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Ridgefield LakesThe Ridgefield Lakes, consisting of Fox Hill Lake, Rainbow (Wataba) Lake and the pond north of Bennett's Farm Road, were created by The Pequot Real Estate Development Co. in the late 1920's. In 1928, the company filed a map (#291) on the Ridgefield Land Records depicting four lakes. All four lakes appear on an aerial photograph of the area taken by the State of Connecticut in 1934. The fourth lake did not survive and now is a small wooded swamp south of Rainbow Lake. Development of summer cottages started in the 1930 and 1940s on Rainbow Lake, and in the 1950s on Fox Hill Lake by William Winthrop through various corporate entities. Most of the homes surrounding the lakes were eventually winterized and now most are occupied year-round. Several of the oldest cottages on our lake are still occupied by their original owners. The Association was incorporated in 1951 and has assumed stewardship of the lake and beach areas since that date. The lake has a surface area of about 26 acres with an average depth of 3-4 feet. Maximum depth is about 6-7 feet. Outpost Farm/Fox Hill InnFox Hill Lake was named for nearby Fox Hill, located on what is now known as the Bennett's Pond property. In 1914, Col. Louis D. Conley constructed his home, Outpost Farm, on the site and shortly thereafter established the Outpost Nurseries - one of the largest nurseries operating on the east coast which at its peak included 2,000 acres in Ridgefield. The mansion was later operated as the Fox Hill Inn, an upscale restaurant which closed in the late 1960s when the property was sold to IBM, which razed the mansion in the early 1970s. 460 acres of the original 2,000 has been preserved as open space, now a part of the Connecticut state park system. The following photos of Outpost Farm were taken in 1937. They were provided by the Friends of Bennett's Pond, which obtained them from the Conley family. |
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