Connecticut Humanities has awarded a $24,500 Implementation Grant to the Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum in support of a new exhibition titled, “Bulls of Wall Street: High Finance, Power, and Social Change in Victorian America,” which will open to the public on May 16, 2025.

“With dozens of compelling applications requesting nearly $700,000, this was a very competitive round of grants,” said Dr. Jason R. Mancini, executive director of CT Humanities. “We are proud to support these projects, which highlight important humanities themes at organizations across the state.  We hope that Connecticut residents and visitors will explore and enjoy the rich stories of our state’s cultural organizations.”            

This grant will support the launch of an exciting exhibition that will explore the financial world of LeGrand Lockwood, one of America’s first millionaires, and his more renowned peers—Vanderbilt, Gould, and Fisk, while investigating the roles and challenges of women and individuals from marginalized communities who tried to break Wall Street’s “glass ceiling” and enter the stock market in 19^th century America.

This exhibition will also delve into the birth of Wall Street, its financial instruments, and scientific breakthroughs that modernized and accelerated the exchange of information, making Wall Street the new economic engine and propelling “self-made men” to new heights of prosperity, while changing American society’s trajectory with its burgeoning capitalism.

LMMM chairman Douglas Hempstead and executive director Susan Gilgore said: “We are very grateful to Connecticut Humanities for awarding critical funding to this thought-provoking and exciting exhibition on 19^th century American Finance. We also thank all our legislators for their continued efforts in supporting the inspiring programs that LMMM can offer to its diverse communities with CTH's support.”

The exhibition will be curated by Alexander Dubois, Curator of Collections at Litchfield Historical Society, Litchfield, CT, and will be based on the planning also funded by CT Humanities, which was developed with the help of several outstanding expert advisors including Challis Professor of History at The University of Sydney, Australia, Shane White, award-winning author of, Prince of Darkness, The Untold Story of Jeremiah G. Hamilton, Wall Street's First Black Millionaire; John E. Herzog, who spearheaded the expansion of Herzog, Heine, Geduld, Inc. into the third-largest NASDAQ market maker in the country, founder of the Museum of American Finance in NYC, and author of, A Billion to One; Prof. Janice Traflet, Ph.D. M.B.A., Howard Scott Research Professor of Management, Bucknell University, and author of, Nation of Small Shareowners: Marketing Wall Street After the Second World War, Johns Hopkins, 2013; and Consultant Archivist Steve Wheeler, Archive Director of the NY Stock Exchange from 1986 to 2015.

About Connecticut Humanities: CT Humanities (CTH) is an independent, nonprofit affiliate of the National Endowment for the Humanities. CTH connects people to the humanities through grants, partnerships, and collaborative programs. CTH projects, administration, and program development are supported by state and federal matching funds, community foundations, and gifts from private sources. Learn more by visiting cthumanities.org.

For more on LMMM and “Bulls of Wall Street” and LMMM please visit: www.lockwoodmathewsmansion.com or call 203-838-9799.