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Tales from the Old Economy
Connecticut's ‘no-tech' industries scramble for survival in the 21st century
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Business New Haven
5/14/2001
By: Mimi Houston
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George Washington had a soft spot for Connecticut. With his troops cold and hungry and morale at its lowest ebb, it was John Trumbull, governor of the colony of Connecticut, who sent them wagonloads of supplies. Since then, Connecticut has been called “the Provision State.”
In today's speed-of-light digital society, it's easy to overlook the extent to which we still rely on the traditional industries that are historically significant to the state. Most Nutmeggers are employed designing new computer products and software, or working to find cures for our most lethal diseases at one of our many pharmaceutical or bioscience companies. We're still the insurance capital of the world - with 106 related companies in greater Hartford alone. In fact, insurance originated in the state more than 180 years ago, with the first policies written to cover ships sailing to and from Connecticut's harbors.
But the backbone industries of Connecticut are still alive and carrying on surprisingly similarly to the way they were hundreds of years ago. Manufacturing and agriculture, most prominently, are still a healthy part of Connecticut's economy. In the late 1990s, the last year of available figures from the state's Department of Economic & Community Development, farming, forestry and agricultural services generated $1.85 billion to the state.
“Farming is still a traditional business of Connecticut. We were known as the provision state because we were so agriculturally centered,” says George Hindinger, fourth-generation co-owner (with his sister and
parents) of the 130-acre Hindinger Farms in Hamden. “Even now, we really still are, especially as far as New England goes. We rank No. 1 in many agricultural commodities. Few people today realize it though. As a society, we're now two generations removed from farming.”
According to the Connecticut Farm Bureau, Connecticut is New England's No. 1 producer in aquaculture, mushrooms, peaches and pears, egg-laying poultry and tobacco (those wrappers on your favorite cigar).
Of course, much has changed across Connecticut's landscape since Hindinger's great, great grandfather began the farm in 1893, as many farms, especially dairy, have gone under.
“I wish we were doing better,” acknowledges Hindinger, “but we're more than holding our own in today's economy. Agriculture in general is holding its own with other businesses in Connecticut, but we've really had to change.”
Hindinger says the retail farm-market is saving many generations-old family farms.
“We are retail-based,” he explains, “meaning we've got a farm market on the property open from June to December. The face of agriculture in Connecticut is reflecting this change. You see a lot more pick-your-own farms, as well as some traditional ones.
“Almost every town in Connecticut has its place to go for fresh-picked fruits and vegetables,” says Hindinger, “from markets located on farms to the guy who pulls his cart out in front of his house to sell whatever is growing in the backyard.
“This is because it's much harder to see any kind of profit selling wholesale nowadays. We're competing with farmers all over the Northeast, the entire U.S. and, because of modern transportation, the world. We're truly in a global marketplace.”
Keith Bishop, great-great grandson of Walter Goodrich Bishop, founder of Bishop's Orchards in Guilford, agrees. Today Bishop is managing partner, along with his cousin Jonathan, of the farm and orchard. The pair run the farm along with their semi-retired fathers. Keith's sister is the farm market's bakery manager, and his wife does the company's payroll and works as head cashier.
“Three out of four family wives help out seasonally,” explains Bishop, “when our employment needs double. Off-season we employ 50 or so people. During the peak season, we're up to around 100. Most of these additional employees are needed for retail help.”
“What we grow we sell in our farm market,” he says. “In wholesale, the pricing of fruits and vegetables fluctuates like the stock market, and growers have no control over this.”
“We're doing well,” Bishop continues. “We're slow and sure, in terms of growth. We've become a viable destination for a year-round clientele.”
The 320-acre farm houses a bakery renowned for its apple pies, and unlike its smaller cousin in Hamden, carries produce throughout the winter.
“We change and mix the products we handle, to supply our needs but also to support other growers around us,” Bishop says. “For example, we sell bedding plants now, but we're not a garden center and we are not competing with them.
“We're trying to grow comfortably, to seek out new areas within our realm. Our goal is to manage the family business, but still have fun doing it. Our goal is to maintain this as a family business. We want to investigate other areas of farming, but we never want to rely on the expertise of someone outside the family.”
