The first Old Home Day was proclaimed by New Hampshire's Governor Frank Rollins in 1899 to bring family and friends back to New Hampshire. The state had a declining population as people moved west, but Old Home Day was a time to visit the old homestead and old hometowns.
Londonderry's Old Home Days stretch over several days and attracts about 12,000 people annually. There is a concert and picnic for seniors on the 16th, Battle of the Bands on the 17th, fireworks and the Police vs Firefighters softball games on the 18th, and a Christian concert on Sunday the 20th, but the biggest day is Saturday August 19th with concerts, fireworks, parade, a 5K road race, children's games, food trucks, a fair on the common, beer festival, and a large historical encampment at the Londonderry Historical Society's museum complex a few yards down the road from the common.
At the Morrison House on Saturday the 19th you will find a blacksmith, corn husk doll demonstrations, a colonial surgeon, a colonial washerwoman, a gunsmith, a horn smith (animal horns), a tinsmith, flax workers, spinners, weavers, country music, a genealogist (Sandy Dahlfred from the Historical Society), and cannon firings at 12, 1 and 2.
If you have never seen the interior of the historic buildings at the Londonderry Historical Society Museum complex, they are all open to the public at Old Home Day including the Morrison House, the Parmenter Barn, the blacksmith shop and the carriage house.
For the truly curious:
Londonderry Old Home Day at the town website: https://www.londonderrynh.gov/londonderry-old-home-day
Londonderry Old Home Day on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TownofLondonderryOldHomeDay/
Derry News article "Old Home Day plans underway", July 13, 2023 https://www.derrynews.com/news/londonderry/old-home-day-plans-underway/article_c13e8a08-1f22-11ee-9153-8ba2e2a1df7b.html
The Londonderry Historical Society website: https://www.londonderryhistory.org/
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To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Londonderry Old Home Days August 16 - 19, 2023", Nutfield Genealogy, posted August 3, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/08/londonderry-old-home-days-august-16-19.html: accessed [access date]).
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