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Noah Webster
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Business New Haven
2/1/1995
By:
Priscilla Searles
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A native of West Hartford, Webster was a descendant on his father's side of one of the original settlers of Hartford and on his mother's side of William Bradford, a founder of the Plymouth colony. Webster came to New Haven a year prior to the outbreak of the Revolutionary War to attend Yale College.
He gained early fame when, having joined a battalion of Yale students, he led an escort to General George Washington, who was on his way in July, 1775, to take command of the Continental Army. With Webster at the head of the column (reportedly playing a fife), the Yale cadets escorted George Washington down College Street to the Neck Bridge at the Mill River. Despite the interruption of his studies to serve in the Continental Army under command of his father, Captain Webster, he graduated from Yale College in 1778.
When Webster returned home after graduation, some say his father gave him $8 in Continental currency and told him to rely on his own exertions in the future. Webster became a teacher and soon realized the need for text books. One of the numerous books he produced was the Elementary Spelling Book. Awarded a copyright by the Continental Congress and backed by Governor Jonathan Trumbull who risked the loss of his property for its publication, this little spelling book sold 41 million copies in various additions and revisions by January of 1862. It was this book that helped to establish a standardization of spelling and pronunciation.
The spelling book would support Webster and his family while he worked on what was to be the great work of his life, the American Dictionary of the English Language. The idea for an American dictionary was born while Webster was studying law. He began to write every word he did not understand. Until Webster's dictionary was published, the only one available was English and had not been improved for decades. Years after Webster's dictionary was published, an English bookseller would claim that the only real English language dictionary was authored by an American.
Webster became a resident of New Haven in 1798 and shortly thereafter moved into Benedict Arnold's former home on East Water Street. Finding it difficult to support his family adequately, in 1812 he moved to Amherst, Massachusetts, remaining there for 10 years working on his dictionary. In 1822 he returned to New Haven and two years later traveled to Europe to perfect his dictionary, consult with literary men and examine some standard works. Webster's first dictionary, a two-volume work, was published in 1828. It had taken Webster 21 years to write. Over the next 12 years Webster published numerous abridgments of various sizes, some prepared by him, others by members of his family. In 1840 he published the Great Unabridged Webster's Dictionary.
Not all of Webster's time was spent writing. An active participant in the community, he served as alderman of New Haven, was a representative to the Connecticut General Assembly and a state court judge and was an active member of the New Haven Chamber of Commerce. Webster was appointed chairman of a committee to build the first aqueduct in New Haven and was one of the first Americans to advocate timber conservation. Long having claimed him as its own, New Haven honored him by naming its first modern school divided into grades after him.
When Webster returned to New Haven, he purchased a house on the corner of Temple and Grove where he remained for the remainder of his life. He died in that house on May 28, 1843 at the age of 85. He is buried in Grove Street Cemetery.
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