Author Michael C. Dooling has revised and expanded his Milford history book, An Historical Account of Charles Island. Originally published in 2006, his book relates the history of what is arguably the most storied island in Long Island Sound. He traces the history from native inhabitants through European discovery, the legend of Captain William Kidd’s treasure being buried on the island, the 19th century resorts, a prize fight gone bad, the Aquinas Retreat in the 1930s and fictional stories that used the island and backdrop.
New material includes shipwrecks off the island, its place in the history of flight when Gustave Whitehead of Bridgeport used it as a testing site for one of his flying machines, testing of a torpedo by the US Navy, the Hermit of Milford Beach, a rumrunner who paid his debt to God, the backstory of a nudist colony proposed for Charles Island and a mysterious woman in white who purportedly walks the tombolo connecting the island with the shore.
Cooling is a lifelong Connecticut resident, former news librarian at the Waterbury Republican-American and former archivist at the Mattatuck Museum. He is the author of four other historical books, including Clueless in New England: The Unsolved Disappearances of Paula Welden, Connie Smith and Katherine Hull; Milford Lost & Found; Seaworthy Timber: The Life & Times of New England Sea Captain Aaron H. Wood; and The Haunting on East 27th, a true story of an investigation into a house haunting in New York City in 1862.
Copies of An Historical Account of Charles Island are available in Milford at The Canvas Patch, the Ships Store and Milford Pharmacy & Home Care.