Brain rattled by this thread about forgotten towns.
I lived in the Bridgeport, CT area around 2000-2005 and I vaguely recall reading several articles in the various local papers about artifacts being found along the shoreline of Westport and Fairfield. Eventually they were attributed to a forgotten small island in the Sound that had been blown away, dirt and all, by a hurricane or Nor’easter sometime between 1900 and the wind-up to WWII. The island was some kind of get-away spot for the gold coast residents.
It is entirely possible I’ve gotten any or all the details wrong. Anyone have any idea what this was about?
I think the NYC Hurricane of 1938 is what you want to research. Second, considering the geography and the types of islands (nothing but little spits of sand…aka ‘sand bars’), I would consider it pretty darn normal for a big, well aimed storm to cut little islands in half or uplift and move everything off the island. Especially ones in a sound, and ones that are acting as barriers.
Along the east and northeast coastline are barrier islands and the soil is alluvial – it just gets tossed around slowly each year and a big storm will speed it up. These islands are merley sandbars. They are not anchored to the earth. They are piles of sand.
Research the NYC Hurricane of 1938 (before naming conventions) and you will read up on several islands that we cut in half, breach, possible wiped of all structures and even one spot where a beautiful natural inlet/canal was formed.
(I am popping in to note that these barrier islands – alluvial formations…these glorified sandbars – are home to millions of residents and many millions of tourists and visitors each year. Some have thousands of homes and structures…and they are blocks or miles long, and are nothing more than piles of sand that get washed around every year. A big storm just throws the whole thing around, much as if you built a sand pile or sand castle along the edge of the water and waited for the tide to come in. That is how these islands sit)
I recall reading about this island, in YANKEE magazine-it was called “Poverty Island”, and it was home to fishermen and people who had no means of paying rent-they lived in shacks on the island, and dug clams, and fished, to survive. It was destroyed by the 1938 hurricane.
I don’t know of any islands that were inhabited and were completely destroyed by the hurricane. Sections were washed away and anything built on them was blown away. But some remnants of the islands remained.
Well, I’ll be jiggered. I thought it was one of the first things Jerry had done after the big upgrade, though admittedly I hadn’t seen it pop up in Google results until much more recently.