List of people from Ridgefield, Connecticut
Notable people, past and present who have lived in Ridgefield, Connecticut or are closely associated with the town, listed by area in which they are best known:
Authors, writers
- Jessica Auerbach, novelist (current resident)
- Robert Daley, author ("Prince of the City," "Night Falls on Manhattan") resident 1984-89)
- Howard Fast, novelist (lived on Florida Hill Road in the 1960s and early 1970s)[1]
- Max Gunther, author (d. 1978)
- Roger Kahn, author including "The Boys of Summer," 1972 (past resident)
- Richard Kluger, author whose works include 1997 Pullitzer winner, "Ashes to Ashes: America's Hundred-Year Cigarette War, the Public Health, and the Unabashed Triumph of Philip Morris" (resident,1969 -1976)
- Allan Nevins, the only writer to win two Pulitzer prizes for historical biography, lived in and loved Ridgefield in the 1920s. won Pulitzers for his biographies of Grover Cleveland (1933) and Hamilton Fish (1937). He died in 1971 at the age of 80.
- Eugene O'Neill, Nobel Prize-winning playwright, owned "Brook Farm" on North Salem Road from 1922 to 1927.
- Cornelius J. Ryan, author of "A Bridge Too Far" (died 1974). At his funeral at St. Mary's Church in Ridgefield, he was eulogized by CBS Network Anchor Walter Cronkite.
- Mark Salzman, author and actor who wrote about the town in his novel, "Lost in Place: Growing Up Absurd in Suburbia," (past resident)
- Richard Scarry, children's author (past resident)
- Maurice Sendak, author and artist best known for his book Where the Wild Things Are (current resident) [2]
- Robert Lewis Taylor, Pulitzer Prize winning novelist (for "The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters," 1959)
- Alvin Toffler, futurist, author (past resident, 1967-74)
- Thomas Walsh, mystery writer resident 1949 -1965; died, 1984)
- Max Wilk, author (resident, 1951-66)
- Howard Roughan, author of The Up and Comer and The Promise of a Lie (current resident)
- Bari Wood, author of horror books, including two that have been made into movies (current resident)
Actors, others in the dramatic arts
(Including playwrights and screen writers. For composers for films and the stage, see "Singers, musicians, composers" below.)
- David Cassidy, actor (The Partridge Family) and singer (past resident)
- Ralph Edwards, producer and erstwhile host of television show "Truth or Consequences" (past resident)
- Harvey Fierstein, queer actor and playwright (current resident)[2]
- Jolie Gabor, Zsa Zsa Gabor's mother, (past resident)
- Walter Hampden, late actor
- Carolyn Kepcher, who appeared on the NBC show The Apprentice and ran Donald Trump's golf course in Briarcliff, N.Y. until she was fired in August 2006 (current resident)
- Eugene O'Neill, Nobel-prize-winning playwright (past resident)
- Cyril Ritchard, actor; played Captain Hook alongside Mary Martin in "Peter Pan," staged live for television (March 7, 1955) making TV history. His funeral Mass in Ridgefield was celebrated by his longtime friend and TV celebrity, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen.
- Erland Van Lidth de Jeude, actor, wrestler; ranked third in his class for Greco-Roman wrestling in 1978, also acted in "Terror," "The Wanderers," and (using the name "Erland Van Lidth") "Stir Crazy." Grew up in town; died in 1987 in his mid-30s.
- Robert Vaughn, actor (current resident) Most famous for role in Man From U.N.C.L.E. Currently in BBC hit The Hustler.
Singers, musicians, composers
- Judy Collins, Grammy-award wining folk singer (current resident)
- Geraldine Farrar, soprano (past resident)
- Alex North, film composer and 12-time Academy Award nominee whose scores include "A Streetcar Named Desire (1951), "Death of a Salesman" (1951), "Viva Zapata!" (1952), "Spartacus" (1960), "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf" (1968), and "Good Morning, Vietnam" (1987). Won an Emmy for the score to "Rich Man, Poor Man" in 1976. He died in 1991.
- Noel Regney, pianist, who wrote the popular Christmas song, "Do Your Hear What I Hear." His wife, Gloria Shayne, wrote the music.
- Jay David Saks, music producer who won seven Grammys and two Emmys.
