Local History & Genealogy Resources

The Hunt Room houses the library's collection of local history materials. The emphasis of the collection is on the history of the Nashua area and of New Hampshire in general.

The collection includes:

• Histories of Nashua, including the history of the mills that developed along the Merrimack and Nashua rivers.
• Histories of Hillsborough County, New Hampshire in general, and other New Hampshire counties and towns.
• Newspapers on microfilm, including Nashua’s Telegraph and L’Impartial, going back to the 1800s.
• Books by Nashua residents and other New Hampshire authors.
• Genealogical materials, including:
• Lineage Book of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution
• The New England Historical and Genealogical Register
• Nashua birth, marriage, and death listings from the late 1800s and early 1900s
• A selection of local cemetery records.
• Files of historical pamphlets and newspaper articles on the history of the Nashua community.
• Historical Nashua city annual reports and city directories. (Current city government information is available in the Reference Department.)
• Nashua High School yearbooks.
• Historical maps of the Nashua area. Of particular note is the 1676 map of Dunstable-Nashua.
• Historical photographs. Some of these photos are available for viewing online. Copies of photographs may be made at the customer’s expense. The General Adult Services Department handles this through a local business.

For a list of books and other library resources that contain birth, marriage, and death records, see "Vital Records @ Nashua Public Library" (this file opens with Adobe Reader).

Electronic Resources

The Hunt Room has a computer reserved for genealogy and history research. From it, you can access:

• America's Obituaries and Death Notices, a large collection of newspaper obituaries and death notices from the United States and U.S. outlying areas. Some notices go back to the early 1990s, most go back only 3 to 4 years.
• Ancestry Library Edition, a database of census records, birth, marriage, death, military and immigration records and much more. (In-library access only.)
• HeritageQuest database, which includes census records and other genealogical resources, available in the library or from home with your Nashua Public Library card.
• History of the City of Nashua, N.H., edited by E.E. Parker.
• Historical photographs of Nashua.

Recommended Genealogy Web Sites

• American-Canadian Genealogical Society
• Castle Garden has immigration records from 1830-1892
• Cyndi's List of Genealogy Sites
• Ellis Island Immigration Records
• Family Search Internet Genealogy Service
• The Library of Congress offers information on proper storage, handling, and display of family treasures such as photographs, books, and papers.
• New England Historical and Genealogical Society
• United States Vital Records Information 

Visiting the Hunt Room
The collection is open to the public during library hours. The Hunt Room is occasionally reserved for meetings, so researchers may want to call ahead (603-589-4611) to determine availability of the room for research. The Hunt Room is available for public access to research materials every Wednesday and Thursday from 6:00-9:00. The one exeption to this is the third Wednesday of each month when the room is available from 6:00 to 7:00.

Materials in the Hunt Room may not be checked out, but may be photocopied. Stop by the Reference Desk to request access to the Hunt Room. Doors to the room are kept locked to insure security, and use of the room is supervised.