In May 1792, two men put down their tools. They did not intend to pick them up again. Peter and Squier Brown, brothers who together owned a “considerable Estate” in Stamford, Connecticut, informed their family that they intended to sell their land, live off the proceeds, and never work again. Their decision was sufficiently radical to cause frustration and concern among their family and the state authorities. However, permission to sell the land, unusually, resided with their brother, Joseph, and the General Assembly of Connecticut. Why was this? Joseph was the conservator to Peter and Squier, who had been “deaf and dumb from their birth.”