Bishop's has been a family business since 1871, and the Bishop family were among the original founders of Guilford.
“My great-great grandfather began by cutting ice off ponds, storing it in special ice barns, and selling it all over town,” Bishop says. “The farm - a dairy, originally - grew as other area farms closed down. In the teens [1911-20], the first apple trees were planted. The end of the 1930s saw the end of the dairy, and by the 1950s the orchards expanded.”
Both farms depend on technology of today for survival in the modern world. From weather and disease tracking to bookkeeping to contacting their customer base by e-mail with weekly specials, newsletters and farm events, the look of this traditional business has changed.
Technology has changed the look of manufacturing, another of Connecticut's mainstay industries, as well. With more and more automated assembly, along with the closing of many of the state's major customers, surviving in this branch of the economy has become a perilous prospect. But some companies have found the secret of survival.
“There really is not any reason why a manufacturing company in Connecticut cannot thrive today,” says Barbara Horton Rockwell, owner of Horton Brasses Inc. in Cromwell. “I don't subscribe to the theory that you have to have workers with low-wages and no benefits.
“We are surviving and thriving,” she continues. “Business is growing at about 15 percent a year since I took over nine years ago. We're good at marketing,” Rockwell explains. “We've been on the Internet since 1996.”
A supplier of traditional hardware for fine furniture, Horton Brasses has grown from modest roots.
“My mother, Angeline, was an antiques dealer. My father was a tool-and-die maker for International Silver. When Mom had a piece of furniture she was restoring she would say, 'Frank, I need some hardware,' and my father would go into the basement and make it for her. That's how the business began.”
Horton soon enjoyed a reputation as the area's finest hardware-maker for antique furniture, and a business was born.
From the family basement, the firm moved to Cromwell in the 1940s. As its market expanded, the company began casting and built its own foundry in the 1970s. Today the company is a vital part of the state's $156 million manufacturing branch.
Our customers are mainly private consumers, small furniture shops, antiques dealers, the kitchen-cabinet industry,” explains Rockwell, whose husband Toby works with her, handling company computer operations and running the foundry.
“We're casting, stamping and turning brass to recreate authentic pieces from the 1700s,” says Rockwell. The company sells its hardware worldwide, and relies on the expertise of employees who are skilled artisans, some of whom have been with Horton for more than 30 years.
But although the product is historically authentic, Rockwell says the technology of today has changed the very core of the business.
“We have all the original tooling,” she explains, “we can't ever change that or we won't retain the authenticity of the project. And we are not automated - we're not computer-controlled. But our equipment changes in order to be safe.”
Rockwell is enthusiastic about the future of her business. Her son, Orion, has just joined the family and will carry it into its fourth generation.
“Our motto is to be ethical,” continues Rockwell, “in all parts of life. If you treat everyone with respect, it all comes back to you.”
Thomas Christensen owns the Anderson Tool Co., headquartered on Willow Street in New Haven. His father Harold and business partner Stan Anderson began the company in 1960.
“We have a constant, steady source of employment,” says Christensen. “We've been able to keep our doors open during several slow times when others have started up, grown quickly and closed down.”
Christensen relies on his company's reputation for providing a top-quality product.
“We listen to our customers needs. What we make, we make well, and our customers are happy,” he says.
Among his company's customers are United Technologies Corp., and the two major gun manufacturers in the state, Marlin Arms and the U.S. Repeating Arms Co., as well as legions of smaller companies.
“Things have really slowed down within the past ten or 15 years, though. So many tool-and-die makers have closed down,” says Christensen. “When Pratt & Whitney closed its North Haven location, and Avco Lycoming in Stratford - they made turbine engines - closed, so did dozens and dozens of toolmakers who relied on their business.”
Anderson Tool's secret weapon? Staying small.
“Being small has definitely worked to our advantage,” says Christensen. “We're not getting rich by staying small, but we don't have a lot of overhead, either. We're at a point where a little work goes a long way.
