Peacham, Vermont

Peacham is a town in Caledonia County, Vermont, United States. The population was 715 at the 2020 census.

History

thumb|left|200px|Peacham Congregational Church

In 1763, Governor Benning Wentworth of New Hampshire gave a charter for the region to a group of proprietors, and the town was given the name Peacham (the etymology of the name is unclear). The original proprietors were speculators who surveyed the town, laid a few rudimentary roads, and divided it into lots, though the territory remained unsettled for some time.

In 1775, settlers, primarily from Connecticut and Massachusetts, bought the lots and built homes, developing the land for agriculture. The original settlers survived almost entirely through subsistence farming despite the long winters, hilly terrain, and rocky soil. Nine years later, records show a population of approximately 200 people. The first recorded town meeting took place in 1784, and selectmen were duly elected to govern the affairs of the town. Peacham was early on presented with a choice of having either the county courthouse or the county school, and the residents voted for the school. In 1795 the Caledonia County Grammar School received its charter, and the first school was established in a log structure on the Bayley Hazen Road, halfway between Peacham Corner and South Peacham.

In 1799, a library was established, which traveled from store to store. A congregational church was founded in 1794—the first pastor, Leonard Worcester, was well known for his fiery sermons. His son Samuel went on to be an important missionary to the Cherokee people, creating the first typeface for the Cherokee alphabet and gaining lasting fame as the plaintiff in the supreme court case Worcester v. Georgia.

Early residents, who came to be known as Peachamites, traded butter, eggs, and wheat for goods which they could not make at home, and also relied on the production and sale of items such as whiskey and potash to help augment the relatively poor harvests. Almost from the beginning, various trades and industries—as many as 30–35 at a given time—flourished. Lumbering, coopering, milling, butter making, tin ware, tanneries and leather goods provided goods for local consumption. From 1800 to 1830, sheep farming flourished as a more profitable endeavor than growing crops. In 1840, the town reached its greatest population of 1,443. From that date on, census numbers steadily declined. Farming methods changed, and dairy farming came to replace sheep. The larger, more industrially advanced farms of the late 19th century could not support large families, and youth began to leave home.

In the 20th century, the population continued to decline to a low in the mid-600s. Farming also became less common due to competition with larger dairy farms in the West, and many farms either consolidated or went under. Tourism became important during the 20th century as people opened their homes to visitors from the cities of the Atlantic seaboard, often derisively referred to as "flatlanders". With the advent of the railroad in Barnet and then motor vehicles, Peacham became a popular location for summer residents, some of whom were educators from Boston and New York City. In the second half of the 20th century, Peacham became a popular vacation spot and retirement home for prominent intellectuals and liberal thinkers—individuals such as David Dellinger, William Lederer, Roman Jakobson, and the historian Shepard Clough all owned houses in town. Their interests and stimulation enhanced the cultural interests of the town.

Geography

thumb|left|Peacham, Vermont, from the east, showing bright [[Autumn leaf color|fall foliage]]

thumb|View from Devils Hill over Groton State Forest in western Peacham

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , of which is land and , or 2.18%, is water. Neighboring towns are Danville to the north, Barnet to the east, Ryegate to the southeast, Groton to the south, Marshfield to the west, and Cabot to the northwest. No numbered state highways pass through the town.

The highest point in Peacham is the summit of Cow Hill near the northern corner of town.

Demographics

As of the census of 2010,

Culture

The Peacham Historical Association (PHA) has been preserving records since 1916. The PHA has published a number of works on the town and has archives which chronicle the town's history from 1776.

The Peacham Library is a private library founded in 1810 as a resource for the debating team of the Caledonia County Grammar School. For the first century of its existence, the library possessed no fixed location and rotated from store to store around the town. The original library building was purchased in 1909. It burned in 1959, destroying almost the entire collection. The current library was constructed on the same location in 1960 and enlarged in 2001. The library has over 9,200 volumes and over 500 registered patrons.

Peacham has hosted the yearly Peacham Acoustic Music Festival since 2011, typically in mid-August. Other yearly events include the Fall Foliage celebration and the yearly July 4 festivities, including the traditional tractor parade.

In September 2005, Peacham was designated "Best New England Village" by Yankee magazine, which wrote, "Of all the villages in New England, Peacham (population 665) is unsurpassed."

Points of interest

On the National Register of Historic Places

Elkins Tavern (oldest structure)
Peacham Corner Historic District
Josiah and Lydia Shedd Farmstead
New Discovery State Park

Other points of interest

Ashbel Goodenough Blacksmith Shop – a 19th-century blacksmith shop which has been restored by the Peacham Historical Association with a working wooden forge
Ski-Tow Hill – operational in the 1960–1976
Devil's Hill
Widow Jennison Road
Martin's Pond
Martin's Pond Saw Mill (Location was on north side of access road. Spillway is still visible, but dry.)
Peacham Pond
Cemetery Hill (Academy Hill)
Peacham Bog, a bog
Cow Hill (highest point in town)
Bayley-Hazen Military Road
Peacham Congregational Church
The Civil War Soldiers Monument with the names of 42 men from town who died in the war
Peacham Observatory (ruins can be seen near Lookout Mountain)
Northern Skies Observatory, operated by the Northeast Kingdom Astronomy Foundation

Education

The town operates Peacham Elementary.

The following schools once operated in town, but have been closed:

Peacham Academy (formerly the Caledonia County Grammar School, closed in 1971)
Yellow School House
Three Corners School House
East Peacham School House
The Stevens School of Peacham (this school has since moved to Lyndonville; its Peacham school building is now defunct)

File:YellowSchoolHouse.jpg|Yellow School House

File:3cornersschoolhouse.jpg|Three Corners School House

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Films

A number of movies have been filmed in Peacham. These include:

A Return to Salem's Lot (1987)
Ethan Frome (1993)
Where the Rivers Flow North (1993)
The Spitfire Grill (1996)

Notable people

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Edward Behr, writer and publisher of The Art of Eating quarterly
William Chamberlain, US congressman
Alexander Dunnett, US Attorney for Vermont, Caledonia County State's Attorney
George Harvey, US Ambassador to Great Britain
John Martin, steamboat captain and businessman
John Mattocks, Whig politician and the 16th governor of Vermont
Samuel Merrill, early leading citizen of Indiana
Thaddeus Stevens, abolitionist and politician
Samuel Worcester, missionary and plaintiff in Worcester v. Georgia

Summer residents and retirees

Harry G. Barnes, Jr., US ambassador, retired to Peacham
David Dellinger, pacifist and member of the Chicago Seven
James B. Engle, diplomat and conservationist
Alger Hiss, US diplomat and suspected Soviet spy
Roman Jakobson, Russian linguist and literary theorist
William Lederer, most famous for co-authoring the novel The Ugly American.