From the beau3ful beaches to Moose Alley, the Granite State has plenty of sites, both historically
significant and naturally beau3ful, to visit.
It was so important to the state of New Hampshire that they chose to
immortalize it on the New Hampshire state quarter released in
2000.
The Old Man of the Mountain was a set of 5 granite cliffs on Cannon
Mountain which, when viewed from the north, formed what appeared to be a man’s face extruding from the
mountain.
The face had the look of a gruff fron3ersman peering out over the land, surveying the expanding realm
before him.
The Old Man was first documented in 1805 by a group of surveyors exploring the Franconia Notch,
though several groups surveying the area around the same 3me claim
the first “discovery”.
The Old Man in the Mountain was popularized in large part by a
statesman, Daniel Webster, who was an influen3al poli3cian and orator of
the 3me.
He wrote; “Men hang out their signs indica3ve of their respec3ve trades; shoe makers hang out a gigan3c
shoe; jewelers a monster watch, and the den3st hangs out a gold tooth; but up in the Mountains of New
Hampshire, God Almighty has hung out a sign to show that there He
makes men.”
American writer Nathaniel Hawthorne found inspira3on in the forma3on when he wrote a short story, “The Great Stone Face” in
1850.
The profile became the official state symbol in 1945 and adorns the state license plate, state route markers and eventually the state quarter in
2000.
An interes3ng piece of trivia is that the New Hampshire state quarter is the only to feature a profile on both
sides.
Freezing and thawing water created fissures on the Old Man’s forehead and by the 1920s, the cracks were
large enough that a1empts to repair it and prevent future breakage
began.
In spite of the state’s best efforts, on May 3, 2003, between midnight and 3 a.m., the Old Man in the Mountain
fell.
In the days following the collapse, the mourning public lay flowers at the base of the cliff in tribute.
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