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THE BEST
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The Best and The Worst of Pittsfield, New Hampshire
Based upon the opinions of Pittsfield resident
Paul Oman
Today, the town is much different, a shadow of its former self. The mills are gone. The mansions are now apartment
buildings. The school system
needs improvement and teen crime and drugs were front page news in the
Concord Monitor newspaper during the summer of 2007. The railroad is gone. The grand old buildings are silent reminders
of better times that are gone for good. Yet traces of the old charm and character remain. While downtown can be
described as 'rundown' it is too small in area to invoke any feeling of 'skid row' or 'inner city.' To me, living
here is more like putting on an old, albeit worn, jacket that is comforting in its memories and fit even it is
no longer in the best of shape.
Of course, the town is not alone in its decline. Nearly all New England communities have seen better days. Only
the luck ones become spruced up Norman Rockwell tourist sites. Most, like Pittsfield, become home to hard working,
blue collar folks more interested in making a living than in downtown historic preservation. While that is a sad
thing in one way, it is a rather ordinary, comforting and natural state of existence in another way. It's my home
and I like living here!
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1) Pittsfield, New Hampshire is in a wonderful and convenient location:
Distances from Pittsfield to other wonderful places:
Airport in Manchester, NH 37 miles
To MA border 53 miles
To downtown Boston 82 miles
To Providence RI 175 miles
To Steeplegate Mall 14.5 miles
To Concord Hospital 22 miles
To Walmart/Target/ Home Depot 14 - 15 miles
To exit 14 on I 93 - 17 miles
kmart 24.5 miles
To Portsmouth, NH /Maine border 40 miles
To Frisbie Hospital in Rocherster, NH 23 miles
To Freeport, ME 125 miles
To Portland, ME 98 miles
To Wolfsboro, NH 27.5 miles
To downtown Manchester, NH 31 miles
To New Haven, CT 225 miles
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Portland, ME
2) A wonderful downtown area....
3) The Suncook River flows through town
4) A wonderful history.....
Basketball great Bob Cousy shows some of the finer points of the game
to Campers at his Pittsfield, NH based Camp Graylag (circa 1960s)
photo from the Pittsfield Historical Society
More on General Thyng CLICK
HERE
"Founders Cemetery"
5) A dedicated core of supporters.....
Concord Monitor - July 25, 2007
A Gilmanton couple have donated $1 million to establish the largest single source of scholarships for Pittsfield
Middle High School graduates.
Richard and Lois Foss have given smaller sums of money to help the school with projects in the past, but they hope
their new trust fund will provide seniors $40,000 in scholarships a year, divided among as many qualified applicants
as possible.
"This past year, we decided to go right ahead and do it," said Lois Foss, who's 73. "Pittsfield
is kind of one of those communities that is not, you know, very wealthy, and we just feel that it will help turn
around the town, we hope. We thought this was a good way to do it, by helping the young people get a better education.
. . . Pittsfield used to be a really thriving community, years ago, when my husband was young, and he would like
to see it get back to that."
Richard Foss, 81, grew up in Pittsfield, graduated from Pittsfield High and went into the military. He later started
his own construction company, R.C. Foss and Son. The idea behind the scholarships, he and his wife said, isn't
to provide seniors with a full ride to a four-year college, it's to help them begin a secondary education.
"This is to assist many and let them use their own initiative" to find additional financial support,
Richard Foss said. "There's a lot of students that go to tech school, which I think is a good thing. There's
some that go to college - it's diversified. I think we want to help anybody that we can."
Between 50 and 65 students graduate from Pittsfield High every year, and there are 20 to 30 scholarships from businesses
or trusts available to those graduates, School Board Chairman Scott Brown said. The Fosses' fund is by far the
largest. Before the $1 million gift, Pittsfield's biggest scholarship trust was the Dr. F.B. Argue fund, valued
at roughly $23,000 and generally used for graduates pursuing medical studies, said Cara Marston, one of Pittsfield's
three town trustees.
"We've never had this much money. It's just so generous," Marston said.
