Two centuries on, the shoreline gave Connecticut a different kind of landmark: Sherwood Island, where the state's first land purchases in 1914 created what would become, after a long public battle, Connecticut's first state park — 238 acres of beach, salt marsh, and woodland on the Sound, right in the Greens Farms section of Westport. A quiet shoreline enclave with three and a half centuries behind it, Greens Farms still holds the promise of the name the Pequot gave it.
Greens Farms is the oldest neighborhood in Westport, Connecticut, and its history runs back through colonial farms to the Pequot, who called this shoreline Machamux. The first English families settled here in 1648, drawn by the fertile meadows and the abundance of shellfish along the Sound. Through the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries the area thrived as a shoreline farming and milling community, its orchards, cornfields, and salt marshes feeding local families and supplying trade. The name reflected exactly what the settlers found: a beautiful, productive stretch of coast that rewarded the people who tended it.
Why People Visit Greens Farms Connecticut
- Explore Sherwood Island State Park, Connecticut's first state park — 238 acres of beach, salt marsh, and woodland on Long Island Sound, with swimming, fishing, and birdwatching.
- Find the Machamux Boulder on the old Common at Green's Farms Road near Morningside Drive, the monument marking the original 1648 settlement.
- See the Green's Farms Congregational Church, the parish society's 1853 meeting house on Hillandale Road carrying a continuous history since 1711.
- Drive Beachside Avenue past historic shoreline estates, with the Sound on one side and salt marsh on the other.
- Walk the quiet shoreline lanes around Frost Point — named for Bankside Farmer Daniel Frost — and the marsh edges of Sasco Creek.
- Catch the Metro-North New Haven Line at Greens Farms Station for a commuter-rail glimpse of the neighborhood's daily rhythm between New York and the Connecticut shoreline.
