BRIDGEPORT, Conn., city, port of entry and county-seat of Fairfield County, on Long Island Sound. and on the New York, New Haven and Hartford Railroad, 54 miles north east from New York city, 17 miles southwest from New Haven. It is the second city in the State in population. The city and town are coterminous, about 15 square miles in area.
Bridgeport harbor is the estuary of a small river, the Pequonnock, and a tidal inlet, called Yellow Mill Pond, with a peninsula between. The lower part of the harbor is about a mile wide and extends about a mile to the Sound. The two arms of the harbor divide the city into three parts; the main city and chief business centre lies west of the harbor; the section called East Bridgeport with a secondary business street occupies the peninsula; and Sturunerfield and Newfield sections lie east of the harbor.
Rising from the plain along the Sound are three elevated districts; the nearest, Golden Hill, one of the oldest and finest residential sections, farther back are Old Mill Hill to the northeast and North Bridgeport to the north, both commanding fine views of the Sound. Bridgeport is called Gtyu from its numerous breathing places. The principal parks are Seaside, Beardsley, Washington and Pembroke. Seaside Park contains about 75 acres with a two mile boulevard along the Sound protected by a strong sea-wall. Here are the Soldier's and Sailor's monument and monuments to Elias Howe and Phineas T. Barnum, the sewing machine of the one and the business enterprise of the other having been largely instrumental in the development of the city. Beardsley Park is in the northeastern part of the city and contains about 150 acres, to which river and lakeside, woods and hills give the charm of nature. Washington Park, about four acres, lies in the centre of the east side. Pembroke Park is a long broad green, an expansion of the Old King's highway from New York to Boston. The finest cemetery is Mountain Grove, about 75 acres, near the west ern boundary. The finest residence sections are Golden Hill, central, Fairfield avenue, the main thoroughfare to the west, Seaside park vicinity in the south, Brooklawn (new) and Clinton avenue in the northwest, Seaview avenue along the Sound in the southeast, and Mill Hill and North Main street with their splendid views. The most notable buildings are the government building, with the post office and custom house; the Barnum Memorial Institute, bequeathed to the Historical Society and the Scientific Society in common; The Young Men's Christian Association the Bur roughs Library, the Burroughs flothe for Women, the Sterling Widows' Home, the Protestant Orphan Asylum and the Bridgeport and Saint Vincent's Hospitals, and a new high school. The public school system has a high school and 25 grammar school buildings. There are about a dozen private and parochial schools. In 1912 the public schools enrolled 15,733 pupils and employed 375 instructors. A free public library established in 1881 now con tains about 60,000 volumes. The religious life
of the city centres around some 90 churches. The leading denominations are Roman Catholic, Congregational, Protestant Episcopal, Methodist Episcopal, Baptist, Lutheran and Presbyterian. There are many social clubs and secret societies. Chief among the clubs are The Seaside, The Algonquin, The Brook lawn Country Club, The University, The Bridgeport Yacht Club. The oldest Masonic lodge, Saint John's, dates from 1762.
Industries, Bridgeport is the leading manufacturing city of Connecticut, standing first in the value of products and in the num ber of employees. It is called the Capital.° The manufactured products are in great variety, the diversity is shown by the fact that the Board of Trade has found it literally impossible to make a list of them. New ones are being invented constantly and at least 15,000 articles which may properly be called different have already been counted. Principal among its manufactured articles are cartridges and shells, corsets, sewing machines, heavy ordnance, brass goods, electrical ap paratus, silver-plated ware, automobiles, tor pedo boats, bicycles, gas and gasoline motors, graphophones, typewriters, machine tools, boilers, cutlery, compressed gas capsules, hats, taps and dies and hardware. Among the largest manufacturing establishments are the Remington Arms and Ammunition Company, whose plant has a combined floor area of 1,104,200 square feet, and employs 16,000 men, Singer Sewing Machine Company (Wheeler & Wilson) with 10 acres of works, Warner Brothers Corset Company, Crane Valve, Amer ican Tube and Stamping, Holmes and Edwards Silver-plating, Amencan Graphophone, Union Typewriter Company, Bridgeport Brass Com pany and the Lake Torpedo Boat Company. The Union Metallic Cartridge Company has an ammunition park of '425 acres here. At the end of 1914 there were in operation 403 estab lishments capitalized at $81,482,000. These establishments employed 34,586 persons, paid $23,206,000 in salaries and wages and used materials to the value of $44,730,000 which were turned into finished products with a value of $85,123,000. In 1916 the payroll was esti mated at $1,200,000 a week, or $62,000,000 for the year. In 1915 new buildings to the value of $9,181,419 were erected, equipped for works of peace as well as for the production of munitions, the demand for which during the European War increased the population of Bridgeport by 50 per cent. The city by its loca tion has excellent transportation facilities. The railroad trackage is ample. A new station has recently been built and the tracks elevated through the city at a cost of over $3,000,000. The harbor admits quite large vessels. There are daily steamers to New York and across the Sound to Port Jefferson, L. I. and much coasting business. The river, creeks and harbor arms are spanned by a half dozen large bridges. Electric railway service is thoroughly de veloped, continuous lines running to New York N and to New Haven, and thence to Boston.