The trustees, who are elected officials charged with overseeing the town's trust funds, hired MassMutual Financial
Group and Bingham Legg Advisers to invest the Fosses' gift, Marston said. The amount of scholarship money handed
out each year will depend on how much interest the fund generates, she said, but the desired starting point is
$40,000.
There won't be a set number of scholarships awarded each year, the Fosses said, and the dollar amount per scholarship
will depend on the number of applicants. The applicants will likely be judged on academic achievement, leadership
ability, teacher recommendations and financial need, among other factors, Marston said.
At their next meeting in September, the trustees will form a committee to evaluate applicants, Marston said. In
their trust, the Fosses specified different people they would like involved in the decision - a guidance counselor,
the school principal, a school board representative and a selectman, for example - and Marston expects all three
trustees to sit on the committee as well.
That committee selection process sets the Fosses' fund apart from other town scholarships, most of which aren't
decided by a large group of people, Brown said.
"I think it will have a very positive impact," he said. "If there's 40 or 50 thousand dollars available,
we certainly can look to help some of our students who are maybe reluctant to try to go to college or technical
school, that this will help them make that decision that it is feasible, it is affordable."
The Fosses hope the fund will be a lasting benefit to the community.
"This is something that we want to see continue on, not just for a short time, but for a long time,"
Lois Foss said, "long after we're gone."
MADDIE HANNA
Monitor staff
THE WORST
1) The schools are lacking....
Pittsfield schools are the worst in the state. The NH Department of Education the 2004-2005
Attendance Rate for the Pittsfield School District places it in the bottom 20 of 171 districts. Over 80% of NH
high schools (2005/2006) have a lower dropout rate than PHS. The PHS 2005 class had significantly less students
taking the SAT exam than the state district average, Their scores were lower than the state school district averages
(as per the Department of Education's website). Outside the classroom, our soccer team has been banned from NHIAA-sponsored
events, due to "Flagrant episodes of unsportsmanlike conduct." The reality is that school data firms
and the state's own educational system have placed the Pittsfield school system, and especially the high school,
among the worst in the state in just about every category.
http://www.psk12.com/rating/index.php, a provider of school performance information, using NH school test scores for the years 1998-2004
(2004 is the latest set of available state scores), rates PHS as 82 out of 82. That's the worst in the state. PMS
is not much better - 178 out of 197. The elementary school is in the bottom 25%.
These shockingly ratings adversely affect the value of local real estate, the economic development growth of the
town, and the future of its children.
2) The downtown area is both a plus AND A MINUS
Now
Back Then
3) Vandalism, crime and sex offenders....
Pittsfield has more than its share of registered sex offenders - CLICK HERE
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Not alone in having loitering issue
Concord Monitor Editorial 8/6/07
Pittsfield's problem with downtown loitering and drug use is familiar to residents,
business owners and the police in most communities. The problem becomes more troubling when the mix includes, as
it appears to in Pittsfield, juveniles as well as people in their late teens and 20s. It's more troubling yet when
drug use is flagrant and extremely serious when it begins to spawn violence and crime.
Pittsfield resident Larry Berube was correct and courageous in his attempt to stir the community into action with
a petition requesting that the loitering and drug use be curtailed. In return, he was threatened, a window in his
home was broken and swastikas were drawn on his property. That symbol is guaranteed to provoke and intimidate,
and the young know it. It might indicate something serious, like a gang of neo-Nazi wannabes, but it's more likely
that it was used to get a rise out of adults. Either way, it's an attempt to instill fear that can't go unanswered.
Merrimack County Sheriff Scott Hilliard, who made cooperation among communities to fight drugs a campaign issue,
has been meeting with Pittsfield Police Chief Robert Wharem and his counterparts in other towns to crack down on
drug dealers. Like most small communities, Pittsfield lacks the resources to solve the problem on its own. It needs
help.
To protect public safety and New Hampshire's quality of life, law enforcement will need more resources, by which
we mean money. Drug investigations are time-consuming and expensive. Drug treatment programs for offenders are
more expensive yet. But drug addiction is responsible for the majority of crimes. It's the reason why convenience
store holdups, once a rarity, occur with alarming frequency in Concord and other cities.
