WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — Conny the Whale, once one of the centerpieces of the Children's Museum in West Hartford, had its tail relocated to a new home.
When the Children's Museum moved to make way for a real estate project on Trout Brook Drive, Conny had to be stored at West Hartford’s Department of Public Works. For the past year, a team behind preserving the massive Sperm Whale Sculpture raised funds to move Conny.
Led by members of the Cetacean Society International, the project for Conny came together. The plan called for just the tail of the whale sculpture to be relocated and put on display.
Dan Barstow from the CSI said, “this (whale tail) is 22 feet at the tip and it weighs 5,600 pounds.”
Barstow, whose father Rob was the project manager on the original installation of Conny in 1976 added, “We wanted to save all of Conny but that was just too expensive, it was in the hundreds of thousands of dollars, but we had to save the spirit of Conny and that led to cutting the tail and envisioning that Conny is still here but it’s under the ocean.”
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Moving Conny’s tail and putting it into place involved a full construction team that spent hours rigging and lifting the sculpture and then lowering and securing it onto a concrete pad.
Along a trail on the Trout Brook Greenway, just across the street from where the whale used to sit, Conny’s tail now sticks out like a spire.
Jessica Dickens, the president of said, “Conny’s legacy will inspire people and people will see this and hopefully think about whales so that whales can continue to flourish and thrive in the future.”
After the construction is complete, plans call for the West Hartford Garden Club to assist with the landscaping of Conny. An official unveiling ceremony is being planned for sometime in the fall.
Jimmy Altman is a reporter at FOX61 News. He can be reached at jaltman@fox61.com. Follow him on Facebook, X and Instagram.
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