Newington, New Hampshire
Newington is a town in
Rockingham County,
New Hampshire,
USA. The population was 775 at the 2000 census. It is bounded to the west by
Great Bay, northwest by Little Bay and northeast by the
Piscataqua River. It is home to
Pease International Airport (formerly
Pease Air Force Base), and to the
New Hampshire National Guard.
Originally a part of
Dover, boundary disputes among early river settlers caused this area to be called
Bloody Point. By 1640,
Trickey's Ferry operated between
Bloody Point and
Hilton's Point in Dover. In 1712, the meetinghouse was erected and the
parish set off, named "Newington" for an
English village, whose residents sent the bell for the meetinghouse. Behind the meetinghouse is a row of horse sheds, once commonplace but now rare. About 1725 the
parsonage was built near the Town Forest, considered one of the oldest in
America. The town would be incorporated in 1764 by
Colonial Governor
Benning Wentworth. Newington's 110 acre
Old Town Center Historic District is listed on the
National Register of Historic Places.
In 1794, a bridge was completed across Little Bay from Fox Point in Newington to the south bank of the
Bellamy River in Dover, by way of Goat Island -- a major engineering feat in its day.
According to the
United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 32.3
km² (12.5
mi²). 21.7 km² (8.4 mi²) of it is land and 10.7 km² (4.1 mi²) of it (33.04%) is water. The highest elevation in Newington is 120
feet (37
meters) above
sea level, within the bounds of the Pease International Airport.
As of the
census2 of 2000, there were 775 people, 294 households, and 209 families residing in the town. The
population density was 35.8/km² (92.7/mi²). There were 305 housing units at an average density of 14.1/km² (36.5/mi²). The racial makeup of the town was 96.00%
White, 1.81%
African American, 0.26%
Native American, 1.03%
Asian, and 0.90% from two or more races.
Hispanic or
Latino of any race were 1.81% of the population.
There were 294 households out of which 28.2% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 59.5% were
married couples living together, 6.8% had a female householder with no husband present, and 28.9% were non-families. 21.8% of all households were made up of individuals and 8.2% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.55 and the average family size was 3.01.
In the town the population was spread out with 21.9% under the age of 18, 4.6% from 18 to 24, 28.4% from 25 to 44, 32.1% from 45 to 64, and 12.9% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 43 years. For every 100 females there were 98.7 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 93.9 males.
The median income for a household in the town was $59,464, and the median income for a family was $76,202. Males had a median income of $48,750 versus $30,250 for females. The
per capita income for the town was $30,172. About 5.0% of families and 4.6% of the population were below the
poverty line, including 4.8% of those under age 18 and 5.3% of those age 65 or over.
In August of 2001, a group of townspeople as well as townspeople from Rye made a strong plea to the state legislature to consider allowing the town to secede from the state due to disproportionate property tax laws which had been passed by the state in 1997 to balance the state's education economy.[
1] The dispute was largely quelled by the lack of support for the movement (the linked page in this paragraph says 52 of the town's 700+ people signed the petition), and was partly deflated due to an increase of patriotism and unity after the
September 11, 2001 attacks. The property tax issue itself quieted as Governor Craig Benson announced in 2003 the property taxes would be cut almost by half by 2008.
*
Official web site*
New Hampshire Economic and Labor Market Information Bureau Profile
