1 History

New Hampshire was founded by Captain John Mason and first settled in 1623, just three years after the Pilgrims landed in Massachusetts and it was one of the thirteen colonies that revolted against British rule in the American Revolution.

2 Law and Government

The New Hampshire state capital is Concord, which has also been known over time by the names Rumford and Penacook. The governor of New Hampshire is Craig Benson (Republican) and its two U.S. senators are Judd Gregg (Republican) and John E. Sununu (Republican), whose father John H. Sununu was governor of the state from 1983- 1988. List of New Hampshire Governors.

Its strong libertarian heritage has attracted the Free State Project to New Hampshire. It has also earned the positive attention of residents in neighboring states: Killington, Vermont voted on March 2, 2004 to secede from Vermont and join New Hampshire.

The New Hampshire General Court, which has 415 members, claims to be the third-largest legislative body in the English-speaking world, behind only the United States House of Representatives and the British House of Commons. Both state representatives and state senators are paid just $100 a year, effectively meaning that state laws are written by volunteers. It is because of this 18th century pay scale that New Hampshire law-makers are with rare exceptions wealthy or retired citizens.

3 Geography

See: List of New Hampshire counties

New Hampshire is part of the New England region. It is bounded by Quebec to the north, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, Massachusetts to the south, and Vermont to the west. New Hampshire's major regions are the White Mountains region, the Lakes area, the Seacoast region, the Merrimack Valley area, the Monadnock region, and the Dartmouth-Lake Sunapee area.

The Presidential Range in New Hampshire spans the central portion of the state, with Mount Washington being the tallest, and other mountains like Mount Madison and Mount Quincy Adams surrounding it.

Major rivers include the 116 mile (187 km) Merrimack River, which bisects the state north-south and ends up in Massachusetts. Its major tributaries include the Souhegan River. The 410 mile (670 km) Connecticut River, which starts at New Hampshire's Connecticut Lakes and flows south to Connecticut, forms the western border of New Hampshire. Oddly, the state border is not in the center of that river, as is usually the case, but lies at the low-water mark on the Vermont side, so New Hampshire actually owns the whole river. The Piscataqua River and its several tributaries form the state's only significant ocean port where they flow into the Atlantic at Portsmouth.

The largest lake is Lake Winnipesaukee, which covers 72 square miles (186 km²) in the central part of New Hampshire.

New Hampshire has the shortest ocean coastline of any coastal state, just 18 miles (29 km). Hampton Beach is a popular local summer tourist destination. About 10 miles (16 km) offshore are the Isles of Shoals, nine small islands best known as the site of a 19th-century art colony founded by poet Celia Thaxter.

4 Economy

New Hampshire's 1999 total state gross product was $44 billion, placing it 39^th in the nation. Its 2000 Per Capita Personal Income was $33,332, 6^th in the nation. Its agricultural outputs are dairy products, nursery stock, cattle, apples, and eggs. Its industrial outputs are machinery, electric equipment, rubber and plastic products, and tourism.

New Hampshire experienced a significant shift in its economic base during the last century. Historically, the base was composed of the traditional New England manufactures of textiles, shoe-making, and small machining shops drawing upon low wage labor from nearby small farms and from Quebec. Today, these sectors contribute only 2% for textiles, 2% for leather goods, and 9% for machining of the state's total manufacturing dollar value ( Source: US Economic Census for 1997, Manufacturing, New Hampshire). These traditional sectors experienced their sharp decline during the Twentieth Century due to increasingly obsolete plants and increasingly cheaper wages available in the US South.

The current New Hampshire economy is largely driven by fiscal policy. The state has no personal income tax and advocates a frugal budget, thereby attracting commuters, light industry, specialty horticulture, and service firms from other jurisdictions with high tax policies, notably from neighboring Massachusetts. This is a viable fiscal policy for a small, high-income state with limited social service demands, but it has not been one hundred per cent successful, and pockets of depressed manufacturing activity still remain. Additionally, New Hampshire's lack of a broad based tax system (aside from the controversial state-wide property tax) has resulted in the state's local communities having some of the nation's highest property taxes.

5 Demographics

The population of the state in 2000 is 1,235,786.

