Hillsborough County - Profile
County Seats: Manchester and Nashua
History: Hillsborough County was organized on May 6,
1771 and named in honor of Will Hill, the Earl of Hillsborough.
The county has the largest population in the state with 346,160
residents, nearly one-third of whom live in the city of Manchester.
During the 1800s, Manchester was known as the textile capital of the United States.
The Amoskeag Mills at Amoskeag Falls on the Merrimack River employed 17,000 people
and produced four million yards of cloth per week at its peak.
Nashua, the second largest city in the county and also the state, was the first
inland town to be settled in New Hampshire.
Peterborough was the inspiration for and the site of the first performance of
the play, Our Town, by Thornton Wilder. The town of Hillsborough was the birthplace
of our 14th president, Franklin Pierce. The county also boasts several
playhouses and theaters, among them, the Palace Theater in Manchester and the
American Stage Festival in Milford.
Dominant industries include manufacture and retail trade. Hillsborough County
is the leading source of meals and rooms tax revenues for the state. Colleges
in the county include the University
of New Hampshire at Manchester and Nashua, Daniel Webster and Rivier in
Nashua, Southern New Hampshire University, Hesser, Notre
Dame and Springfield
College in Manchester
and Saint Anselm in Goffstown. Parks, such
as Greenfield, Miller, Fox and Silver Lake State Parks and Beaver Brook and Shieling
Forest offer outdoor recreation while the Currier Gallery of Art and the Institute
of Arts and Sciences in Manchester and the Nashua Arts and Science Center provide
cultural opportunities. The county agricultural fair at the 4H Youth Center in
New Boston, always held on the weekend following Labor Day, and Manchester's
Riverfest on the Merrimack River in the millyard are annual celebrations of rural
and urban county life.
