By Jeff Dickey-Chasins
The Spiderweed Preserve is one of the more popular properties managed by the Middlesex Land Trust. It contains great views, historic ruins, a trail that can be challenging at times, and yes, both spiders and weeds. But the story behind the preserve – how it came to be, and what it was before acquisition – is fascinating. Read on!
In 1743, Soloman Hubbard built a farmhouse near what is now Spiderweed Preserve. His father – also known as Soloman Hubbard – farmed and lived nearby. When he died, the younger Hubbard inherited his land, and also bought additional land from his neighbors. Eventually he deeded the land and house to the Town of Middletown, in order to pay his debts. When he died, Middletown sold the house to the Bailey family, who sold it to the Dripps family in 1866.
So how did Spiderweed move from being a farm held by local families to the land preserve that the Middlesex Land Trust protects and shares with the residents of Connecticut? The story of Spiderweed is the story of how one woman kept acres of Connecticut land from development, let farmland go back to its origins, and created a place that we all can enjoy. In 1936, an independent and successful writer and editor, Helen Lohman, bought the Hubbard farmhouse on Dripps Road and its surrounding acreage. She renamed the land Spiderweed – because, she said, it was full of nothing but spiders and weeds – and used it as a country retreat from her busy life as an editor and writer in New York City and Washington D.C.
Lohman, born in 1896, grew up in New York City, was educated in a Quaker Friends school, and then promptly ran away from home, unwilling to settle into a traditional female life of the times. She moved to Boston, became an assistant to Amy Lowell, the poet, and then entered the world of publishing via secretarial work and her own capacity for both writing and learning. By the time she purchased (with her lover Paul Foster) the land that would become Spiderweed for $3000 in 1936, Ms. Lohman had established a reputation as an independent and extraordinarily skilled writer and editor of books, articles, journals, and letters to the editor. Although she spent most of her time in New York, Washington, and Boston, she used Spiderweed to both revive herself and to manage making ends meet in the depths of the Great Depression. During the remainder of her life she let most of the 157 acres grow wild, although she did make cider and kept a small garden. For most of her life her finances were quite tight, but she refused to subdivide and sell Spiderweed.
As she grew older, however, she felt a desire and obligation to keep the land protected beyond her own life. She began investigating how this could be done in consultation with the Nature Conservancy. The property was transferred to the Conservancy in June of 1967, although she continued to live there. In 1979, she died at the age of 83. Her beloved house, the stone lodge, and land were then acquired by the Conservancy. It decided that the farmhouse was too much of a financial burden, and so sold the house in 1982, at which point it was removed from the property. Until the land was eventually transferred to Middlesex Land Trust in 2019, the Conservancy took inventories of the flora and fauna, and kept the property in an undeveloped state.
What will you find if you visit the Spiderweed Preserve today? A convenient parking area has been constructed recently at the trailhead. If you need a trail map, just click here to download the Land Trust’s guide. As you hike into the property, you will see what remains of an old stone lodge – a relic from the farm that existed there in the 1700s – on your left. Further along, you will encounter many boulders – it is, after all, Connecticut! – of Middletown gneiss. There are also outcrops of pegmatites (igneous rocks showing a very coarse texture, with large interlocking crystals), and of course many ridges, cliffs, and slopes – the result of long-gone glaciers. There is a great difference in elevation throughout the reserve, from 320 feet to 620 feet, which you will definitely notice as you scramble up and down the trail! The forest is typical for the area, with a mix of white oak, hickory, maple, and laurel. You will also see the remains of old farm stone walls. If you follow the loop, you will be rewarded with a great view of the surrounding hills and valley.