The Connecticut Panhandle is in southwestern Connecticut, where it abuts New York State. It is contained entirely in Fairfield County and includes Greenwich, Stamford, New Canaan, and Darien, housing some of the wealthiest residents of the United States. Official language(s) English Capital Hartford Largest city Bridgeport Area - Total - Width - Length - % water - Latitude - Longitude Ranked 48th 14,371 km² 113 km 177 km 12. ... Official language(s) None, English de facto Capital Albany Largest city New York City Area - Total - Width - Length - % water - Latitude - Longitude Ranked 27th 141,205 km² 455 km 530 km 13. ... Fairfield County is located in the southwestern corner of the state of Connecticut. ... Greenwich is a town located in Fairfield County, Connecticut. ... There is more than one place named Stamford. ... New Canaan is a town located in Fairfield County, Connecticut. ... Darien is a town located in Fairfield County, Connecticut, USA. As of the 2000 census, the town had a total population of 19,607, but a July 1, 2002 Census estimate put the towns population at 19,887. ...
The irregularity in the boundary is the result of territorial disputes in the late 1600s, culminating with New York giving up its claim to this area, whose residents considered themselves part of Connecticut, in exchange for an equivalent area extending northwards from Ridgefield, Connecticut to the Massachusetts border as well as undisputed claim to Rye, New York. The History of Connecticut begins as a number of unrelated colonial villages. ... Categories: 1600s ... Ridgefield is a town located in Fairfield County, Connecticut. ... Official language(s) English Capital Boston Largest city Boston Area - Total - Width - Length - % water - Latitude - Longitude Ranked 44th 10,555 mi²; 27,360 km² 183 mi; 295 km 113 mi; 182 km 13. ... Rye, New York is the name of two places in Westchester County, New York. ...
Under a new agreement of November 28, 1683 the boundary between Connecticut and New York was generally recognized as a line parallel to and twenty miles from the Hudson River north to the Massachusetts line.
However, New York, acknowledging most of Connecticut's settlements in Fairfield County, gave up a claims to a 61,660 acre rectangle east of the Byram River, which became the area sometimes referred to as Connecticut's"panhandle" or the "handle of the cleaver".
In return, Connecticut gave up its claims to Rye and ceded to New York a strip of land 580 rods (1.81 miles) wide "equivalent" to the area of the panhandle that extended north from Ridgefield along Dutchess, Putnam, and Westchester Counties, New York, to the Massachusetts line.
Connecticut is shaped in large part like a rectangle and its borders look as though they were planned, but in fact Connecticut owes its shape to about 150 years of wrangling with its neighbors from about 1633 to state-hood in 1776.
Connecticut is split north to south by the Connecticut River, which enters the state from Massachusetts to the north near the town of Enfield, flows south to Middletown, then shifts to a southeasterly direction, eventually flowing into Long Island Sound at the town of Old Saybrook.
Connecticut is bordered on the south by Long Island Sound, on the west by New York State, on the north by Massachusetts, and on the east by Rhode Island.