NEW LONDON, Conn.—All Susette Kelo wanted was to live with a view of the water.
In 1997, Kelo achieved her dream with the purchase of a 900-square foot Victorian home located in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood of New London, Conn.
The home enveloped her when she walked through the front door for the first time, like she had lived there her entire life. And when Kelo bought the home, she painted it pink—Odessa Rose from Benjamin Moore’s historic collection, Kelo specifically remembers.
From her front porch, the mother of five boys could see the mouth of the Thames River. On a clear day, she could see all the way to Montauk Point on New York’s Long Island.
But less than one year after moving to her piece of paradise, Kelo found out the city of New London wanted to take her waterfront property and others belonging to her Fort Trumbull neighbors.
The city used its power of eminent domain.
And so she, along with six other families who owned 15 properties in Fort Trumbull, fought back.
“When I first started this battle, it was about me and this little pink house,” Kelo told The Daily Signal. “But it grew into something much bigger than that. It turned into a nationwide battle to save the Fort Trumbull neighborhood.”
Kelo and her fellow plaintiffs—Thelma Brelesky, Pasquale Cristofaro, Wilhelmina and Charles Dery, James and Laura Guretsky, Richard Beyer and Bill von Winkle—fought the city of New London to keep their homes. The city wanted to transfer the property to a private nonprofit organization, which would facilitate its development.
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