to submit their recommendations as to the advisability of establishing the same as a turnpike. The first report of the committee, covering the section from Danbury to Newtown, was made in October, when the committee was continued and instructed to continue its labors to Poland Bridge in Plymouth. That done and reported in May, 1803, the scheme was still unsatisfactory and the patient committee was further required to continue its labors to Farmington, where the Farmington and Bristol Turnpike would be met, over which the journey to Hartford could be finished.

    The committee's full report, containing certain alterations in the older part of the route, was accepted in October, 1803, and the road declared laid out as a public highway, with the proviso that the part between Poland Bridge and Farmington should only attain that status when a turnpike corporation had been formed to construct it.

    The Middle Road Turnpike Company was formed at the October session of 1803 and given the newly created public road, with the obligation to build the section from Poland Bridge to Danbury. The influence which had prevented the part from the bridge to Farmington from being accepted in full was either absent or met defeat, for the towns of Bristol and Farmington were obliged to build that section for the corporation.

    The turnpike, as recorded in the secretary of state's office, commenced on the Farmington and Bristol Turnpike in the Main Street in Farmington and went nine miles, seventy-two rods, and seven links to the bridge over the Poland River in the easterly part of the town of Plymouth, Thence it continued generally westerly, passing Plymouth meeting-house, to the Waterbury River Turnpike, which it followed for a distance of eighty chains or one mile. It then crossed the towns of Watertown, Woodbury, and Southbury, to the Main Street in Newtown after which it continued directly to Danbury. The road was commonly known as the Hartford and Danbury Turnpike, although after 1823 the journey between those places took one over the roads of three distinct corporations. In its length it intersected the Middletown and Berlin, Waterbury River, Straits, Pines Bridge, Washington, Housatonic, and Bridgeport and Newtown turnpikes which, with its two important terminals, doubtless seemed to justify the building of forty-six miles of road.

    After twenty years of operation in May, 1823, the road and corporation were divided; the East Middle and the West Middle Turnpike companies being formed and given respective sections of the old Middle Road Turnpike. The part from Danbury to a point ten miles east of the crossing of the Housatonic River was given to the West Middle Turnpike Company, the East Middle taking the balance. The point of division was about where the Washington Turnpike crossed the Middle Road.

    The East Middle secured permission to make changes in its gates in 1834, 1840, and 1844, but in the last year suffered the repeal of as much of its charter as applied to the towns of Woodbury and Watertown. When the balance through Plymouth, Bristol, and Farmington became free has not been learned.

    All franchise rights of the West Middle were revoked by the assembly at its May session in 1839.

Pages 373, 374, and 375

    Another of the radial feeders for New Haven was projected by the Pines Bridge Turnpike Company, chartered in May, 1824, to build from the northeast part of Woodbury to the west abutment of Pines Bridge in the east part of Oxford, in which length of road of about thirteen miles one gate was allowed.

    Starting from Pines Bridge the road followed a northwesterly course into the town of Woodbury, after which it turned northerly, skirting the east side of Quassapaug Lake and running on the boundary between the towns of Watertown and Woodbury. Then it turned into Woodbury, ending in the northeast quarter of that town.

    Twelve years was long enough to try the experiment in the town of Oxford and in May, 1836, the assembly allowed all in that town to be turned over to the public. In 1841 the charter was repealed and that marked the end of the whole turnpike.

Pages 392 and 393

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These pages copyright 2002 by Brian Gallagher