Concord, New Hampshire

Our next New England stop was New Hampshire, with the primary purpose of visiting the Capitol in Concord, while using the rest of the week to tour other parts of the state. I don't remember most of the state mottos, but somehow "Live Free or Die", New Hampshire's famous maxim, seems to stick with me. No, Bruce Willis didn't coin the phrase in Live Free or Die Hard, but I can see how using this would appeal to movie makers, it's catchy! (The motto comes from a statement written by the Revolutionary General John Stark.) I didn't find much about the State House itself to give it standout ranking. The building houses all the regular offices such as the Senate Chambers, the Representatives Hall, The Office of The Governor, the Secretary of the State's Office, and so forth. What I did find interesting was their claim of "oldest continuously used legislative chambers in America". There are a lot of "firsts" and "oldest" designations on this side of the country, I've noticed. Some fun facts about New Hampshire include: The first potato planted in the United States was at Londonderry Common Field in 1719; Alan Bartlett Shepard Jr., the first American to travel in space is from East Derry, New Hampshire; in 1833 the first free public library in the United States was established in Peterborough.