Plymouth, New Hampshire, whose nickname is "The Gateway to the White Mountains," was founded in 1763. In 1895, local citizens commissioned historian Ezra Stearns to write a history of the town and its families. This association resulted in the publication, in 1906, of a two-volume history of Plymouth. Volume I of the work is a historical narrative of Plymouth, and Volume II, reprinted here without its companion volume, is a self-contained collection of roughly 1,500 genealogical sketches of Plymouth families, many of which extend backwards to the the very beginnings of the town nearly 250 years ago. Based on extensive research into the town records and more than 2,000 pieces of correspondence with his contemporaries, Plymouth, New Hampshire Families contains references to more than 5,000 persons, as found in the complete name index at the back of the book. The sketches, which are detailed or sparse by degrees, commence with the oldest known member of the family and extend to the turn of the twentieth century, fleshing out the genealogy with biographical information--career, education, military service--whenever it is available. While it is not possible in the space allowed to list the surname of every family covered here, what follows is a list of several hundred families receiving the most extensive coverage:

Abbot, Adams, Aldrich, Allen, Ames, Andrews, Atwood, Avery, Ayer, Babb, Bacon, Bailey, Baker, Baldwin, Ball, Barnard, Barnes, Bartlett, Batchelder, Bean, Bennett, Bickford, Blake, Blanchard, Bliss, Blood, Boardman, Boynton, Bradley, Brooks, Brown, Bryant, Burnham, Buzzell, Carr, Carter, Chamberlain, Chandler, Chapman, Chase, Cheney, Church, Cilley, Clark, Clement, Clifford, Clough, Coffin, Colby, Collins, Cook, Copp, Corliss, Corser, Cox, Craig, Crockett, Crosby, Cross, Cummings, Currier, Darling, Davis, Day, Dean, Dearborn, Dodge, Dole, Dolloff, Dow, Drew, Durgin, Eastman, Eaton, Elliot, Emerson, Emery, Emmons, Evans, Farnum, Farwell, Fellows, Fifield, Fisher, Flanders, Fletcher, Flint, Fogg, Ford, Foss, Foster, Fowler, Freeman, French, Fuller, Gage, Gale, Garland, George, Gilman, Glover, Goodhur, Goodrich, Gordon, Gould, Gove, Graham, Grant, Gray, Greeley, Green, Hadley, Haines, Hall, Hardy, Harris, Hart, Harvey, Haseltine, Hastings, Heath, Herbert, Herrick, Hill, Holmes, Holt, Homans, Hoyt, Hunt, Huntington, Huse, Hutchins, Ingalls, Jewett, Johnson, Jones, Kelley, Kendall, Keyes, Kidder, Kimball, King, Knight, Knowles, Ladd, Lane, Lawrence, Leavitt, Lewis, Libbey, Little, Locke, Lougee, Lovejoy, Lovering, March, Marsh, Marshall, Marston, Martin, Mason, Matthews, McClure, Meloon, Merrill, Milk, Mitchell, Moore, Morrill, Morrison, Morse, Moses, Moulton, Mudgett, Mulliken, Muzzey, Nason, Nelson, Nichols, Norris, Noyes, Nutting, Ordway, Osgood, Packard, Page, Paige, Paine, Palmer, Parker, Payne, Peabody, Pearson, Peaslee, Perkins, Permoit, Perry, Phelps, Philrick, Phillips, Pierce, Pike, Pillsbury, Pingrey, Piper, Plummer, Pollard, Poor, Pope, Porter, Powers, Prescott, Preston, Quimby, Randall, Reed, Richardson, Richmond, Roberts, Robie, Robinson, Rogers, Rollins, Rowe, Rowell, Russell, Rust, Sanborn, Sargent, Savage, Sawyer, Scott, Scribner, Senter, Shaw, Shepard, Shute, Simonds, Sleeper, Small, Smart, Smith, Spalding, Stanton, Steele, Stetson, Stevens, Stinson, Strong, Swain, Swett, Taylor, Tewksbury, Thomas, Thompson, Tilton, Townsend, Tucker, Tufts, Turner, Underwood, Wadleigh, Walker, Wallace, Walton, Ward, Warner, Warren, Washburn, Watson, Webber, Webster, Weeks, Wells, Wentworth, West, Wheat, Wheeler, Wheet, Whipple, Whitcher, White, White, Whitney, Willard, Willey, Williams, Willoughby, Wilson, Winegar, Wise, Wood, Woodbury, Woodman, Woodward, Woodworth, Worthen, Wright, Wyatt, Wyman, Yeaton, and Young.