Home Care In West Granby, CT

Joining Industries – an advanced manufacturing enterprise with 30-year-old roots – recently paid $3 million for the East Granby building in which it is located.

“Our businesses are doing very well,” said David Hudson, CEO of Joining Industries. “They are growing. The building has a lot of value, and the seller was ready.”

Hudson said the purchase of the 45,110-square-foot building at 17 Connecticut South Drive gives his company greater ability to make improvements on its schedule.

JTI Realty LLC. -- created by Joining Industries – bought the 45,110-square-foot, metal-sided building from GSL Newgate One LLC, in a deal logged by the town on April 7.

The 1987-vintage building sits on 5.7 acres. It had once housed Advanced Vacuum Resources, a company headed by GSL Newgate One principal Gary James Lachapelle, of West Granby.

Hudson said the building had about seven tenants when Joining Technologies moved in 20 years ago. Jointing Technologies leased additional space as other tenants moved out over time. Today, the building hosts Joining Technologies and JT Automation LLC and their parent company, Joining Industries. A daycare also leases about 14% of the building.

Hudson said his company is happy to continue hosting the daycare.

Michael Francoeur, chairman of Joining Industries’ board of directors, launched the business in 1992, opening Cheshire-based Energy Beam Labs Inc., a provider of electron beam welding services. Over the following decade, the company expanded into laser welding and relocated to East Granby, changing its name to Joining Technologies.

Today, the company specializes in laser and electron-beam welding, making components for medical, aerospace, automotive, semiconductor and other industries.

Joining Technologies Automation LLC was formed in 2016 to build automated work cells for larger equipment manufacturers like Raytheon Technologies and Honeywell, allowing them to bring laser welding, laser cladding and other processes in-house, Hudson said.

Joining Technologies’ laser cladding department was spun off into American Cladding Technologies Inc. in 2017. Today, it operates out of about 26,000 square feet of leased space at 15 International Drive in East Granby. The company uses lasers to apply metal coatings to metal parts, making them more durable and corrosion resistant.

Joining Industries launched in 2017 to serve as a parent company binding Joining Technologies, Joining Technologies Automation and American Cladding Technologies.

Energy Beam Labs got its start in 1992 with six employees. Today, Joining Industries and its subsidiaries employ just over 100, and is growing.

“We will probably be looking for another building in the next couple of years,” Hudson said.

This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Politics & Government

The Tough Life of Mountain Farmers in the 18th and 19th Centuries

Neighbor

|Updated Sun, Jun 26, 2011 at 1:10 pm ET

Go west young man! In the 18th century, in the town of Granby, that meant settling on Popatunuck Mountain or Poppetunuck, as the early Algonkians called it. This rugged country was, for the early Salmon Brook settlers, the western edge of civilization and bounded by what they referred to as “the wilderness."

The “mountain” is the area bounded roughly by the Moosehorn Brook on the west; the Salmon Brook (west branch) on the south; the Mountain Brook on the east and the Ring Brook to the north.

In the 1700s there were just two roads that traversed over Popatunuck, but the only one still in use today is Silkey Road. The other street was Messenger Road, named for the family that farmed much of the property up there but subsequently saw the road abandoned by the town of Granby in the late 1800s.

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The one crop that did thrive however in this rocky terrain was the apple. Apples were an amazing product to the early American. They ate them fresh, but also found they could store some varieties most of the winter. Apples could be dried, made into apple butter, made into pies, squeezed into a cider beverage but also, to the horror of the local minister, it could be distilled into the very potent (and tempting) cider brandy.

Getting their products to market was not easy because the road we know today as "Old" Messenger Road was really not a road at all. Early on, the town selectman refused to survey and make the roadway an official town road primarily because of the great time and expense it would take to maintain. So the Messengers had to keep it up themselves and count on the good will of the owners of adjoining parcels to do the same. It was over a mile in any direction to a "town” road and they regularly traveled: east down Creamery Hill Road to the meetinghouse, south to the mills and north to the new that were beginning to appear in the late 18th century.

