To give you the whole rundown of the history of Dunstable would be a daunting task via e-mail. However, in a nutshell, according to Hurd's "History of Hillsborough County" pub in 1885, Dunstable was formed by a petition granted to twenty-six inhabitants of the area in October of 1673. "It included the present city of Nashua, the towns of Hudson, Hollis, Dunstable and Tyngsborough, besides portions of the towns of Amherst, Milford, Merrimack, Litchfield, Londonderry, Pelham, Dracut, Brookline, Groton and Pepperell. It extended ten to twelve miles west of the Merrimack river, and three to five miles east of it, and its average length, from north to south, was from twelve to fourteen miles. the present city of Nashua is very nearly the centre of the original townwhip of Dunstable, the name that Nashua continued to bear till the early 1800's. The name Dunstable is said to have been given in compliment to Mrs. Mary, wife of Edward tyng and mother of Jonathan Tyng, one of the grantees and one of the most prominent of the first settlers. She was a native of a town of that name in the south of England. For many years prior to 1740 the boundary line between the provinces of Massachusetts and New Hampshire had been a subject of bitter controversy. The state line was fixed in 1740 by a royal commission. The new line was run in 1741, leaving in Massachusetts that pat of the old township now in Tyungsborough and in Dunstable, in that State and adding to New Hampshire the present territory of Nashua, Hudson, Hollis and all the other portions of "Old Dunstable" north of the designated line. The name "Dunstable" , however, was still retainde by the territory which now constitutes the city of Nashua till the NH legislature of 1836 changed the name to Nashua. If you want the story in its entirety, e-mail me privately and we'll work out a photocopy and mail arrangement. Regards, Richard Putnam Putnam's Store Wilton, NH