The 250th and North Hampton

The 250th and North Hampton 

There’s been a small exhibit in the Library about the 250th – not of the U.S. but of the Town in 1992. Yes, North Hampton was here before there was a United States.   The display was chosen for practical reasons – when we looked through our collections,  we had nothing showing what North Hampton did for the Nation’s Bicentennial in 1976.  If anyone remembers or has materials relating to that celebration please consider donating them to us. 

In Portsmouth, thanks to the internet and AI, I now know in 1976 there was a week-long celebration – fireworks, concerts, boat races,  parades, and special activities at both the Portsmouth Naval Base and Pease AFB attracting as many as 50,000 people.  

This year there also will be an array of activities in Portsmouth.  For North Hampton the Library and Historical Society have offered programs sponsored by NH Humanities.  There is one joint NHPL & NHHS US@250 program remaining on June 30th that can catch the reader up on what New Hampshire and North Hampton citizens were doing back then.    

Unlike Portsmouth which was a Loyalist stronghold until the Royal Governor John Wentworth decamped in August 1775,  North Hampton was a hotbed of revolutionary folks (or perhaps the others stayed quiet).  A previous blog entitled How North Hampton helped defeat the British in the American Revolution provides some information.  

In 1776 there were 90 families in North Hampton.  The North Hampton Timeline found on the Town website https://www.northhampton-nh.gov/historical-society/pages/time-line-documents provides the names of all who signed the Association Test pledging loyalty to the American cause.  Signers were limited to all men 21 years or age of older, excluding “lunaticks, idiots and Negroes.”  

That same timeline shows that by 1777 and Saratoga, Paul Long, an African-American, had enlisted and served.   There’s another blog about Long entitled Who was Paul Long?  and two about Henry Dearborn, a North Hampton favorite son, American Revolution hero and Secretary of War under Jefferson --  The “Dearborn” of Dearborn Park and Henry Dearborn Revisited.

This year’s anniversary is a significant one for the country, having existed for a quarter of a millennium.