Berlin, New Hampshire: The Paper City

 Deep within Coos County along the rugged path of the Androscoggin River lies Berlin, New Hampshire (historically pronounced /bɜːrlɪn/, emphasizing the first syllable). Known traditionally as "The Paper City," Berlin developed as an intense, urban industrial powerhouse fueled by vast spruce forests, immense water power, and a massive influx of international immigrants.

Old photo of Berlin NH taken in March 1940

Berlin NH in March 1940

Thought to be an old photo of Berlin, New Hampshire - March 1940

• Originally Chartered as "Maynesborough": The wilderness tract that would become Berlin was first granted as a plantation by King George III in 1771 to Sir William Mayne and his associates. It was named Maynesborough in his honor. Because of its remote location and incredibly rugged terrain, the land sat entirely unsettled by Europeans for more than fifty years.

• The Very First Settlement (1825): Permanent settlement finally began in 1825 when William Sessions, a pioneer from Gilead, Maine, cleared a plot of land for farming. He was quickly followed by Cyrus Wheeler, Amos Green, and Thomas Wheeler. Green, an enterprising builder, recognized the industrial potential of the river and built the settlement's very first primitive sawmill.

• Incorporation and the 1830 Population Baseline: In February 1829, the small community successfully petitioned the state legislature for official town status, choosing the name Berlin. According to the official federal census records compiled just one year later in 1830, the newly minted town launched its history with a tiny baseline population of exactly 73 residents.

• The Powerhouse Topography of the Androscoggin River: Berlin’s industrial destiny was dictated by a striking geographical layout. The Androscoggin River drops roughly 200 vertical feet over a span of just two miles within the city limits. This fierce, concentrated series of rapids provided a staggering amount of kinetic energy, which 19th-century engineers successfully harnessed to drive heavy machinery on an unprecedented scale.

• The Arrival of the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad: Berlin was rescued from its deep geographic isolation in 1852 when the Atlantic and St. Lawrence Railroad laid tracks through the town. This connected the remote mountain outpost directly to international shipping ports in Portland, Maine, and Montreal, Canada, allowing heavy timber and paper products to be exported worldwide.

• The Rise of the Largest Pulp Mill on Earth: By the late 1800s, timber barons moved past simple lumber production and began chemically processing wood into paper pulp. The Burgess Sulphite Fibre Company was established in Berlin, and by the early 20th century, its massive mill complex was officially recognized as the largest sulfite pulp mill on Earth, producing hundreds of tons of pulp daily.

• The Home of America's Oldest Operating Ski Club: Founded by Norwegian immigrants in 1872 (originally as the Berlin Mills Ski Club), the organization later became the famous Nansen Ski Club, named in honor of Arctic explorer Fridtjof Nansen. It is historically verified as the oldest continuously operating ski club in the United States and all of North America.

• The Monolith Nansen Ski Jump: Capitalizing on the town's winter sports dominance, the Nansen Ski Club constructed the historic Nansen Ski Jump in 1936. This towering steel monolith featured a 171-foot structure and a 310-foot drop, making it the largest ski jump in the eastern United States at the time. It hosted the 1938 National Ski Jumping Championships and served as a premier Olympic trials training site for decades.

• The Invention of Major Global Household Staples: Berlin's chemical engineers transformed global daily life. Working in the research laboratories of the city's powerhouse Brown Company, scientists invented Nibroc Towels—the world's first mass-produced brown paper towels commonly used in commercial restrooms. They also engineered the chemical processes used to refine cellulose for plastics, artificial leather, and photographic film.

A French-Canadian Melting Pot to an Historic Peak: To satisfy the voracious labor demands of the mills, thousands of immigrants arrived from Italy, Russia, Norway, and Ireland. The largest group by far was French-Canadians moving south from Quebec; by World War I, French was spoken as the primary language in many of Berlin's neighborhoods and Catholic parishes. This boom drove Berlin to officially become a city in 1897, with its population skyrocketing to an all-time historic peak of 20,018 residents in the 1930 census.