Curfews and arrests for loitering aren't the answer. Many of those involved are too old for curfews and teen centers.
And the state's anti-loitering and prowling law is a poor and clumsy tool, one inappropriate to employ to control
people gathered in public places.
There's no easy answer. Stepped up police patrols and neighborhood vigilance, in the form of watch programs and
citizen willingness to call an anonymous police tip line when a problem is spied, are crucial.
The Big Brother-like proliferation of security cameras - New York City recently announced that, like London, it
is installing thousands of cameras to observe downtown - is offensive but arguably necessary. In this case, a few
cameras, adequately protected from vandals and trained on Pittsfield's downtown, would be worth trying as a deterrent.
No group should be allowed to congregate and behave in a way that makes a public place off-limits for anyone else.
When problems occur, it's the behavior of the group, not their ability to assemble peaceably, that should be addressed.
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Concord Monitor - August 02, 2007
The police plan to arrest three people within the next three weeks in connection with the vandalism that occurred
a month ago at Pittsfield's Floral Park Cemetery, where about 60 gravestones were overturned, Pittsfield Police
Chief Robert Wharem said yesterday.
The individuals are all from Pittsfield - one minor and two adults, Wharem said. The police will not make the arrests
for another two or three weeks because they're still waiting for the results of forensic evidence, he said.
"During the course of the investigation, last week was kind of the winding-down portion, where we completed
our interviews," Wharem said, "and at the conclusion of our interviews, we were sure we had the right
individuals."
The charges will likely include vandalism and criminal mischief, but they will differ for each person, Wharem said,
depending on whether the person damaged or toppled certain gravestones.
Wharem credited residents who made anonymous tips with moving the investigation forward.
It was "more or less word of mouth that came through and told us what was going on," he said.
MADDIE HANNA
Monitor staff
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Concord Monitor - Letters to the Editor - August 3, 2007
It took just the first few hours of the year I spent living in Pittsfield to determine that the town was plagued
by a youth of a drug-addled, imbecilic and prejudiced nature. I never thought that life in such a small New Hampshire
town could get much more unpleasant. Apparently, that was a stupid assumption to make.
The report of vandalism done to Larry Berube's home can only lead one to wonder if Pittsfield is the worst town
in all of New Hampshire (Monitor, Aug. 1). I do not know what the statistics say, but it has to be one of the most
unsafe suburban areas.
Many claim that Pittsfield really is a nice town, that it is just given a bad name by a few unfortunate young people
who insist on ruining the party for everyone. I'm sorry, but that clearly is not the case; the violence and illegal
activity are not coincidental, nor are they infrequent.
The only reason such acts are so commonplace is because there are not enough people in Pittsfield like Larry Berube
who bravely stand up for what they know is right.
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| When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for
one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers
of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent
respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. --Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world. He has refused his assent to laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good. He has forbidden his governors to pass laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them. He has refused to pass other laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of representation in the legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only. He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures. He has dissolved representative houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people. He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the legislative powers, incapable of annihilation, have returned to the people at large for their exercise; the state remaining in the meantime exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within. He has endeavored to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migration hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands. He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers. He has made judges dependent on his will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance. He has kept among us, in times of peace, standing armies without the consent of our legislature. He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation: For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us: For protecting them, by mock trial, from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states: For cutting off our trade with all parts of the world: For imposing taxes on us without our consent: For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of trial by jury: For transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offenses: For abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighboring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies: For taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments: For suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated government here, by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands. He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare, is undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions. In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. Nor have we been wanting in attention to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends. We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America, in General Congress, assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the name, and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the state of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor. New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton Massachusetts: John Hancock, Samual Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry Rhode Island: Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery Connecticut: Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott New York: William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris New Jersey: Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark Pennsylvania: Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross Delaware: Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean Maryland: Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton Virginia: George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton North Carolina: William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn South Carolina: Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton Georgia: Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton Source: The Pennsylvania Packet, July 8, 1776 |