By the time the third generation came along, there were four families raising children and trying to carve out a living on Popatunuck Mountain. The going was getting rougher and rougher traveling down their little street as more clearing brought torrents of water down the mountain that continually washed out their old road.

But things were improving in other ways as more and more farmers populated the western hills of Granby. Town elections allowed the Messengers and other hill farmers the power to win election to town government, including one for a position that was considered minor and burdensome: Surveyor of Highways. For the Messengers, this office turned out to be the key to their survival.

When the state assembly passed a law that required all taxpayers to work on their town's roads and bridges based on the value of their property, this afforded Daniel Messenger, the new "surveyor of highways," the opportunity to recruit townspeople to work on roads that needed the most work. It never occurred to the men working on Daniel's road to ask if the road was an "official" town road and so for decades the Messengers were able to keep their roadbed passable and in good repair.

However, things never stay the same for long and as the 19th century moved forward, the temperance movement and the refinement of the character of the Granby citizen began to take hold. For the Messengers, their best cash crop, cider brandy, became less popular and much less socially acceptable. At the same time the center of Granby started to be refreshed, upgraded and became a progressive and fashionable place to live.

The fourth generation of Messengers was getting tired of trying to herd their few cows and sheep, logging, hunting, fishing and distilling cider on the rugged Popatunuck Mountain. In the 1890s, when property values in the ”valley” became more affordable, they left their old homes on the mountain and took the opportunity to buy good “brook” land, located on real town roads, which for them and for their families seemed the best thing to do.

In 1899, the town officially abandoned their “non-road” completely which left the remaining Messenger Road residents with no choice but to abandon their old homes. Still they continued to harvest timber for lumber and produced charcoal for the brick kilns of Granby.

Many members of the Messenger family stayed active in town government and the Granby DPW well beyond the middle of the 20th century.

Although a 21st century court judgment deemed many of the Old Messenger Road parcels “build-able," the cost of getting electric power and a good road up the Popatunuck continues to bedevil all who consider building in this location even to this day.

Today much of the Popatunuck property is in open space and is either owned by the town or the Granby Land Trust. These parcels feature amazing water falls and cliffs of pure stone. Large parcels include additions like The Schlict Preserve and the most recent acquisition, The Garmany Preserve.

Hiking this "ghostly" old trace of road today, with its abandoned cellar holes and stone walls that disappear into the thick forest, makes one wonder why anyone would choose to farm land that is so filled with boulders, drenched with surface water and isolated in these remote Popatunuck hills.

Thanks to Mark Williams for the inspiration and research for this story.

A brief history of West Granby's esteemed farmstead, to be continued next week.

Neighbor

|Updated Mon, Apr 4, 2011 at 10:58 am ET

According to Holcomb tradition, the family first settled in Salmon Brook in 1677. The Holcomb name and the family's land continue to define the rural character of West Granby today.

Nathaniel Holcomb was born in the Poquonock section of Windsor in 1648, less than 30 years after the Pilgrims arrived at Plymouth. The Holcomb’s fortunes rose and fell, as did all who pioneered the settlement of the Granbys. In 1871 Samuel Holcomb inherited the farm at the foot of Broad Hill on Simsbury Road in West Granby from his father, Nahum Holcomb, when he was just 16 years old.

The young Holcomb inherited an orchard, cider mill, tobacco fields and a small herd of cattle. He was also presented with debts totaling over $15,000 and never received the $600 fortune that was bequeathed to him.

Somehow this teenage farmer was able to make his payments and pull through. In 1882 he married Lizzie Dewey and in 1886 and 1888 their children Tudor and Laura were born.

Samuel managed to build a successful dairy business on the land he inherited. During cider season he was shipping 1,750 gallons to New Haven via the Granby Depot each day.

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The family attended the Methodist Church in West Granby center and their children attended the one-room school on the corner of Firetown and Simsbury Road, just south of the farm. Laura was quite studious, but Tudor, by his own admission, had a permanent seat in the corner.

