Founder's Park, Hampton, New Hampshire

Do you have colonial roots in Hampton, New Hampshire?  If you have roots in Hampton, I have photos of all the surname stones in "Founder's Park".  Contact me and I will publish your ancestral surname stone photo in another post.

The central stone in the park commemorates
Rev. Stephen Bachiler, who founded Hampton, NH
(click here to enlarge, and you'll see some of the
surname stones on the circumference of Founder's Park)

In Hampton, New Hampshire there is a little park on Old Landing Road called “Founder’s Park”.   It was built in 1925 to honor the earliest settlers in Hampton with stones marked with the surnames.  If you can prove your family settled in this area before 1695 you can apply to the Historical Society for a stone memorial.  The last stone to be placed here was the Elkins family stone in 2004. 

In the corners of the park there are stones for each of the “daughter towns” of Hampton (Danville, Sandown, East Kingston, Kingston, Kensington, Hampton Falls, North Hampton, and Seabrook).  At the center of the park is a memorial to Reverend Stephen Bachilder, who led his flock to settle here in 1638. 

This is a list of the names at Founder’s Park:

Batchelder	Blake
Brown	Chase
Cole	Dalton
Dearborn	Dow
Drake	Elkins
Fogg	Garland
Godfrey	Gookin
Gove	Green
Healey	Hobbs
Hussey	James
Knowles	Lamprey
Lane	Leavitt
Locke	Mason
Marston	Nudd
Page	Palmer
Perkins	Philbrick
Prescott	Redman
Sanborn	Shaw
Sleeper	Taylor
Tilton	Toppan
Towle	Weare
Johnson	Moulton
Tuck

I have photographed all the surname stones at Founder’s Park.  If you would like me to post a photograph of your family memorial stone please leave me a comment below or email me at vrojomit@gmail.com   The Hampton Historical Society has files and books on most of these families, so if you are researching your family tree you might want to contact them.  I'm descended of twelve of these families, including those highlighted in yellow. 

The Batchelder family is represented by this stone.
My 11x great grandfather Stephen Bachilder lived from 1561 to 1656. 

My 9x great grandfather John Locke
lived in Hampton (abt 1627 - 1696)

For more information on Founder’s Park:

From the Hampton Historical Society website, the Founder’s Park link: http://www.hamptonhistoricalsociety.org/foundpk.htm

This link is from the Hampton Public Library, showing an article in the 21 August 1990 Atlantic News about Founder’s Park, with photos from the 1925 dedication of Founder’s Park: http://www.hampton.lib.nh.us/hampton/history/parks/founderspark.htm

-------------------------

Copyright 2012, Heather Wilkinson Rojo