Program

Legends & Lore®

Subject

Legend

Location

2 Hunting Ridge Ln, Norwich, CT 06360, USA

Lat/Long

41.55652, -72.10831

Grant Recipient

City of Norwich

Norwich’s Bean Hill section has an intriguing name that derives from local lore. While competing place name legends exist, the most popular tells of weary, famished prospectors finding pots of beans buried in the ground. The hungry men took the beans with thanks, ate them with relish, and named the place Bean Hill in their honor. Who buried the pots of beans remains a mystery. However, local indigenous residents were known to store food in buried containers.

Another possibility is that the moniker originates from locals’ proclivity to raise bean crops. The prevalence of bean farming may have led to the appropriately named Bean Hill.

And then there is an outside chance that “Bean” refers not to legumes but to William Bean, a contemporary of frontiersman Daniel Boone. While Bean is lesser known today, he was of great renown in the era of Bean Hill’s christening.

Not all celebrate the quirky Bean Hill designation. For centuries, there have been attempts to change the name to something more refined, such as Westville (the hill’s original geographic location) and Jacksonville (after a visit from President Jackson), but none have proven successful. Today, the neighborhood remains Bean Hill, now a preserved historic district listed on the National Register of Historic Places.