List of people from Ridgefield, Connecticut

This is a list of 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, playwrights, screenwriters

• Silvio A. Bedini (1917–2007), retired Smithsonian Institution curator, author, born and raised in Ridgefield
• Rich Cohen (born 1968), non-fiction writer ^[1]
• Howard Fast (1914–2003), novelist ^[2]
• Ira Joe Fisher (born 1947), CBS weatherman and poet (Some Holy Weight in the Village Air) ^[3]
• Robert Fitzgerald (1910–1985), poet, critic and translator; he and his wife Sally called Ridgefield home and many sources repeat the assertion, though their residence was located in neighboring Redding ^[4]
• Tom Gilroy, screenwriter, actor and film producer, graduated from Ridgefield High School in 1978
• Max Gunther (1926–1998), journalist and writer
• Tim Herlihy (born 1966), screenwriter, film producer, former head writer of Saturday Night Live
• Roger Kahn (1927–2020), author
• Irene Kampen (1923–1998), novelist and journalist
• Richard Kluger (born 1934), author
• Clare Boothe Luce (1903–1987), playwright, ambassador, politician, and wife of Henry Luce
• Andy Luckey (born 1965), children's book author
• John Ames Mitchell (1844–1918), novelist, founder of Life magazine
• Allan Nevins (1891–1971), only writer to win the Pulitzer prize for historical biography twice (on Grover Cleveland and Hamilton Fish)
• Flannery O'Connor (1925–1964), writer often said to have lived in town when she was a boarder of Robert Fitzgerald's from 1949 to 1951, although Fitzgerald actually lived in neighboring Redding ^[4]
• Eugene O'Neill (1888–1953), Nobel Prize-winning playwright, owned Brook Farm on North Salem Road from 1922 to 1927
• Brad Parks (born 1974), author
• Cornelius J. Ryan (1920–1974), author
• Mark Salzman (born 1959), author and actor who wrote about the town in his novel Lost in Place: Growing Up Absurd in Suburbia
• Richard Scarry (1919–1994), children's author
• Maurice Sendak (1928–2012), author and artist ^[5]
• Fred Stahl (born 1944), Professor (Columbia University), author, pioneer computer scientist, computer security and forensics, science historian, inventor, lexicographer, ^[6] real estate developer (current resident) ^[7]
• Robert Lewis Taylor (1912–1998), Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist (The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters, 1959)
• Alvin Toffler (1928–2016), futurist, author
• Abigail Goodrich Whittlesey (1788–1858), educator, publisher, editor
• Max Wilk (1920–2011), author
• Bari Wood (born 1936), author

Actors, others in the dramatic arts

• David Cassidy (1950–2017), actor and singer
• Ralph Edwards (1913–2005), producer and host of television show Truth or Consequences
• Chris Elliott (born 1960), actor, comedian, author
• Giancarlo Esposito (born 1958), actor (current resident)
• Harvey Fierstein (born 1954), actor and playwright ^[5] (current resident)
• Walter Hampden (1879–1955), actor
• Carolyn Kepcher (born 1969), appeared on the NBC show The Apprentice and ran Donald Trump's golf course in Briarcliff, New York (current resident)
• Cyril Ritchard (1897–1977), actor
• Grant Rosenmeyer (born 1991), actor
• Erland Van Lidth de Jeude (1953–1987), actor, wrestler, computer engineer and singer, grew up on Short Lane
• Robert Vaughn (1932–2016), actor
• Mary A. Wray (1804 – 1892), American actress

Singers, musicians, composers

• Larry Adler (1914–2001), harmonica virtuoso, lived on Pumping Station Road
• Judy Collins (born 1939), Grammy Award-winning folk singer (current resident)
• Aaron Copland (1900–1990), lived on Limestone Road ^[8]
• Fanny Crosby (1820–1915), wrote more than 8,000 hymns, lived as a child at the corner of Main Street and Branchville Road
• Edwina Eustis Dick (1908–1997), contralto, pioneer in the field of music therapy, lived on Old Branchville Road
• Geraldine Farrar (1882–1967), Metropolitan Opera soprano, lived on West Lane and later New Street, where she died
• Andrew Gold (1951–2011), singer, songwriter, and musician, lived on St. Johns Road
• Stephen Jenks (1772–1856), composer and "teacher of psalmody", lived in Ridgefield
• Ed Kowalczyk (born 1971), singer, songwriter, musician and a founding member of the band Live
• Jim Lowe (1927–2016) singer, disc jockey and radio host
• Václav Nelhýbel (1919–1996), composer
• Alex North (1910–1991), film composer
• Noël Regney (1922–2002), pianist and songwriter
• Stephen Schwartz (born 1948), composer and lyricist (current resident)
• Debbie Shapiro (born 1954), singer (current resident)
• Maxim Shostakovich (born 1938), conductor (past resident)
• Jim Steinman (1947–2021), composer, lyricist, record producer, and playwright

