Before the Town of Bennington existed, it was part of the Town of Hancock. Hancock had some running water to power some small factories, but nothing like the huge store of potential energy along the Contoocook River in Bennington. Bennington was originally planned as a site for mills.

The saw mills and flour mills of the late 1700s soon gave way to fulling mills [to turn woolen fibers into felt for hats], paper mills, and knife factories in the 1820s. Because of this, Bennington was once called ‘Hancock’s Factory Village.’ On the 1859 map, not made in any great detail, a Powder Mill [gunpowder], a Paper Mill, and a Knife Factory are shown. In the 1887 map, the Goodell Cutlery Company competed with the C.J. Kimball & Son Cutlery and Tool Company. Goodell Cutlery later moved to Antrim and most people forget that they started in Bennington. Also shown were the Monadnock Paper Mill and the W.C. & F.C. Starrett lumber mill. While the factories began by using the water as their sole source of power, the smoke in the postcard picture indicates that by the late 1800s, the machinery of the mills was powered by combustion, most likely coal.

The mills attracted workers, some of whom moved from neighboring towns, some were immigrants new to this country. Workers required housing. The three white-painted Cape-Style houses on Main Street were built by Joseph Putnam around 1800, perhaps to attract workers for his mills. On the strip of land across from the Paper Mill, between the River and the road, there used to be workers’ housing in the 1880s, since replaced by the garages of the Mill. Going up Starrett Road, one sees several identical houses on the right. When you see a row of such dwellings in a mill town, you know they were built for workers and rented to them by the factory owners.

Today, the only mill that is still operating is the Monadnock Paper Mill which has been using water power to make its products since 1819.

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