Editing Bridgewater, Connecticut (section)

==Education==
[[Regional School District 12]] is the area school district. Residents are served by REACH Preschool in [[Washington, Connecticut|Washington]], Burnham Elementary School in Bridgewater, and [[Shepaug Valley School]] (secondary school) in Washington.<ref>"[http://www.bridgewatertownhall.org/Pages/BridgewaterCT_Webdocs/burnham-schools Schools]." Town of Bridgewater. Retrieved on January 19, 2017.</ref>

===The Burnham Library===

[[File:William Dixon Burnham 001.jpg|thumb|160px|William Dixon Burnham {{circa|1919}}]]
[[File:Burnham Library 030.JPG|thumb|The Burnham Library, May 11, 2012]]
In 1904, the Bridgewater Library Association was established, succeeding previous lending libraries operated by individuals in town. In 1909 room for library purposes was set aside in recently built town hall. A bequest from William Dixon Burnham, a native who made his fortune in shipping, allowed a Greek Revival style building to be erected from 1925 to 1926, using Mine Hill granite from nearby Roxbury.  The dedication took place on August 26, 1926.<ref name="history">{{cite web|last=Bernstein|first=Jane
|url=http://burnhamlibrary.org/about/history/|title=Burnham Library » History|access-date=May 21, 2012}}</ref>

By the early 1960s, the library's two floors were finally becoming cramped. With the death of town resident [[Van Wyck Brooks]], a biographer and critic, a "Van Wyck Brooks Memorial Fund was set up to raise money for a library wing in his name. The effort, however, flopped, despite support from such celebrities as [[Pearl Buck]] and [[Archibald MacLeish]]. Just enough money was raised for a bust of the author and a display of some of his memorabilia. His desk, books, and other items can be found on display in the library's biography section. The fund-raising committee disbanded in 1972, but a year later, a surprising source of funding became known.<ref name=history/>

Charles E. Piggott, a hermit, misanthrope, and miser living in a Los Angeles slum, died in 1973.  As a bulldozer operator razed the shack that had been Piggott's home, the operator happened to notice something shiny. It was a bottle with Piggott's holographic will inside.<ref name=history/>

Despite apparently having no discernible connection with Bridgewater, Piggott left the fund $300,000—money from careful investments over the years. The state of California contested the will and the library hired a lawyer, at considerable cost, to defend the bequest. Eventually, the lawyer won the case and the library got $210,000.<ref name=history/>

By 1980, the Van Wyck Brooks Memorial Wing was dedicated, doubling the size of the library.<ref name=history/>

Burton Bernstein, a longtime town resident, looked into why Piggott would leave money to the library, then wrote an article on the bequest, which appeared in the December 18, 1978, issue of ''[[The New Yorker]]''. Piggott, as it turned out, had been a voracious reader on any number of subjects and loved public libraries (which are, after all, free). Bernstein believes that Piggott came across Van Wyck Brooks' ''The Flowering of New England'', which describes the hermit [[Henry David Thoreau]]. Piggott may have compared himself to Thoreau, or saw wisdom in some of Thoreau's ideas as presented by Brooks. Perhaps this quote stuck in his mind: "The mass of men led lives of quiet desperation... Did they not know that the wisest had always lived, with respect to comforts and luxuries, a life more simple and meager than the poor?... Poverty had given him all this wealth."<ref name=history/>

Piggott heard of the Van Wyck Brooks Memorial Fund, recognized the name, and, Bernstein believes, decided to contribute.<ref name=history/>