Connecticut Town Chafes at Return to the Spotlight
Published: February 9, 2010
MIDDLETOWN, Conn. — There was the college-wide ban on students’ sidewalk scribblings, which set off a First Amendment debate at one of the country’s more progressive campuses. There was the faculty-led seminar, “Pornography: Writing of Prostitutes,” which raised questions over the role of sex in undergraduate curriculums.
Usually, this riverside city of 48,000 residents claims the national spotlight only when its primary attraction, Wesleyan University, makes news. But in the last year, Middletown has gained attention for more unseemly, tragic events: the point-blank shooting death of a Wesleyan undergraduate; the arrest of a resident in a slaying at Yale University; and, on Sunday, the explosion at a power plant that killed five workers and injured 12. “It just keeps happening, strange events,” said Anthony Garofalo, 44, a lifelong resident who owns a local construction firm and said he was friends with the plant’s developer. “You don’t want that stuff to happen anywhere, but when it’s at …