A judge in 17th century Connecticut ruled on the thorniest of problems. Some of these included ruling on a piglet’s paternity, who was to blame for faulty shoes, and whether illicit sex had occurred on a boat sailing to Stamford.
While most of the rulings wouldn’t stand up in today’s court, our earliest settlers struggled to decide a fair price to pay under a harsh system. Connecticut Superior Court Judge Jon Blue shares some of the liveliest tales from our past, vividly described by court reporters not bound by modern day legalese.
But first, as the country debates the merits of the most recent Iran nuclear deal and migrants flood into Europe from Syria and Africa, Ted Danforth reminds us that the seemingly "arbitrary events of history are the result of geopolitical dynamics that go back to the beginning of recorded time." What happens today is directly related to patterns that repeat.
Ted Danforth will speak at the Stonington Village Improvement Association on Sunday, October 11. You can contact them for more details.
GUESTS:
- Ted Danforth - Letterpress printer, historian, and author of The Eastern Question: A Geopolitical History in 108 Maps and Drawings
- Jon Blue - Judge of the Connecticut Superior Court and the author of The Case of the Piglet’s Paternity: Trials from the New Haven Colony, 1639-1663
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John Dankosky and Chion Wolf contributed to this show.