Artists, architects, designers, cartoonists

• Peggy Bacon (1895–1987), author and artist with works in the National Gallery of Art and Metropolitan Museum of Art
• Wayne Boring (1915–1982), an artist of Superman comic strips, lived on Lincoln Lane
• Sarah Bostwick (born 1979), visual artist
• Orlando Busino (born 1926), cartoonist and author (current resident)
• Roz Chast (born 1954), New Yorker cartoonist and book author (current resident) ^[5]
• Niels Diffrient (1928–2013), industrial designer
• Cass Gilbert (1859–1934), architect
• Alexander Isley (born 1961), designer and educator (current resident)
• Alexander Julian (born 1948), designer (current resident)
• Nicholas Krushenick (1929–1999), abstract artist, a dozen of whose works are in the National Gallery of Art
• Erik Nitsche (1908–1998), graphic designer
• Frederic Remington (1861–1909), painter, illustrator, and sculptor; died in Ridgefield in 1909, less than six months after moving to the town
• Julian Alden Weir (1852–1919), impressionist painter, bought Nod Hill Farm in 1882, now a National Historic Site
• Mahonri Young (1877–1957), grandson of Brigham Young; artist and sculptor

Businessmen

• Lawrence Bossidy (born 1935), retired CEO of AlliedSignal and General Electric (current resident)
• E.P. Dutton (1831–1923), publisher
• Joseph M. Juran (1904–1908), founder of the Juran Institute, lived on Old Branchville Road
• Hans Peter Kraus (1907–1988), rare book dealer, author of A Rare Book Saga
• Arvind Krishna, CEO of IBM (current resident)
• John R. Patrick (born 1945), former IBM vice-president and innovative leader in the information technology industry, author of Net Attitude
• Jay S. Walker (born 1955), Priceline.com founder (current resident)
• Stephen Ward Jr., retired CEO of Lenovo (current resident)

Journalists

• Todd Brewster, author, documentary film producer, former Senior Editorial Producer, ABC News (current resident)
• Morton Dean (born 1935), television journalist (current resident)
• Henry Luce (1898–1967), founder of Time magazine, husband of Clare Boothe Luce
• David Manning, fictitious film reviewer said to be with the Ridgefield Press but created in a deceptive advertising campaign
• Westbrook Pegler (1894–1969), columnist and Pulitzer Prize winner (resident, 1941–1948)

Government

• Joel Abbot (1776–1826), United States Congressman ^[9]
• Jeremiah Donovan (1857–1935), United States Representative from Connecticut
• John H. Frey (born 1963), Minority Whip, Connecticut House of Representatives; Connecticut National Committeeman, Republican National Committee
• George E. Lounsbury (1838–1904), former Connecticut governor
• Phineas C. Lounsbury (1841–1925), former Connecticut governor
• Clare Boothe Luce (1903–1987), playwright, ambassador, politician, wife of Henry Luce
• Theodore Sorensen (1928–2010), JFK advisor
• Norman Thomas (1884–1968), six-time Socialist candidate for president, spent summers in Ridgefield until the early 1920s
• Kurt Waldheim (1918–2007), U.N. secretary-general (1972–1981), frequently stayed at the estate of a friend in town

Other

Alice Paul, 1901

• Anthony Alfredo (born 1999), NASCAR driver
• Blackleach Burritt (1744–1794), noted clergyman in the American Revolution
• Jolie Gabor (1896–1997), jewelry store-owing mother of the famous Gabor sisters—Eva, Magda, and Zsa Zsa—had a home on Oscaleta Road from 1966 to 1970 ^[10]
• Samuel Keeler (1656–1713), founding settler of Ridgefield
• Jeff Landau (born 1974), professional tennis player
• "Typhoid Mary" Mallon (1869–1938), 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)
• Matt Merullo (born 1965), former baseball player and scout for Arizona Diamondbacks
• Elmer Q. Oliphant (1892–1975), played with NFL's Buffalo All-Americans (1920s)
• Alice Paul, author of the proposed Equal Rights Amendment, author and suffragist, part-time resident (1885–1977)
• George Scalise, owned a mansion on Lake Mamanasco, president of the Building Service Employees International Union ^[11]
• Kieran Smith, competitive swimmer, Olympian ^[12]
• Tucker West (born 1995), Olympic luger
• Sarah Bishop (died 1810), pirate and later hermit ^[13]
• Phoebe Schecter, NFL Analyst, football player and coach

