April 9 - Christian Funcke & John Kelley Happy birthday to Christian Funck, born on April 9, 1810, in Neuhaus, Germany. Funck came to America with his wife Anna Johanne Stamm and their six children. Initially, they settled in Brooklyn, NY. Funck was a skilled cabinetmaker and Elias Ingraham discovered him as he was searching for cabinetmakers to work in his factory. He successfully recruited Funck, and the family moved to Bristol, settling in Chippens Hill. Funck became a naturalized citizen in 1852. While working for Ingraham, Funck made furniture in his home for sale. In 1865 he opened a furniture shop in the Maple End area. He also began to make coffins, a natural thing for a furniture maker to do, but Funck took it one step further and entered the undertaking business as well. The first funeral at the Funck Funeral Home took place in October of 1865. In 1867, the business moved to the corner of Main and South Elm Streets. In 1889, they moved across the street to a different part of the intersection. In that year, they also began construction of a new four-story structure on Prospect Street, which would be finished in 1890. Christian Funcke passed away before the Prospect Street Building was finished. His son Augustus, a survivor of the Civil War and the Andersonville prison, would take over the business, and would drop the ‘c’ from the name, serving as president until 1911. Christian Funcke is buried in West Cemetery. If you were born on April 9, you also share a birthday with John F. Kelley born on this day in 1878 in Unionville. Kelley worked for 30 years at New Departure. He married Margaret O’Sullivan and they had six children. He passed away in April of 1953 and is buried at St. Joseph Cemetery. He is shown here receiving a retirement gift. At its heart, Bristol history is made up of the people who have lived and worked here. In 2025, we will celebrate the birthdays of some of these people who spent part or all of their lives here. From industrialists, shop owners, educators, administrators, soldiers, medical professionals, and engaged citizens, we invite you to find out which Bristol resident shares your birthday and how they fit into the city's story. (fb)

April 8 - Albert F. Rockwell Happy birthday to Albert Fennimore Rockwell, born on April 8, 1862. Early on in Rockwell’s life, his family moved to Morris, IL, where Albert received his education. He and his brother, Edward, worked at Marshall Field’s in Chicago, but the family later moved to Florida where Edward opened a hardware store in Jacksonville. In 1888, Albert replaced the wet-cell battery in the doorbells that the store was selling with a spring. There was little time to do much about the innovation in Florida, as a yellow fever outbreak soon forced the two brothers to head north. Bristol was a natural choice as a destination, as Albert’s brother Franklin (an artist), sister Mae, and mother had already moved here, and it had been the center of spring manufacturing since the 1840s. Albert and Edward Rockwell rented a small portion of the Thompson Clock factory to work on their new doorbell. The innovation didn’t take much development. As Albert drily noted, “It only took three minutes to pop in the spring; the rest was paperwork.” Thus, New Departure Bell Company was born, selling a variety of bells. In 1897, New Departure added coaster brakes to their manufacturing catalog. Ball bearings followed in 1906. New Departure was the first American company to manufacture ball bearings and the Rockwell brothers would continue to improve their ball bearing line over time. Albert Rockwell started, joined, or purchased a number of other companies as they interested him: He served as president of Bristol Brass and the American Silver Company. During World War I, he purchased the former Marlin Company in New Haven, renaming it the Marlin-Rockwell Company, building machine guns for the war effort. He started the Bristol Corporation, which built automobiles, and specifically the first yellow taxi cabs (his second wife Nettie allegedly picked the color). The last venture did not prove successful and contributed to his ouster from New Departure in 1913. (Brother-in-law DeWitt Page, Mae’s husband, would replace him as head of the firm.) Rockwell was a philanthropist and lifelong Progressive Republican, and the city of Bristol bears his imprint. A firm believer in education, Rockwell lobbied for, donated the land for, and was instrumental in building the Memorial Boulevard school building when it became clear that the first high school on Center and Summer Streets could not keep up with the growing population. At the same time, he insisted on a wide boulevard to connect the south side of town with the downtown area, and Memorial Boulevard was constructed. In 1911, Rockwell and his second wife Nettie (oddly, his first wife had also been named Nettie) donated 80 acres of land that included a lagoon for use as a public park. The Rockwells would also hire Boston-based landscape artist Sheffield Arnold to design it. Six years later, Rockell added an additional 15 acres for the construction of a playground, named in Nettie’s honor. It opened in 1917 and included some very modern playground equipment for the time. Even after Albert Rockwell’s death, his wife remained committed to the playground and park, providing for the playground in her will and leaving money to be placed in trust for the city’s park system, ensuring significant support for generations to come. Rockwell Park was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987. The occasionally fiery Rockwell has been said to be stubborn and independent—his death was allegedly caused by the infection of a corn he casually cut off his own toe—but he remains one of the people most responsible for the landscape of the city. Whether you have business in one of the now converted New Departure buildings, see a show in the theater in the renovated Rockwell Theater at BAIMS, walk your dog on Memorial Boulevard, or see a summer concert in Rockwell Park, the landscape is one that Albert Rockwell shaped. Rockwell passed away in 1925 and is buried in West Cemetery. His portrait is shown here, along with a photograph from the early Rockwell Park. He also appears in one of our favorite Rockwell pictures, with a fish. (He was an avid outdoorsman—he might have actually caught that fish!). His monument in West Cemetery is pictured here as well. (fb)