Was it a folly or just a circle?
I’ve heard that the intersection of routes 7 and 35 was known as Carol’s Folly. Who was Carol and what did she do?
She wasn’t Carol; he was Carroll, as in Leo Francis Carroll. He was perhaps the leading public servant in Ridgefield in the 20th Century, and he did not like the name.
Leo Carroll began a 34-year career in the Connecticut State Police in 1919 when the department was largely a motorcycle patrol. The “Flying Squad,” as it was called, mostly cracked down on trucks, many of which were hauling illegal booze.
He rose through the ranks to become the lieutenant in command of Troop A Barracks in Ridgefield, and later became second in command of the entire Connecticut State Police. Mr. Carroll later served four years as chairman of the state Liquor Control Commission.
In 1957, Mr. Carroll was elected Ridgefield’s first selectman, a job he held for 10 years. If that wasn’t enough, in the 1970s he served six years on the Board of Education.
But it was while he was running Troop A that the once-famous term, “Carroll’s Folly,” was coined. According to Mr. Carroll, “some damn Democrat started it to hurt me politically.”
Years ago routes 7 and 35 intersected with a 90-degree junction, without a traffic light, and many accidents occurred. Around 1940, Lt. Carroll asked the state highway department to redesign the intersection, resulting in a semi-rotary arrangement that lasted until around 1984, when the state returned the T, but this time with traffic lights.
Mr. Carroll claimed that “the circle,” as he preferred to call it, was “the safest intersection in New England. There hasn’t been a single (serious) accident out there.”
However, the seeming complexity of the circle gave rise to some complaints, many of them half teasing. One day soon after the intersection was completed, the Rev. Hugh Shields, pastor of the First Congregational Church, called Lt. Carroll at the barracks and said, “Lieutenant, I’m up here at 35 and 7, and I don’t know which way to go to get to Danbury.”
“Listen,” Lt. Carroll replied, “you sober up and you’ll find your way.”
The lieutenant, who knew the minister never touched a drop of alcohol, then hung up.