Editing Weathersfield, Vermont (section)

==History==
The town of Weathersfield was named after [[Wethersfield, Connecticut]], the home of some of its earliest settlers.<ref>{{cite web|url= http://www.epodunk.com/cgi-bin/genInfo.php?locIndex=65273|title=Profile for Weathersfield, Vermont, VT
|publisher =ePodunk.|access-date= May 12, 2014}}</ref> The Connecticut town had taken its name from Wethersfield, a village in the [[England|English]] county of [[Essex]]. 

[[William Jarvis (merchant)|William Jarvis]] was appointed by President [[Thomas Jefferson]] as U.S. Consul General to [[Portugal]] after founding a trading house in [[Lisbon]].<ref>William Jarvis Papers, 1793-1845</ref> In 1811, Jarvis imported the first Merino sheep to America from Spain to his farm at Weathersfield Bow.<ref>[http://www.weathersfield.org/pages/history.htm William Jarvis, Weatherfield history, Town of Weathersfield, Vermont]</ref> Jarvis set aside eight of the 4,000 Merino sheep he imported as gifts to former President Jefferson and to President [[James Madison]].<ref>[http://www.monticello.org/reports/interests/sheep.html Monticello Report: Sheep for the President, monticello.org]</ref>

"I cannot forbear, Sir," Jarvis wrote to Jefferson, "making you an offer of a Ram & Ewes, both as a mark of my great esteem & well knowing that the experiment cannot be in better hands."<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=NlRgvqWHc8oC&dq=%22william+jarvis%22+sheep&pg=RA1-PA125 U.S. Consul William Jarvis to Pres. Thomas Jefferson, Lisbon, Jan. 20, 1810, Thomas Jefferson's Farm Book, by Thomas Jefferson, ed. by Edwin Morris Betts, University of North Carolina Press, 2002]</ref> Jarvis was a wealthy financier and gentleman farmer who had bought up most of the floodplain of Weathersfield. He was also one of the most prominent [[Republican Party (United States)|Republicans]] in the [[Connecticut River Valley]]. Thanks to his introduction of Merino sheep, he provided the underpinning for Vermont agriculture for the next century.<ref>[http://vermonthistory.org/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id=298 William Jarvis's Merino Sheep, Vermont Historical Society]</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=PsMJAAAAIAAJ&dq=%22william+jarvis%22+sheep&pg=PA1 ''Our Sheep and the Tariff'', William Draper Lewis, Wharton School of Finance, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 1890]</ref><ref>[http://www.groton.org/home/news_item.asp?id=375&pointID=701&zzSec=chapel Stone Walls and the Joys of Scholarly Connections, January 5, 2007, Dr. Ross, Groton School, groton.org]</ref>

Jarvis married his maternal first cousin, Mary Pepperell Sparhawk of Boston, a fellow descendant of [[Sir William Pepperrell]] of Massachusetts.<ref>[http://www.vermonthistory.org/arccat/findaid/jarvis.htm#bio William Jarvis Papers, Vermont Historical Society Library]</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=RGsFAAAAQAAJ&dq=%22the+life+and+times+of+hon+william+jarvis%22&pg=PA489 "The Life and Times of Hon. William Jarvis", ''The New England Historical and Genealogical Register'', John Albion, 1869]</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=KR8aAAAAIAAJ&dq=%22william+jarvis%22+weathersfield&pg=RA1-PA511 ''The Wentworth Genealogy: English and American'', John Wentworth LL.D., Little, Brown and Company, Boston, 1878]</ref> Katherine L. Jarvis, daughter of Hon. William Jarvis, married [[Harvard]]-educated lawyer and photographer Col. [[Leavitt Hunt]], brother of architect [[Richard Morris Hunt]] and Boston painter [[William Morris Hunt]], and son of Vermont congressman [[Jonathan Hunt (Vermont Representative)|Jonathan Hunt]]. Leavitt Hunt and his wife later lived in Weathersfield at their home, ''Elmsholme''.<ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=Sg0MAAAAYAAJ&dq=%22katherine+jarvis%22+hunt&pg=PA181 Social Register, New York, Social Register Association, 1896]</ref><ref>[https://books.google.com/books?id=8dUHTfULq2QC&dq=%22katherine+jarvis%22+hunt&pg=PA729 ''Annals of Brattleboro, 1681&ndash;1895'', Mary Rogers Cabot, 1922]</ref>

Rev. John Dudley, a sometime missionary to the [[Choctaw]] Indians, a graduate of [[Yale University|Yale Seminary]], the descendant of one of the earliest families of [[Connecticut]] (his ancestor William Dudley settled in [[Guilford, Connecticut|Guilford]] in the early 17th century) and a widely reprinted [[Congregational]] preacher, made his home in Weathersfield, where his son [[William Wade Dudley]] was born.{{Citation needed|date=June 2010}}

On August 20, 2011, Weathersfield celebrated the 250th anniversary of its town charter.{{citation needed|date=November 2023}}

===Romaine Tenney===
In September 1964, a Weathersfield bachelor farmer named Romaine Tenney burned himself and his farm rather than allow construction of [[Interstate 91]] which was then proceeding through the [[Connecticut Valley]]. The state transportation agency had offered landowners compensation, but could also seize land by [[eminent domain]].  Many landowners resisted, including one who shot a hole through a surveyor’s hard hat. Tenney happened to be the last local holdout. Finally, he was given an ultimatum to leave. That night a fire ravaged the barn, sheds, and farmhouse.  Although Tenney’s body was not identified, it was evident he had nailed his bedroom door shut from the inside. The day after his memorial service, construction on the highway resumed. Tenney was memorialized as the subject of poems, ghost stories, and songs. Tenney’s legacy has become a source of pride for some, despite its horror. It is a display of New England "flint", a story preserved by the Weathersfield Historical Society. The farm eventually became a [[park and ride]] at Exit 8 ([[Vermont Route 131]]), where commuters could park their cars and board buses. In March 2020, the last vestige of the farm, a dying [[rock maple]] tree was removed. The [[Vermont Agency of Transportation]] acknowledged the site’s significance as the Romaine Tenney Memorial Park with a lawn, pavilion, memorial plaque, and picnic table.<ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/27/us/vermont-farmer-tree.html |title=Goodbye to a Yankee Farmer, the Ghost of Exit 8 |first=Ellen |last=Barry |work=[[The New York Times]] |date=May 27, 2021 |accessdate=May 30, 2021}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://newengland.com/yankee-magazine/living/new-england-environment/eminent-domain-romaine-tenney-farm/ |first=Howard |last=Mansfield |title=I Will Not Leave: Romaine Tenney Loved His Vermont Farm To Death |work=[[Yankee (magazine)|Yankee]] |date=March–April 2013 |accessdate=May 30, 2021}}</ref>