Historic Sites In New Hampshire. I taught American history for more than twenty-five years before I started visiting these places, and the Granite State holds a remarkable range of them. Shaker villages, a president’s homestead, a sculptor’s studio, a Cold War submarine, and a railway that climbs the Northeast’s highest peak all sit within a few hours’ drive.
Below are the 15 historic sites in New Hampshire I recommend most, ranked from a preserved Shaker community up to a sculptor’s estate that helped define American art. I have noted who manages each one and what you will find when you arrive.
Historic Sites In New Hampshire At A Glance
| Site | Type & Manager | Location |
|---|---|---|
| Saint-Gaudens National Historical Park | National Historical Park (NPS) | Cornish |
| Franklin Pierce Homestead | State Historic Site | Hillsborough |
| Strawbery Banke Museum | Living-history museum (nonprofit) | Portsmouth |
| Mount Washington Cog Railway | National Historic Landmark (private) | Mount Washington |
| USS Albacore | Museum submarine (nonprofit) | Portsmouth |
| Harrisville Historic District | National Historic Landmark district | Harrisville |
| Epic of American Civilization | NHL mural at Dartmouth College | Hanover |
| Robert Frost Farm | State Historic Site | Derry |
| Enfield Shaker Village | Historic site (nonprofit) | Enfield |
| Appalachian Trail | National Scenic Trail (NPS) | White Mountains |
| Castle in the Clouds | Historic estate (nonprofit) | Moultonborough |
| The Fells | Historic estate (nonprofit) | Newbury |
| Daniel Webster Birthplace | State Historic Site | Franklin |
| Star Island | Historic island (nonprofit) | Isles of Shoals |
| Canterbury Shaker Village | National Historic Landmark (nonprofit) | Canterbury |
15. Canterbury Shaker Village
I start at one of the best-preserved Shaker communities in the country. Founded in 1792, Canterbury Shaker Village was home to a celibate religious community known for its plain, beautiful craftsmanship and its inventions. At its peak it had hundreds of members and dozens of buildings; today it is a National Historic Landmark and nonprofit museum with 25 restored original structures. Guided tours and demonstrations bring the Shakers’ ingenuity and faith to life.
14. Star Island
Out in the Atlantic, about six miles off the coast, Star Island is part of the Isles of Shoals, a cluster of islands shared by New Hampshire and Maine. Fishermen settled here in the 1600s, and by the 1800s the island held a grand resort hotel, the Oceanic, which still stands. Today it is a nonprofit conference and retreat center, and day visitors can ride a tour boat from Portsmouth to walk the island and tour the historic stone chapel and hotel.
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13. Daniel Webster Birthplace State Historic Site
Near Franklin, this state historic site preserves a small reconstructed farmhouse marking the 1782 birthplace of Daniel Webster, the famed orator, lawyer, and statesman who served as a senator and secretary of state. Webster argued landmark cases before the Supreme Court and was one of the great political voices of the early republic. The site is modest, with costumed interpreters in season, and sits in a quiet rural setting.
12. The Fells Historic Estate and Gardens
On the shore of Lake Sunapee in Newbury, The Fells was the summer home of John Milton Hay, who served as private secretary to Abraham Lincoln and later as secretary of state under Presidents McKinley and Theodore Roosevelt. The Colonial Revival house and its terraced gardens are now a nonprofit historic site. You can tour the home, wander the gardens, and hike trails through the surrounding forest and lakeshore.
11. Castle in the Clouds
High above Lake Winnipesaukee in Moultonborough, Castle in the Clouds is an Arts and Crafts mansion called Lucknow, built in 1914 by shoe magnate Thomas Plant. The estate sits on thousands of acres in the Ossipee Mountains, with sweeping views of the lakes region. It is now a nonprofit historic site, and you can tour the mansion, walk the trails to waterfalls, and dine on the terrace overlooking the lake.
10. Appalachian National Scenic Trail
The Appalachian Trail crosses roughly 160 miles of New Hampshire, including some of the most demanding terrain on the entire 2,200-mile route. The trail climbs through the White Mountains and over the Presidential Range, including the summit of Mount Washington, where the weather is famously violent. The trail is a National Scenic Trail administered by the National Park Service with the Appalachian Trail Conservancy and many volunteers.
