Hanover, New Hampshire | Could You Live Here?
Town and gown thrive side by side in Hanover, New Hampshire. This just might be the best college town of all.
By Annie Graves|Feb 05 2018|
Dartmouth’s Baker-Berry Library in Hanover, New Hampshire.
Credit: Michael Seamans
Credit: Michael Seamans
“Parents or alumni?” asks a fellow passenger as we step into the elevator at the Hanover Inn, docked like an ocean liner on the banks of the Dartmouth College Green in Hanover, New Hampshire. Neither, as it turns out, but the lines get blurry in this Ivy League enclave. The pretty town was founded July 4, 1761; the college followed in 1769. Since then, the two have grown together like vines, to the point where they’re practically indistinguishable from each other. Hanover’s population (11,260 in 2010) is almost double Dartmouth’s, but it feels like an even match. Maybe it’s all that youthful energy, or the elegant 269-acre main campus infiltrating the town. Or the range of daily diversions, from arts to sports, that speak to both students and residents. Or the dynamic café scene that someone like Robert Frost (student, lecturer), Theodor Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss (student), or Mindy Kaling (student) might appreciate. “It’s a concentrated shot of culture,” says one local resident. “People are well educated, and you feel it.”
The Appalachian Trail winds past the college-owned inn (the only inn on the 2,200-mile trail). Nearby, there’s Ledyard Canoe Club for canoeing and kayaking, Occom Pond for skating, Dartmouth Skiway for downhill, and the Dartmouth Cross Country Ski Center for, well, the obvious. All the perks of an Ivy League habitat, none of the academic pressure.
The Hanover Inn’s restaurant, Pine, offers locals and visitors a refined gathering spot.
Credit: Michael SeamansCredit: Michael Seamans
The downhill crowd hits the slopes at the Dartmouth Skiway.
Credit: Jennifer GreenCredit: Jennifer Green
The Setting
Midway up New Hampshire’s western border, Hanover sits on the Connecticut River, with Vermont just across the water. The White Mountains rise to the east, the Green Mountains to the west, less than an hour in either direction. In the center of town, college buildings surround the Green, which is anchored at the top by the Baker-Berry Library, with its polished-wood study nooks, and at the bottom by the Hanover Inn, still gleaming from its $43 million facelift in 2012. Main Street shoots off the Green in a tumble of cafés, clothing shops, and bookstores—an impressive amount of stimulation condensed into several blocks, illustrating a peculiarly Hanoverian law of physics.
The Social Scene
While the Hopkins Center for the Arts (the Hop) posts a full roster of films and performances, it offers less predictable events, too—a piano master class, say, or Christmas Revels at Spaulding Auditorium. The adjacent Hood Museum, one of the oldest and largest college museums in the country, shares its rich collection for free, but residents can also volunteer to be docents, learning all there is to know about Assyrian reliefs in the process. The sports-inclined can find a hockey game on Occom Pond or watch the college stars at Dartmouth’s Thompson Arena, and cheer on the entire college community at the Big Green bonfire on homecoming weekend.
The Hopkins Center for the Arts, touting some seasonally appropriate Shakespeare.
Credit: Michael Seamans