6 Important cities and towns

• Manchester, the largest city in the state, has a main street (Elm Street) which is a dead-end at both ends.
• Keene is still often called "The Elm City" despite the fact that the Dutch Tree Blight destroyed most of the city's Elm Trees in the 1930s.
• Peterborough is the inspiration for the town of Grover's Corners portrayed in Thornton Wilder's play Our Town.

Manchester Nashua Concord Derry Portsmouth Rochester Keene Lebanon Durham Peterborough Loudon Claremont

Salem Dover Merrimack Londonderry Hudson Hampton Milford Hanover New London Randolph Tilton Franklin

7 Education

7.1 Colleges and universities

Antioch New England Chester College of New England Colby-Sawyer College College for Lifelong Learning Daniel Webster College Dartmouth College Franklin Pierce College Franklin Pierce Law Center Keene State College

New England College Southern New Hampshire University Notre Dame College Plymouth State University Rivier College Saint Anselm College The Thomas More College of Liberal Arts University of New Hampshire University of New Hampshire at Manchester

8 Professional sport teams

Minor league baseball teams:

• Nashua Pride
• New Hampshire Fisher Cats

Hockey teams:

• Manchester Monarchs

Arena football teams:

• Manchester Wolves

9 Miscellaneous information

See List of New Hampshire-related topics

• New Hampshire was the last of the New England states to observe Fast Day, a day of prayer for a bountiful harvest. Traditionallly observed on the 4th Thursday in April, from 1949 was observed as a legal holiday on the 4th Monday in April until 1991 when it was replaced by Civil Rights Day. [1]
• In 1999 New Hampshire changed the name of Civil Rights Day to Martin Luther King Day. [2]
• There are no general sales or individual income taxes in New Hampshire, though the state does have meals, lodging, and other taxes. ( List of other states without personal income taxes)
• New Hampshire is the only state that does not mandate public kindergarten, partly out of frugality and lack of funding, and partly out of belief in local control, a philosophy under which towns and cities, not the state, make as many decisions as possible. As of 2003, all but about two dozen communities in the state provided public kindergarten with local property-tax money.
• Like several states, New Hampshire requires all hard liquor to be sold in state-owned, state-run stores. This system generates millions of dollars annually for the state and results in liquor being so cheap that it attracts many out-of-state customers. Many liquor stores are located near state lines, often on interstate highways.
• New Hampshire is host to the New Hampshire Highland Games , formerly the Scottish Games . New Hampshire has also registered an official Tartan with the proper authorities in Scotland; this tartan is used to make kilts worn by the State Police while they serve during the games.
• New Hampshire has the only piece of Interstate highway that is two-lane (i.e. a single northbound lane and a single southbound lane) with a cobblestone median. This was done to preserve Franconia Notch, the site of the Old Man of the Mountain, a rock formation visible from Interstate 93 in Franconia. The formation was the symbol of the state until it fell apart, due to natural erosion, on May 3, 2003.
• The Census of 2000 says the unincorporated town of Erving's Location has a population of exactly 1 - although this fact is disputed. A June 27, 2004, article in the Union-Leader of Manchester quoted the administrator of Coos County as saying the town's only taxable property is some utility poles, and that nobody has ever lived there.
• In northern New Hampshire the town of Dixville Notch is traditionally the first city or town in the U.S. to vote in presidential primaries and the presidential election. The few dozen residents of Dixville Notch all stay awake until after midnight to vote. State law grants that a town where all registered citizens have voted may close early and announce their results.
• New Hampshire is the only state with no mandatory seatbelt law for adults, no motorcycle helmet law for adults nor mandatory vehicle insurance for automobiles.

9.1 Daily newspapers

Union Leader of Manchester Telegraph of Nashua Concord Monitor Foster's Daily Democrat of Dover

Portsmouth Herald Keene Sentinel Conway Daily Sun Eagle Times of Claremont

9.2 Other publications

• New Hampshire Business Review (statewide)
• Hippo Press (Manchester)

10 External links

• Official State Website
• The New Hampshire Almanac

Regions of New Hampshire
Dartmouth Sunapee | Great North Woods | Lakes | Merrimack Valley | Monadnock | Seacoast | White Mountains
Counties
Belknap | Carroll | Cheshire | Coos | Grafton | Hillsborough | Merrimack | Rockingham | Strafford | Sullivan

New Hampshire

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