“We also find ways to diversify our product,” he says. “We're definitely not high-tech here, but we do what we have to service the customers we have remaining as best we can, and pick up new customers when we can.”
Still, Christensen is cautiously optimistic about the future, for his company and for traditional manufacturing in general. Still a major factor in the state's economy, manufacturing of industrial machinery grossed $2.4 billion in 1998, according to the latest available figures from DECD.
Workers in another branch of Connecticut's economic heritage - one that stems from the 1700s - are cautiously optimistic as well.
At 6 a.m. most days, Bobby Bloom is already hard at work. From his workstation he enjoys striking panoramic views of Long Island Sound. He's not sitting in a Dilbert-like office cubicle, though. He's manning one of his company's 22 oyster boats as a sea farmer. He also spends many days in the firm's New Haven office, taking care of the landlocked side of things, while his cousin Hillard is out at sea every day, cultivating the company's precious resources.
Oysters were once a dietary staple of coastal Native and pre-Revolutionary Americans. They are so much a part of the state's history that they have been officially declared the state shellfish.
“We have beds in Norwalk, Bridgeport and New Haven,” says Bloom, whose father began the company with his twin brother. “We're out at 6 a.m. and back in at around 4 p.m. Then we package and ship out the same day.”
The boats go out six days a week year round. Workers seed the beds, spread clean shells when oysters are spawning, and move young oysters to various locations depending upon their specific growth needs. The company owns beds in Connecticut and New Jersey, in the Delaware Bay.
Tallmadge Brothers, a 100-year-old Connecticut business, is the largest oyster fishery in the Northeast, and the second largest in the country, begun by the Bloom twins, Norman and Hillard. Back in 1995 Connecticut produced somewhere between $40 million and $60 million worth of the shellfish, much of that right off the Tallmadge Brothers boats.
“It's a farming industry,” explains Leslie Miklovich, Bloom's cousin and daughter of Hillard Bloom, who with her sister runs the Tallmadge office. “It's very cyclical, very dependent on Mother Nature.”
Dependent, that is, for good and for bad. Tallmadge Brothers has weathered some hard times in recent years, due to some quirks in Connecticut weather.
“Ninety percent of our oysters died in the late 1990s,” says Miklovich. “A warm-water parasite called MSX slowly made its way up the coast, and because of some milder winters, it was able to survive up here in Connecticut.”
Survive, that is, to wreak havoc. Also a leading harvester of Atlantic hard clams, Tallmadge has had to rely almost solely on its clamming keep its doors open since the late '90s.
“Clamming is a different business,” explains Miklovich. “You don't farm them at all; you just find them. Then you have to dredge them up. We've reseeded our oyster beds, though, and we've had a couple of good, cold New England winters. Things are looking like we'll be back on track within the next few years in terms of oyster production.”
Paul Maugle, director of aquaculture for the Mohegan Tribal Nation at Fort Shantok, is hopeful of better oystering conditions in his part of Long Island as well. After years of being in the planning stages, oyster farming is now becoming a reality for the tribe.
“The Mohegans have their roots in the Sound,” says Maugle. “The tribe identifies itself as a water people. Archeological records show evidence - whale bones, shark jaws, shellfish remains - for the tribe, it means going back to their beginnings.”
Maugle says he plans to grow oysters a bit differently than traditional Connecticut aquafarmers traditionally have by suspending the beds in nets off lines that lie eight feet below the surface of the water.
“Grown in mid-water,” explains Maugle, “we'll get a rounder, deeper pocket and a more tender oyster. Our goal is to break into the New York market.”
The council will also be farming tulapia, a mild, white-fleshed fish that is compared to filet of sole, in fish barns in and around the seaside reservation property in the Thames River and in sites along the coast of New London.
“The Mohegans are using this as an opportunity to step forward and provide jobs on the water, 360 days a year with good benefits and very decent pay,” says Maugle.
“We're also working hard with our neighbors, and doing all we need to do to address any issues concerning the recreational boating and fishing in the area,” says Peter Schultz, vice chairman of the Mohegan Tribal Council.
“We've been good neighbors since the 1640s, and we plan to be good neighbors in the future too.”
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