WEST HARTFORD, Conn. — The tail of Conny the Sperm Whale was successfully and safely removed from the site of the former Children’s Museum Tuesday in West Hartford. The tail will later be installed in West Hartford’s Trout Brook Greenway, pending approval of permits.
The effort was led by a coalition including Cetacean Society International (CSI), Continental Properties, the Town of West Hartford, the Children’s Museum, Kingswood-Oxford, and approximately 250 individual donors.
CSI, a non-profit whale conservation and advocacy organization, built Conny the Sperm Whale in 1976, with all volunteer labor. It was inspired by the Connecticut General Assembly’s 1975 proclamation to designate the sperm whale as the state animal because of its specific contribution to the state's history and its present-day plight as an endangered species.
The tail was moved and placed in storage at the Town of West Hartford’s Public Works facility on Brixton Street. Continental Properties, the new owners of the former Children’s Museum property, paid for the costs to successfully remove Conny’s tail and transport it to Brixton Street. Continental is building a new multi-family community on the site.
“After a great deal of consideration, we determined that our original plan to move all of Conny - a 20-ton whale sculpture - was far too costly and technically challenging,” said CSI President Jessica Dickens. “We believe that by installing Conny’s tail, as if diving away to explore the world’s oceans, on the Trout Brook Greenway, we will be able to continue to honor Conny’s legacy for generations to come and inspire environmental awareness and action.”
CSI is currently submitting an application for a permit to permanently install Conny on the Greenway.
CSI is accepting donations to cover the remaining costs of installing the tail and sustaining CSI’s environmental education, outreach and research, through CSI’s GoFundMe page here.
Angelo Bavaro is an anchor and reporter at FOX61 News. He can be reached at abavaro@fox61.com. Follow him on Facebook and Twitter.
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