By Marilyn May
Milford History
A set of copper tree tags sold at an estate sale harkens to the origins of Milford’s Orchard Hills neighborhood’s namesake. Photo by Ed Abbazia.
Lots of people who enjoy the hobby of metal detecting like to spend a few hours on weekends going over the beaches and public lands waiting to hear signals that alert them to metals buried underground. Ed Abbazia is one such enthusiast, but a recent discovery of his was not found underground. It was found in a wooden box at an estate sale.
Recently, Abbazia’s friend and one-time schoolmate at Orchard Hills Grammar School, John Stewart, was selling the contents of his father’s house on Baxter Lane within Milford’s Orchard Hills neighborhood. The land in that area once grew hundreds of fruit trees and flowers.
“I saw a large box with old locks, keys and dozens of copper tags,” Abbazia said, and he decided to buy it.
The tags were what interested him most, so he decided to research how they were used. The rectangular strips of copper were between 3 to 6 inches long and about half an inch wide with a single hole punched at one end where a wire was doubled through it to form a loop.
Copper was used because it naturally resists corrosion and survives decades outdoors. Tags also had names either pin-punched or scratched on them. Originally, the copper wires were placed on stakes or loosely attached to tree limbs to allow for plant growth.
Such tags were used in the late 1800s up to 1940s on land that was used for permanent agricultural plantings. It wasn’t until the 1950s that the land was subdivided and sold for house lots.
These tags are authentic identification markers from the original fruit orchard and gardens that predated the residential development on Baxter Lane and the area.
Those clues match with the history of the Orchard Hills part of Milford that was once covered with fruit trees, especially peach and apple trees. Streets in that area today include Macintosh Road, Snow Apple Lane and Applejack Lane.
By analyzing the hand-stamped impressions, we can glean clues that tie the tags directly to historic fruit varieties.
Abbazia supplied the information below.
Mrs. WARNER: It was common for an orchardist to rename a cultivar after a prominent local resident. (A cultivar is a variety of plants that have been created and maintained through cultivation.)
MORROW: This could be a person’s last name, a nursery or grower’s name, or a plant name.
CARMEN: This is documented as a rose name and is also a peony cultivar registered in 1898.
BEACON: This is a documented apple variety introduced in 1936 by the University of Minnesota’s fruit-breeding program.
OMAR: Omar’s giant sweet is an heirloom tomato known for its massive size.
COMMANDER KOHEL: While stamped Kohel, there was a documented heritage variety of gladiolus or dahlias named Commander Kohl.
There were many more tags: PAPP, YANKEE.Q., FARNCOT, AMBAS, MRS. SEAL, CHAMPOEG.
Abbazia added that a close friend’s family once owned a peach orchard on land now known as Clark Hill, and a city census record shows that the Clark family owned this property from 1868 until 1950. Fruit production took off in the 1880s, and by 1890s the hill was covered with thousands of peach trees. This golden era matches the stamped variety of names found on some of the copper tags.
Connecticut orchards were hit with sub-zero freezes in 1917-1918 that decimated peach orchards across the state. In the Post World War II years, many of the state’s orchard lands were sold, historic trees were cleared and a housing boom began. The Milford lands, however, will forever hold the name Orchard Hills in tribute to the area’s history.
Marilyn May is a lifelong resident of Milford and is on the board of the Milford Historical Society.