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9. Enfield Shaker Village
On the shore of Lake Mascoma, Enfield Shaker Village preserves another of New Hampshire’s Shaker communities, active from 1793 to 1923. Its centerpiece is the Great Stone Dwelling, the largest Shaker dwelling house ever built, a six-story granite structure completed in 1841. The nonprofit museum offers tours and exhibits on Shaker life, and the building now also operates as an inn, so you can spend the night where the Shakers once lived.
8. Robert Frost Farm
In Derry, the Robert Frost Farm State Historic Site preserves the farmhouse where the poet lived from 1900 to 1911, the years when he found his voice. Many of the poems in his early collections draw on the people and landscape of this farm. The site includes the restored home and a poetry-nature trail through the woods and fields that inspired works like “Mending Wall.” It is a state historic site with seasonal tours.
7. The Epic of American Civilization
At Dartmouth College in Hanover, the Baker Library holds one of the great works of public art in North America. Between 1932 and 1934, the Mexican muralist José Clemente Orozco painted The Epic of American Civilization, a sweeping mural cycle spanning more than 3,000 square feet that traces the history of the Americas from ancient times through the modern industrial age. It is a National Historic Landmark, and you can view it free during library hours.
6. Harrisville Historic District
The village of Harrisville is one of the best-preserved early industrial communities in the country, a National Historic Landmark district. Built around brick textile mills along a chain of millponds in the early 1800s, it survives almost intact, with its mills, workers’ housing, store, and church still standing in their original setting. A nonprofit works to keep the village a living community rather than a museum, and it remains a working town you can walk through.
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5. USS Albacore
In Portsmouth, the USS Albacore is a research submarine you can walk through. Built at the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard and launched in 1953, the Albacore pioneered the teardrop hull design that shaped every modern submarine that followed. She set underwater speed records and tested new technologies for two decades. Now a National Historic Landmark and the centerpiece of a small museum, she is preserved in a grassy berth where visitors can tour the cramped interior.
4. Mount Washington Cog Railway
The Mount Washington Cog Railway, opened in 1869, was the first mountain-climbing cog railway in the world. It hauls passengers up grades as steep as 37 percent to the 6,288-foot summit of Mount Washington, the highest peak in the Northeast. The railway is a National Historic Landmark and remains privately operated, running both vintage steam and modern biodiesel locomotives. The ride to the summit, and the views from it, are unforgettable on a clear day.
3. Strawbery Banke Museum
In the heart of Portsmouth, the Strawbery Banke Museum is a ten-acre outdoor history museum on the site of one of the earliest English settlements in New Hampshire, founded in 1630. Rather than recreating a single moment, it preserves more than 30 historic houses spanning four centuries, restored to different eras. Costumed roleplayers, working gardens, and exhibits let you walk through Portsmouth’s evolution from colonial port to twentieth-century neighborhood.
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2. Franklin Pierce Homestead
In Hillsborough, the Franklin Pierce Homestead preserves the childhood home of the 14th president, New Hampshire’s only president. Built by his father, Governor Benjamin Pierce, in 1804, the elegant house reflects the family’s prominence. Pierce grew up here before a presidency remembered largely for the failures that helped push the nation toward civil war. It is a state historic site and a National Historic Landmark, with guided tours in season.
1. Saint-Gaudens National Historical Park
My top pick is the only National Park Service site in New Hampshire. Saint-Gaudens National Historical Park, in Cornish, preserves the home, studios, and gardens of Augustus Saint-Gaudens, the leading American sculptor of his era. An Irish immigrant who rose to the top of the art world, he created some of the country’s most famous public monuments, including the Shaw Memorial in Boston and the standing Lincoln in Chicago.
The estate, called Aspet, became the heart of the Cornish Art Colony, where artists and writers gathered around the sculptor. Today you can tour his house, see casts of his major works in the studios, walk the formal gardens, and hike the wooded trails. The site was redesignated from a national historic site to a national historical park in 2019.
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More Things To Do In New Hampshire
These 15 sites pair well with the state’s mountains and coast. The White Mountain National Forest surrounds the Cog Railway and the Presidential Range, Portsmouth packs Strawbery Banke and the USS Albacore into a walkable old port, and Lake Winnipesaukee anchors the lakes region. For a wider New England trip, our roundups of historic sites in Vermont and Maine connect across the borders.
We do not make this up out of thin air. More Than Just Parks is a family operation. My sons Will and Jim have spent their adult lives exploring and filming America’s national parks and public lands destinations, working with the National Park Service, the Department of the Interior, the USDA, and the U.S. Forest Service on films about important places. In 2018, after a career teaching history, I joined them to help tell the stories behind these places.