- Stephen Schwartz, composer and lyricist ("Godspell," "Pippin")(current resident)
- Maxim Shostakovich, conductor (past resident)
Artists, architects, cartoonists
- Peggy Bacon (1895-1987) author and artist with works in the National Gallery of Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art
- Roz Chast, cartoonist (current resident)[2]
- Cass Gilbert, architect (past resident)
- Alexander Julian, designer (current resident)
- Nicholas Krushenick, abstract artist, a dozen of whose works are in the National Gallery of Art (d. 1999)
- Jerry Marcus (1924-2005), magazine and newspaper cartoonist whose syndicated strip, "Trudy," was carried by more than 200 newspapers, lived here 40 years.
- Frederick Remington, an American painter, illustrator, and sculptor who specialized in depictions of the American West (past resident). He died in Ridgefield in 1909, less than six months after moving to the town.
- Julian Alden Weir, impressionist painter, bought Nod Hill farm in 1882, now a National Historic Site (died in 1919)
- Mahonri Young, (1877–1957), grandson of Brigham Young and the artist who sculpted "This is the Place Monument" and "Seagull Monument" in Salt Lake City, sometimes lived at home of J. Alden Weir, his father-in-law, he died in Norwalk.
Business people
- George Doubleday, Ingersoll-Rand President [1913-1935] (past resident)
- E.P. Dutton, publisher (1831-1923)
- Robert P. Scripps, president of Scripps-Howard Newspapers (past resident)
- Jay Walker, Priceline founder (current resident)
Journalists
- Morton Dean, television journalist (current resident)
- Henry Luce, founder of TIME magazine, husband of Clare Booth Luce (past resident)
- Westbrook Pegler, columnist, Pulitzer Prize winner (resident, 1941-48)
Government
- Joel Abbott, (1776-1826), United States Congressman [3]
- John H. Frey, Assistant Minority Leader, Connecticut House of Representatives
- George Lounsbury, past Connecticut governor, brother of Phineas (died, 1909)
- Phineas Lounsbury, past Connecticut governor, brother of George
- Clare Booth Luce, playwright, ambassador, politician, wife of Henry Luce (past resident)
- Theodore Sorenson, JFK advisor (past resident, now lives in Bedford, N.Y.)
- Norman Thomas, six-time Socialist candidate for president, spent summers in Ridgefield until the early 1920s
- Kurt Waldheim, U.N. secretary-general (1972-1981), frequently stayed at the estate of a friend in town
Other
- Ira Joe Fisher, poet and CBS weatherman[4]
- Janel Jorgensen, first Ridgefielder to win Olympic medal (on 1988 U.S. women’s 4x100 medley relay team, Silver Medal, Seoul)
- "Typhoid Mary" Mallon, who became famous for infecting people with typhoid, spent some time as a cook in town, where she infected some. (according to brief, front-page story in the July 22, 1909 Ridgefield Press)
- Elmer Q. Oliphant, established nation's first college intramurals program while a cadet at West Point, played with NFL's Buffalo All-Americans (1920s); 1955 inductee, National Football Hall of Fame. (resident from 1940s to 1952)
- Alice Paul, author of the proposed Equal Rights Amendment, author and suffragist, part-time resident (1885-1977).
Did NOT live in town
- Robert Fitzgerald, late poet and translator (lived on Seventy Acre Road in Redding, Connecticut but with a Ridgefield Post Office address)
- Flannery O'Connor, writer (Redding, Connecticut resident 1949-1951, when she was a boarder of Robert Fitzgerald's)
Footnotes
- ^ [1]"Notable Ridgefielders" A-F page, at Jack Sanders' Web site about Ridgefield history
- ^ a b c [2]"Where Americana and Aesthetics Mingle," article by Lisa Prevost, part of series "If You're Thinking of Living In" in the Real Estate section of The New York Times, March 14, 2004, accessed August 29, 2006 "Current residents include Maurice Sendak, the children's book author and illustrator; Harvey Fierstein, the actor and playwright; and Roz Chast, the New Yorker cartoonist."
- ^ Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume, 1607-1896. Marquis Who's Who. 1967.
- ^ [3]Internet Movie DataBase Web site, Web page titled "Biography for Ira Joe Fisher" accessed August 20, 2006