In spite of growing the dairy and cider businesses, in 1887 the State of Connecticut, the benevolent mortgage holder in its day, was forced to begin foreclosure proceedings. In addition, town real estate taxes had gone unpaid and it was no longer a question of if but who would show up with papers in hand to evict the family from their home. Lizzie even took the children to a neighbor’s house.

It could have been just a fortunate development, or the shrewd, sophisticated strategy of a New England Yankee farmer, but good fortune found Holcomb. When two separate entities had claim to the farm, time was needed to sort out who had first right to the foreclosure proceeds. This gave Samuel time to work out a deal with a distant relative from Granville, MA, who helped bring him current on his debts.

Nathaniel was later able to refinance the property with a successful local blacksmith and cabinetmaker, Lucius Huggins. Huggins was a benefactor to many of his neighbors and made it a practice to invest in people whom he knew and trusted. He was patient and allowed a missed payment now and then. Additionally, small bequests from various relatives helped Samuel and Lizzie keep up with their mortgage payments and raise their children.

In early 1900s, Tudor spent a few years at Mount Hermon School in northern Massachusetts, a semester at a business school in Hartford, and took a short course at Amherst Agricultural College. He never graduated and later said, “You can’t learn everything in college”.

Nevertheless, he learned enough to know that the recovery of farm prices in the early 20th century would not last forever. He recognized that his parents, in spite of their success, were not running a business that would survive in the long run. No one was keeping books, new agricultural techniques were being ignored, and the farm was, with the threat of prohibition looming, dependent on the cider revenues. He saw waste and inefficiency everywhere. So this young man, along with his sister Laura, returned to Granby to help his family run the farm.

Soon, Holcomb became one of the most prosperous farmers in town. Later in his life, Holcomb would donate much of his wealth to the Town of Granby and the .

Today, Holcomb Farm is one of the core organizations in the town of Granby. It attracts children and families from throughout the region. What is the Holcomb Farm and how did it become what it is today? Please return to Patch next weekend for the remarkable story of how these two siblings helped bring us the venerable place that we know and love today.

Most information in today's story comes from Mark Williams' wonderful book, A Tempest In A Small Town.

This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Community Corner

A West Granby couple shares their unique love story.

Neighbor

|Updated Mon, Feb 14, 2011 at 5:15 pm ET

For Put and Nannie Brown, the forces of nature couldn’t keep them apart. Here’s their story of how they found love against all odds.

On July 30th 1964, Put Brown was at a party at a beach club in Newport Rhode Island, as a member of the crew of one of the boats competing for the The America’s Cup, when in walked Nannie Wright Talbot.

“I saw this fascinating girl, who was being escorted around by the English crew members” and “I said to myself, I’m going to marry her,” Put admitted. He tried not to obviously stare at her, but he kept his sights on her the whole night.

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One attempt involved Put at the club’s swimming pool, where a crew member told him to wait there by the pool’s edge and he would bring Nannie over and they could finally talk.

As soon as his friend left, Put jumped into the pool and started swimming.

Nannie posed the question “I never thought about it until now, but were you hoping to display your swimming prowess?”

“No, I was just hiding,” Put replied.

Another time, Put saw Nannie confidently walking down the dock towards him with her father and uncle, when he dodged her once again by hiding in the middle of the boat.

“She was too intriguing, too beautiful, I couldn’t talk to her,”Put said.

By the end of the summer, Nannie had only heard about Put, “A sweet boy who didn’t have a girlfriend and was so shy,” she shared.

At that point, the competition was narrowed down to two teams, ironically they were, the English, Sovereign Rose and the American, Constellation team.

The teams had a couple of weeks respite before the competition was to start and Put went to visit his Grandmother in Martha’s Vineyard.

To kick off the competition, there was an old world tradition called the , “English Speaking Union Ball,” where the challenger honored the defender and this Ball would take place when he returned to Newport.

“Out of the blue, I decided to call Nannie while at my Grandmother’s, I asked her if she had a date for the Ball, and she said no, and then I asked her if she would go with me,” Put stated.

“I said yes, I kind of walked into that, but by then I had heard about him, I remember thinking he doesn’t even have a date, what’s wrong with him?” Nannie said.

