ALLENSTOWN

A short history of Allenstown

Allenstown takes its name from 17th-century provincial governor Samuel Allen. It was granted in 1721 but not incorporated until July 2, 1831. A part of neighboring Bow was annexed to Allenstown in 1815, and a portion of Hooksett was annexed in 1853.

Most of the town's earliest settlement occurred in the eastern part of town along Deerfield Road, around the area now mostly occupied by Bear Brook State Park, and where the Old Allenstown Meeting House is located. Following the Civil War, the town's population shifted from the east to the west part of town, centered around the confluence of the Merrimack and Suncook rivers, in the area now known as Suncook.

Railroads were instrumental to the development of Allenstown. First, the Concord and Portsmouth Railroad running from Candia and points east arrived in the 1852, but that line was subsequently torn up from Candia to Allenstown, with a new branch being built from the Suncook River down to the Hooksett Falls in 1862. The Suncook Valley Railroad would follow in 1869, which ran northeast along the river, first to Pittsfield and later, to Center Barnstead. While the Suncook depot was just across the river in Pembroke, the Suncook Valley Railroad built Allenstown another depot in the northern part of town, along what is now Verville Road. In 1902, the Concord & Manchester Electric Railway came to town, connecting its two namesakes. It crossed the Suncook Valley track adjacent to the Catholic Church on Main Street; the Blodgett depot was built at that location to facilitate transfers between the steam road and the interurban.

Allenstown, at the junction of the Suncook and Merrimack rivers, proved a prime location in which to harness the Suncook's power for manufacturing. The China Mill, the only large textile mill in the Allenstown part of Suncook, was built in 1868. At this time, a large number of French Canadians, mostly from Quebec, began emigrating to the area to work in the mills. Eventually, Suncook became one of many New England industrial villages known to locals as "le petit Canada."

In 2006, Allenstown was hit hard by the Mother's Day Flood. More than 10 inches (250 mm) of rainfall caused the Suncook River to overflow, inundating homes, roads, and other low-lying areas. As a result of the flood, 14 flood-prone homes in Allenstown were bought out with federal money and demolished in order to avoid more flooding and evacuations in the future.

Adapted (trimmed) from the Wikipedia article Allenstown, New Hampshire, revision 1377057419 by its contributors, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.