• February 6, 2012:  Dr. Glenn Gordinier of Mystic Seaport and the University of Connecticut at Avery Point will speak about "The War of 1812, Connecticut, and Groton Bank".  He will put Groton Bank in context of the larger developments of the war and include comments about Mother Bailey and other Groton Bank residents of the time. 

The War of 1812 became a serious concern for Groton Bank on June 1, 1813 when the British fleet blockaded Commodore Decatur's squadron in New London Harbor for the remainder of the War.  Area residents remembered Benedict Arnold's bloody 1781 attack on Groton and New London.  Fearing a repeat, the militia was sent out, forts were reinforced and women, children and portable possessions were evacuated.

Glenn is a visiting scholar at U. CT Avery Point and the Robert C. Albion Historian  and co-director of the Frank C. Munson Institute of American Maritime Studies at Mystic Seaport.  He is also working on a Lyman Allyn Museum exhibit on the War of 1812.

• April 16, 2012:  Annual Meeting, speaker and topic to be announced.

• November 14, 2011:  GBHA president Tom Althuis kicked-off the association's 40th season by stepping back in time with a visit to Groton Bank more than a century ago.  Using slides of old photos of houses, businesses and maps, Tom took the audience on a tour of sites and architecture, describing historical events and people that made the growing village of Groton Bank notable in local, state, national and occasionally even world history.   Did you know:
  • The largest ship in colonial America was launched here in 1725 and shipbuilding here has set records ever since.
  • Almost all men who lived in the village were killed or wounded in 1781 during the Revolutionary War Battle at Fort Griswold.
  • A heroin of the War of 1812 who lived on Thames St. received national attention later to be visited here by 3 U.S. Presidents.
  • The most notabe and successful sea captains of the whaling era lived here.
  • Groton Bank is an architectural gem with colonial to Victorian styles.
  • Ferries were the only form of transportation across the Thames River until the first railroad bridge opened in 1889 followed by the first car bridge in 1919.

Come join your friends and neighbors and learn about the people who lived in our neighborhood and what happened here a century ago.

Unless otherwise noted, meetings are held  at 7 PM in Fellowship Hall at the Groton Congregational Church, 162 Monument Street, Groton CT and preceded by coffee/tea and desserts at 6:30 PM