Nannie was now committed to going to the Ball with Put, much to Bertie’s chagrin. Bertie had assumed that she was going with him, even though he hadn’t officially asked Nannie.

When Put picked up Nannie, they were officially meeting for the first time, he remembers that she wore a black dress with roses on it and was beautiful. And she remembers how handsome he looked in his white dinner jacket.

They pulled up to the Breakers, Vanderbilt Mansion in the Constellation Sail truck that Put had borrowed from the crew. As they came through the portico, they were met by the media. The event was being covered by The Wide World of Sports.

As Put escorted Nannie to the top of the stairs, he said “That was just magnificent, how did you do that so calmly, with all these cameras?”

Put admitted that he never even saw the cameras, he was so excited to be escorting her to the Ball.

Like a boat getting buffeted by the crashing waves, Put was discouraged by the English crew at the Ball to continue his date with Nannie. Bertie eventually stole Nannie away for awhile.

“She was away for 45 minutes and I thought, that was it, she was whisked away by the competitor,” Put explained.

But after the 45 minutes, Nannie returned tearful and Put found out that Bertie had actually proposed to her. She of course said no to him.

Put pointed out that if any one of those questions that he or Bertie asked Nannie, had been answered differently, Put and Nannie may have never been together.

Soon after, The America’s Cup competition was held and the American team won. But Put had won more than that, he had won the love of Nannie Wright Talbot and he couldn’t have been more pleased.

The summer ended and the couple returned to their respective colleges and they continued dating. After 2 years Put proposed to Nannie on the shores of Lake Michigan.

After almost 45 years of marriage what keeps this couple happy?

“At our wedding, my father-in-law said in his speech , the key to a good marriage is the 60/40 rule, everybody thinks marriage is 50/50, but it’s not. Each party should assume that it’s your job to give more than you get, you’ll always be happy if you follow that,” Put said.

Nannie also added, “You can’t pick the flowers unless you weed the garden, you have to work on it, you have to be there and pay attention in your marriage. Every day we wake up and immediately start talking to each other, we are happy to be together.”

When traveling east from Granby Center on Rte. 20, one may take note that this section of state highway is also known as Turkey Hills Road. As I soon learned, when I moved to New England, you typically end up in the town named after the road you are traveling on. Thus West Granby Road will take you to the metropolis of West Granby and Turkey Hills Road takes you to . . . Turkey Hills?!

Well yes, in the 18th century East Granby was known as the Turkey Hills Ecclesiastical Society of Simsbury. The Turkey Hills section of Granby became East Granby when it became its own incorporated town in 1858. So why would any one choose to name there community after the turkey? Well the turkey has an interesting and wonderful history.

Early explorers to the New World quickly acquired a taste for turkey and took birds back to Europe. By the 1500s, turkeys were being raised domestically in Italy, France and England. When the Pilgrims and other settlers arrived in America, they were already familiar with raising and eating turkey and naturally included it as part of their Thanksgiving feast.

Benjamin Franklin, who proposed the turkey as the official United States' bird, was dismayed when the bald eagle was chosen over the turkey. Franklin wrote to his daughter, referring to the eagle's "bad moral character," saying, "I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country! The turkey is a much more respectable bird, and a true original native of America." So when the settlers in ancient East Granby named the new little community, why not name it after this wonderful fowl that populated their countryside?

Although the wild turkey (Phasianidae: Meleagris gallopavo) was once plentiful, by the 1930s it had become almost extinct. In the 1950s the total US population had shrunk to just over 300,000 birds. Today the efforts to restore the turkey to New England, represents one of the most significant wildlife restoration successes in North American history. This feathered friend has not only been restored to virtually all of its ancestral range, but has been successfully introduced to suitable habitats elsewhere on the continent.

Find out what's happening in Granby-East Granbywith free, real-time updates from Patch.

East Granby's pride in their heritage was evident when they recently featured an artists tour of painted turkeys. These wonderful works of art can be found throughout the town center as travel around there today.

Wild Turkey Waltz Video