See also

• List of people from Connecticut
• List of people from Bridgeport, Connecticut
• List of people from Brookfield, Connecticut
• List of people from Darien, Connecticut
• List of people from Greenwich, Connecticut
• List of people from Hartford, Connecticut
• List of people from New Canaan, Connecticut
• List of people from New Haven, Connecticut
• List of people from Norwalk, Connecticut
• List of people from Redding, Connecticut
• List of people from Stamford, Connecticut
• List of people from Westport, Connecticut

Footnotes

1. BookBrowse. "Rich Cohen author biography". BookBrowse.com. Retrieved 2020-11-22.
2. "Notable Ridgefielders" A–F page, at Jack Sanders' Web site about Ridgefield history
3. Internet Movie DataBase Web site, Web page titled "Biography for Ira Joe Fisher" accessed August 20, 2006
4. 1 2 Numerous sources state that the Fitzgerald's home was on Seventy Acre Road and that Flannery O'Connor lived with them there, including, Letters of Flannery O'Connor: The Habit of Being, selected and edited by Sally Fitzgerald (1979, Farrar, Straus & Giroux), address from the top of a letter from O'Connor: "70 Acre Road/Ridgefield, Conn./October 6, '49", page 15; Hyson, Lynn, "Flannery O'Connor Biographer gets glimpse of author's time here", article in The Redding Pilot, February 1, 2007, page A020: "The scene at the home of Janet August and Amy Atamian on a recent Saturday resembled a salon, true to the tradition of their house on Seventy Acre Road. Around the massive stone fireplace the two had gathered neighbors and friends to compare notes about the time writer Flannery O'Connor (1925–1964) lived here."; "Flannery O'Connor". Archived from the original on 2003-01-18. Retrieved 2007-07-12. Web page titled "Flannery O'Connor / Lesson Plan Ideas for Teachers" from "Flannery O'Connor-Andalusa Farm Foundation" website ("she was introduced to Robert and Sally Fitzgerald, with whom she lived for over a year in Ridgefield, Connecticut.") accessed July 12, 2007; Map of Redding showing 70 Acre Road entirely within Redding (between Mountain Road and Umpawaug Road in the central part of western side of town; click on map to enlarge), at the "History of Redding" Web site, accessed July 12, 2007
5. 1 2 3 "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."
6. ResearchGate.com. "Profile - Fred Stahl".
7. ResearchGate.com. "Profile - Fred Stahl".
8. A Library of Congress biography of Copland includes a photograph of him raking leaves at his Ridgefield home in 1946. See Library of Congress
9. Who Was Who in America, Historical Volume, 1607–1896. Marquis Who's Who. 1967.
10. "Notable Ridgefielders" G–L page, at Jack Sanders' Web site about Ridgefield history. Actor George Sanders, married to both Magda and Zsa Zsa, was also fond of Jolie. "You know, Jolie," he once wrote her, "I think marriage is for very simple people, not great artists like us." Zsa Zsa, on the other hand, observed of Sanders: "When I was married to George Sanders, we were both in love with him. I fell out of love with him, but he didn't."
11. Scalise was an associate of mobster Dutch Schultz. He was arrested in 1940 by the crusading district attorney Thomas E. Dewey, later governor of New York and almost-president, and was charged with extorting $100,000 from hotels and contracting firms. But the arrest came only after Pegler exposed Scalise as part of a series of anti-racketeering columns that won him the Pulitzer. In a 1940 piece, Pegler described how Scalise had acquired the 27-room mansion on Tackora Trail in Ridgefield, apparently with union funds. “A remarkable proportion of Mr. Scalise’s fellow officers of the union have criminal records, and he reached the presidency by private arrangement with the officers and without any vote, direct or indirect, of the rank and file chambermaids, charwomen, window cleaners, janitors and other toilers,” wrote Pegler, who moved to Ridgefield a year later. He also noted that just across North Salem Road in Ridgefield was the town poor house. “Villa Scalise” was later acquired by the Society of Jesus, who used it as a retreat house, and is now the St. Ignatius Retreat House, owned by the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X.
12. Barker, Sean (June 13, 2021). "Ridgefield swimmer Kieran Smith qualifies for Olympics in 400 freestyle". Connecticut Post . Retrieved July 20, 2021.
13. Barber, John Warner (1838). Connecticut Historical Collections, Containing a General Collection of Interesting Facts, Traditions, Biographical Sketches, Anecdotes, Etc., Relating to the History and Antiquities of Every Town in Connecticut with Geographical Descriptions. Durrie & Peck. pp. 400–401.

External links

• "Notable Ridgefielders" webpage