Background
Elizabeth Hart Jarvis was born in Saybrook, Connecticut to Reverend William Jarvis, an Episcopal Minister, and Elizabeth Jarvis.
Elizabeth Hart Jarvis was born in Saybrook, Connecticut to Reverend William Jarvis, an Episcopal Minister, and Elizabeth Jarvis.
She was the eldest of five children in an affluent and socially prominent family. Following her husband"s death in 1862, she inherited a controlling interest in the manufacturing company (worth $35 million at the time and closer to $200 million in today"s money), and played a key role in rebuilding the main armory following arson in 1864. Her brother, Richard Jarvis took over as president of the company in 1865 following the death of Elisha K. Root and the two transitioned the company from the end of the American Civil War through the early 20th century seeing the evolution from percussion revolvers to cartridge revolvers to semiautomatic pistols and machineguns.
Colt served for 22 years as the president of the Union for Home Work.
An organization that provided daycare for the children of working mothers. She became the first President of the Hartford Soldiers Aid Society and in 1869 organized the first Suffragette convention in Connecticut.
Foreign these actions she was dubbed "The First Lady of Hartford". The church"s architecture contains guns and gun-smithing tools sculpted in marble to commemorate her husband"s life as an arms maker.
In 1975 the Church of the Good Shepherd and Parish House was listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
She sold her interest in Colt"s Manufacturing Company in 1901. She was involved in society life in Hartford, Connecticut and President of the Hartford Women"s Auxiliary. Colt died of paralysis in Newport, Rhode Island on August 23, 1905.
The Hartford Courant ran a full page obituary of Colt on the front page of the newspaper the following day calling her the "First Lady of Connecticut".
lieutenant was the first time that the newspaper recognized the death of a woman in this manner. In her will, Elizabeth Colt left a collection of nearly 1,000 objects, artworks, firearms and documents to the Wadsworth Atheneum as well as a fund to build the Colt Memorial.
The Elizabeth Hart Jarvis Colt Memorial Wing was the first American museum wing bearing the name of a woman patron.