Since the development of photography in the mid-nineteenth century, the camera has been used as a tool of both discovery and preservation. Photographs bring alive our image of the past, and can open a floodgate of memories and nostalgia or inspire curiosity and a sense of history. One of the prominent geological features in the southwest corner of New Hampshire is Grand Monadnock, a bald granite mountain that is a constant presence for miles around. Mount Monadnock gives its name to the beautiful region surrounding its base, a region made up of small towns and villages hundreds of years old, places such as Marlborough and New Ipswich, Peterborough and Rindge, Jaffrey and Hancock, Troy and Fitzwilliam, Harrisville and Dublin. The selection of photographs which make up this charming visual history highlights some of the themes important in the rich history of these communities.

Around the landmarks of a village—the meetinghouse and common, the inn and the store—we see work and play, celebration and catastrophe; indeed all the elements of daily life as it was played out over a century of change.