Concord NH is the capital city of the U.S. state of New Hampshire and the county seat of Merrimack County. As of the 2010 census, its population was 42,695. Concord includes the villages of Penacook, East Concord and West Concord. The city is home to the University of New Hampshire School of Law, New Hampshire’s only law school; St. Paul’s School, a private preparatory school; New Hampshire Technical Institute, a two-year community college; and the Granite State Symphony Orchestra.
The area that would become Concord was originally settled thousands of years ago by Abenaki Native Americans called the Pennacook. The tribe fished for migrating salmon, sturgeon, and alewives with nets strung across the rapids of the Merrimack River. The stream was also the transportation route for their birch bark canoes, which could travel from Lake Winnipesaukee to the Atlantic Ocean. The broad sweep of the Merrimack River valley floodplain provided good soil for farming beans, gourds, pumpkins, melons and maize.
