Northwest Park in Windsor, CT
On the same day I visited the Connecticut Trolley Museum and East Windsor Historical Society, I walked through Northwest Park run by the town of Windsor, CT. This 473-acre park includes a tobacco museum, a nature center, a heritage breed animal barn, public art, and twelve miles of walking trails.
The history of tobacco has appeared on my blog more often than one might expect of a non-smoker. (Evidenced in part by the perennial favorite essay “Concerning Pipe-weed”.) The Connecticut Valley Tobacco Museum at Northwest Park encompassed two buildings and had some similarities to the tobacco exhibit at the Dominican Amber Museum Experience in Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic, which I visited in June 2023. The exhibit demonstrated the process of harvesting and drying tobacco, which is grown throughout this part of Connecticut. A detailed sign gave the history of plant from its earliest cultivation in Connecticut around 1000 BC, the rise of tobacco plantation during the 1600s, and the modern industry, which generated $20 million in income annually. One interesting fact that I did not know what that tobacco comes in varieties, much like other cultivated plants, and have names like Sumatran, Havana, and Connecticut Broadleaf.
Besides providing facts, the museum displayed a wide range of equipment used to plant seedlings, prepare the soil, provide shade for growing plants, and harvest the leaves. One building looked like a historic tobacco drying shed, while a corner of this building was set up to resemble the small houses where migrant workers live. The other building held smaller artifacts related to the history of tobacco, including artwork by Deborah Spears Moorehead. She belongs to Seaconke Pokanoket Wampanoag Tribal Nation, and her sculpture “Three Sisters Rainkeeper” can be viewed at Historic New England’s Casey Farm, which I reviewed in 2022. A short documentary playing on a loop in the museum told the story of teenagers and young adults who worked on the tobacco farms and appeared in the 1961 movie Parrish.
Between the tobacco museum and the nature center was a painted horse sculpture named Field Day created by local artist Jack Derail. The painting features a tobacco barn, rolling hills, grassy fields, and a fish-filled river. The nature center was small, similar in size to the Blue Hills Trailside Museum run by Mass Audubon, which I had visited a few weeks prior. Exhibits included taxidermy, dinosaur footprint fossil replicas, and a few animals in aquariums. The animal barn contained turkeys, cows, and mules with a somewhat worn sign explaining their biology and historical importance.
As for trails, the colorful map marked the different biomes found in the park, including a marsh, a bog, wetland forest, a reservoir, and fields. I traveled mostly along the Wetland Forest Trail, the Conservation Trail, and the Farm Road, which allowed me to see a pair of tobacco sheds. The trails were not marked quite as much as I would prefer as an easy befuddled hiker, although there is not enough space to become horribly lost.
Northwest Park is open for the entire year from dawn to dusk. While I visited in the warm summer months, I would be happy to return for snowshoeing during this time of year. The hours of the tobacco museum vary, and regular hours are posted only during the warmer months. An audible version of the exhibit is provided by Connecticut Radio Information System (CRIS) Access and sponsored by the Windsor Lions Club. (The New England Carousel Museum in Bristol, CT also uses this system.) The nature center is open from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Monday through Friday, 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Saturday, and 1:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Sunday. Biking is permitted on the farm road. Dogs are permitted to walk on the trails if on a leash, and children may walk without a leash. This park is a hidden gem, and I would gladly visit again to explore more of the trails.
Abby Epplett’s Rating System
Experience: 9/10
Accessibility: 8/10