#Real life stars hollow tv

The arrival of the train suddenly connected Washington with New York and other regions, and with this came the arrival of wealthy, artistic and community-minded summer residents from Brooklyn and the rise of a local dairy farming industry.

When the Shepaug Rail Road brought the train to Washington in the 1870’s, Factory Hollow became Washington Depot. Early Washington was largely a family-farming community, small mills developed along its streams and rivers, small businesses populated the center of town that was known at that time as “Factory Hollow.” The Congregational Church, the institution that founded the town, sat prominently up on the top of the hill, on the Green, together with The Gunnery, a school begun by Frederick Gunn in the mid 1850’s.

The first Europeans settled in the region in the early 1700’s and named the town Judea. There is archaeological proof that Native Americans lived in the area along the banks of the Shepaug River, over 10,000 years ago. Washington has a rich and multi-layered history. Tell us a little bit about the history of your town and the museum’s role in it. The Gunn Historical Museum, Washington CT Subsequently, our girls have attended the Westover School in Middlebury, CT and The Gunnery School here in Washington. I am American-born, but married a Dutchman, and we lived together in the Netherlands for 25 years where our children were born and spent their earliest years. My husband and I moved to Washington, CT, in 2010, from the Netherlands in order to give our four daughters an American prep-school education. Are you from Washington, CT? If not, what brought you there? How long have you worked at the museum? Meet Louise, pictured here along with Gunn Historical Museum curator Stephen Bartkus (on her left) and Museum Council member Nicholas Solley (on her right) In today’s post we are chatting with Louise Van Tartwijk, museum director at the Gunn Historical Museum in Washington, Connecticut to learn more about the real history of her enchanting small town, the Gilmore Girls impact upon it and what it means to work as a modern day gatekeeper to the past. Throughout all seven seasons of Gilmore Girls, town history has played an active role in the show with storylines that ran the gamut from quirky to sentimental. Luke’s Diner, The Dragonfly Inn, Doosie’s Market, Chilton, the Town Square along with a host of other well-loved landmarks in and around Stars Hollow were all inspired in part on the equally charming real life landscape of rural Litchfield County, Connecticut. Thanks to this 237 year old town with its historic villages, convivial atmosphere and captivating residents, this think-tank weekend laid the foundation for the show’s central cast of characters and the community in which they all circulated. In a stunning stroke of serendipity, Amy saw Washington and then she saw her setting. So she fled to Washington, CT – a place she had never been – for a quiet weekend of major thinking. The script was needed by the network ASAP. All she had was this mother and daughter jumping up and down in her head. She didn’t know who the supporting characters were or the dynamics of these two feminine lifestyles. She didn’t know where it took place and at what time period. She had no formal flushed out material for this snippet of a show idea. We’ll take that one, ” said the network (in a simplified nutshell). “There is this single mother and her daughter who act more like best friends than parent and child.” The network passed on the first four – but in a last ditch effort to end the meeting on some sort of satisfactory and productive note, Amy threw out a vague concept about a show she was still muddling about in her mind.

#Real life stars hollow tv

She had just pitched five television show concepts to a major tv network all during one meeting. That’s the spot where show creator Amy Sherman-Palladino spent a magical weekend dreaming up the culture, characters and community of all things Gilmore.Īt the time of her visit in the late 1990’s, Amy was in a little bit of a tricky spot. If you are a serious fan of the show Gilmore Girls you already know that the fictional town of Stars Hollow was inspired by the real town of Washington, Connecticut.

View of Town Hall from Hickory HIll Washington, CT