We have a BIG milestone right around the corner for our Club, and we hope you’re excited to celebrate with us! Join us at the Mark Twain House on Tuesday, April 8 from 6-8 PM for our 140th Anniversary Celebration!
We’ll be celebrating with complimentary food and a cash bar. 🥳🥂 We’ll also have photos and memorabilia from throughout our past which will be on display during the evening at the Mark Twain House, a venue purposefully chosen given how closely Samuel Clemens engaged with our Club in our earliest years (read on to find out more about our Club’s connection with the author!). And for anyone curious to find out more about the stories, achievements, and anecdotes that have dotted our rich past, a few of us will be happy to share more if asked!
Simply put: come join us for a drink and a quick bite after work on April 8th, and be part of celebrating our Club’s vibrant 140 year history as we look ahead to what’s next!
Hope to see you there on April 8th!
You are invited to the
Yale Club and Scholarship
Foundation of Hartford
140th Anniversary Celebration
at the
Mark Twain House
351 Farmington Avenue, Hartford
Tuesday, April 8
7:00 - 8:00 PM
Founding of the Yale Club of Hartford
Almost 140 years ago ‒ in 1885, just one day after April 8th ‒ what was then still called The Hartford Daily Courant published an article about “The Yale Alumni,” reporting there was a “A Very Large Meeting Last Night ‒ An Association Formed.” Those of our alumni who joined that evening shared their vision for an organization they believed would become “a good thing for Hartford and for Yale.” After adopting a Constitution at the very first meeting, our Club got started!
Our history is richer and more intertwined with those of Yale and Connecticut than is often realized! In the 1920s, our Club committed itself to helping Yale invest in its early science and engineering programs. In the 1930s, our Club helped Yale raise significant funds to offset the effects of the depression. In the decades both before and after World War II, our Club would frequently host concerts with the Yale Glee Club and Whiffenpoofs at the Bushnell and elsewhere to help fund much needed scholarships for deserving Yale students from Connecticut in a largely pre-financial-aid world. And very early on, Mark Twain / Samuel Clemens often sought out our Club as a place to engage with others around his ideas and writing, and spoke to our Club on several occasions. Ourr events have featured more than ten of Connecticut’s Governors and Lieutenant Governors ‒ many of them Club members themselves ‒ and most Yale Presidents inaugurated since our Club was founded in 1885 have joined our events.
We hope you’ll join us on April 8th as we celebrate our Club’s rich history!
The Hartford Daily Courant Story of When it All Began
April 1885 | A full-text, larger-font, easy-to-read copy of the below is linked here