Celebrating Civil Rights in Connecticut

Hartford artist Micaela Levesque has painted murals using spray paint and latex in places far and wide. She has created work in Colombia, Mexico, and St. Martin, but it is her home state of Connecticut that holds the bulk of her vibrant creations. Perhaps you have visited the Ruth Bader Ginsburg Women’s Empowerment Center at 330 Market Street in Hartford. There you likely would have seen Levesque’s brilliant depictions of RBG, Kamala Harris, Michelle Obama, Sonia Sotomayor, and Ella T. Grasso. Her murals, however, are found all over Hartford and the rest of the state. From Bradley Airport and Trinity College to East Hartford, Niantic, and Hamden, Levesque has been hard at work redefining public spaces with inspiring stories and natural landscapes. “My message is to basically tell a story—tell individual stories—while creating a place where beauty exists,” Levesque explains.

On Saturday, September 14, 2024, at 2 PM, the Town of Glastonbury, Connecticut, will celebrate Levesque’s latest mural project, which appears on Town Hall located at 2155 Main Street. Acknowledging Glastonbury’s farming traditions with bounteous farmland in the background, the mural honors several of the town’s civil rights leaders while looking to promote discussions around belonging and diversity. The most prominent figures in the piece are Zandra Flemister (1951-2023) and Kirby Edmonds (1951-2020), both of whom graduated from Glastonbury High School. In 1974, Flemister became the first Black woman to serve in the United States Secret Service. Among others, she protected Susan Ford and Amy Carter. Edmonds would graduate from Cornell University and then dedicate his life to communities of service in the greater Ithaca region and beyond. In 1981, he co-founded Training for Change to combat all forms of oppression.

The mural also acknowledges important persons in Glastonbury’s more distant past. This includes Sarah Wumpane, a Wangunk leader “representing the Native American history of the land that is now Glastonbury and its surrounding towns,” and sisters Julia and Abigail Smith, who were supporters of antislavery, women’s suffrage, and women’s equality in the nineteenth century. Using symbols, Levesque connects her viewers to several other key figures: the powder horn seen in the foreground is that of Prince Simbo, who enlisted in the military during the American Revolution in Glastonbury; a silver buckle and signature evoke Mary Syphax, who with her husband, was freed from slavery after the American Revolution for his service in the military; and, finally, the flag in the mural is the battle flag of what was known in the American Civil War as the 29^th (Colored) Regiment Connecticut Volunteer Infantry, an all-Black military unit that had 13 men connected to Glastonbury.

The mural project is the result of a collaborative effort of town leadership, the Historical Society of Glastonbury, Glastonbury MLK 39 Community Advocate Group, and RiseUP for Arts. The mural is part of the MLK39 Racial Equity Mural Tour, RiseUP’s initiative to erect thirty-nine murals in Connecticut, one mural for each year of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Additional Information:

Artist Micaela Levesque to Begin Painting Glastonbury MLK39 Mural at Town Hall, Highlighting Local Civil Rights History

Glastonbury Life, A Wall Mural Come to Life

Scott Gac is a Professor and Director of American Studies at Trinity College and a Stowe Center Board of Trustees member

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Isabella Beecher Hooker

Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker (1822-1907)
An ardent member of the woman’s suffrage movement, Isabella Holmes Beecher Hooker joined in the cause along with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony.

Isabella was the first child of Lyman Beecher and his second wife, Harriet Porter Beecher.

Isabella began her education at Catharine Beecher’s Hartford Female Seminary and lived with her sister Mary Perkins. In 1841 she married John Hooker, a descendant of Thomas Hooker, the founder of Hartford. John Hooker was a lawyer and an abolitionist.

In the early 1860s Isabella got involved in the woman’s suffrage movement. Isabella joined Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony as a member of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in 1869. She was a founding member of the Connecticut Woman’s Suffrage Association. Isabella’s ideas of equality were influenced by John Stuart Mills’ On Liberty and the Subjection of Women.

In 1871, Isabella organized the annual convention of the National Woman’s Suffrage Association in Washington D.C. and presented her argument before the Committee on the Judiciary of the United States Senate. Her husband, John Hooker, believed in his wife and supported her activities. He helped Isabella draft a bill to the Connecticut Legislature giving married women the same property rights as their husbands. The bill passed in 1877. Isabella annually submitted a bill granting women the right to vote, but it did not pass in her lifetime.