Basic Information
- Type of Place
- Independent City or Town
- Metro Area
- Politics c. 1860?
- Don’t Know
- Unions, Organized Labor?
- Don’t Know
Sundown Town Status
- Sundown Town in the Past?
- Possible
- Was there an ordinance?
- Perhaps, Some Oral Evidence
- Sign?
- Perhaps, Some Oral Evidence
- Year of Greatest Interest
- Still Sundown?
- Don’t Know
Census Information
| Total | White | Black | Asian | Native | Hispanic | Other | BHshld | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1860 | ||||||||
| 1870 | ||||||||
| 1880 | ||||||||
| 1890 | 4686 | 1 | ||||||
| 1900 | ||||||||
| 1910 | ||||||||
| 1920 | ||||||||
| 1930 | 3930 | 74 | ||||||
| 1940 | ||||||||
| 1950 | ||||||||
| 1960 | 5587 | 225 | ||||||
| 1970 | ||||||||
| 1980 | ||||||||
| 1990 | ||||||||
| 2000 | 5534 | 5196 | 178 | |||||
| 2010 | ||||||||
| 2020 |
Method of Exclusion
- Police or Other Official Action
Main Ethnic Group(s)
- Unknown
Group(s) Excluded
- Black
- Other
Comments
Portland, CT, is situated on the Connecticut River and is home to stone quarries which supplied a large percentage of the brownstone for Manhattan.
A former resident of Portland remembers being told by a local person, “at one time, the Italian stonecutters (who all apparently came from a small Sicilian town called Melili) had to be across the Connecticut river bridge by midnight. The bridge would be left open all night so that no traffic could pass. My memory fails now but I believe they had to be over the bridge into neighboring Middletown and thus out of Portland.”
Another former Portland resident adds, “As far as the sundown laws were concerned…the Italians and other non Protestants who worked in the quarries were told to scoot after sunset. I remember that fact from a little elementary school history class tour of the place, many moons ago. Being Catholic it struck me as bizarre. I’m sure it can be verified in town records or in the town library.”