New Hampshire
How removal of a Durham historical marker sparked debate about who gets to write history
Three hundred and thirty years ago, a group of English settlers and allied French and Wabanaki soldiers battled near the Oyster River, in what is now Durham, leaving about 100 settlers dead.
While those bare facts were first commemorated on a historical marker decades ago, the story behind the battle – including where the blame lies, what led to the conflict, and which group suffered more – is still up for debate as Durham residents have been working to erect what they hope will be a more accurate marker describing the deadliest event in the town’s history.
A committee of residents and representatives from several local and state agencies have spent months in lengthy roundtable discussions, struggling to agree on the words to best describe this colonial-era conflict. The conversations became so contentious that town leaders brought in mediators to help find consensus.
“I don’t think at the end of this process that we are going to have resolved what happened in 1694,” said facilitator Barbara Will at a meeting earlier this year. “I think what we’ll find at the end of this process is that we have come together as a community to give our best interpretation of what happened and the context within which it happened.”
Now, the story of what came to be known as the “Oyster River Massacre” has the chance to be presented in a new way – as long as it can be encapsulated into just a few dozen words while also touching on issues of Indigenous identity, historical memory and the legacy of colonialism.
An abrupt removal sparks debate
The current debate over how to properly commemorate the battle began in 2021, when the state of New Hampshire removed the historical marker that had stood near Durham’s town hall for decades.
In a revision form filed with the New Hampshire Division of Historical Resources, members of the state’s Commission on Native American Affairs had flagged the sign’s language as problematic and suggested revising it.
The original historical marker described the battle as an attack in which a French soldier led 250 “Indians” in a “raid” on the English settlements in the area, “killing or capturing approximately 100 settlers, destroying five garrison houses and numerous dwellings.” It also described the event as “the most devastating French and Indian raid in New Hampshire during King William’s War,” a conflict between France and England over control of North American territories in which the Wabanki people allied with the French.
In a few short bullet points, the Native American Affairs Commission said the sign lacked context, called the language “insulting or derogatory” and asked: “Devastating for whom?”
The former director of the Durham Historical Association, who was not involved in the roundtable discussions, said the complaints outlined by the Commission on Native American Affairs were the only information the association was given as to why the sign was removed, and the only guidance they had for suggesting a revision. The form didn’t include any suggestions for what should be on the sign instead.
“We were always working in the dark, not knowing specifically what the issues with the original sign were,” David Strong said.
Contested identity
The Commission on Native American Affairs is composed of New Hampshire residents who are tasked with representing Indigenous people in the state. But the Indigenous identity of one member, who was a part of flagging the Oyster River marker for revision, is contested.
Denise Pouliot describes herself as the head female speaker of the Cowasuck Band of the Pennacook Abenaki People. She was also selected to participate in the roundtable discussions in Durham as a representative of the Indigenous community.
“My presence here is very simple,” Pouliot said in January. “I want to make sure that the Indigenous history of the past is included in these signs. These signs are primarily constructed of colonial perspectives.”
However, as a 2023 NHPR investigation found, there is no evidence to support Pouliot’s claim of Abenaki heritage, as leaders of the Odanak First Nation in Canada and scholars on Indigenous identity have said for years. Pouliot continues to assert that she does have Abenaki ancestry, although she declined to provide any family names or documentation to corroborate her claims.
During the roundtables in Durham, Pouliot insisted on using oral histories to recount the events of the massacre, and has claimed to personally know the history of that era.
“We were here first,” Pouliot said at a February meeting. “We were hunting and fishing and living in these locations and you came in and forced us out by gunpoint. And that’s the story that really should be told if you want to talk about really encompassing the true history of the region. But I don’t see a plaque for that anywhere, and I don’t see anywhere trying to fight for that level of truth.”
While none of the roundtable participants have publicly questioned Pouliot’s ancestry claims, Carolyn Singer of the Durham Historic District and Heritage Commission has stressed the importance of using primary and secondary sources when constructing the language for the sign, instead of a sole reliance on oral histories. She said the Heritage Commission had used primary sources in its draft, but that she had not seen evidence of documentation in iterations suggested by other groups, including that of the Commission on Native American Affairs.
“Language has already been suggested,” Singer said, referring to the draft from the Commission on Native American Affairs. “A narrative has already been suggested, so we should have a document to back up that narrative.”
Durham Town Administrator Todd Selig has a longstanding relationship with Pouliot and her husband, Paul Pouliot, who is also a co-speaker of her group. When asked about Denise Pouliot’s involvement in the process as a representative of the Indigenous community, despite a lack of evidence of her connection to that community, Selig said he had no problem with her presence at the table. Selig said over the years, he’s valued the couple’s contributions to Durham.
“To the extent the Pouliots have been involved in Durham, it’s generally been helpful,” Selig said.
‘A deeper sense of history’
The roundtable panelists began with three versions of the text for the new marker suggested by different groups. The group debated each option until, eventually, they combined and whittled them down to one.
Panelist Steve Eames was there as a representative of the Durham Historical Association. He’s a historian who focused his research on warfare on the New England frontier in the 17th century. He saw problems with all three versions.
For example, Eames and others around the table debated what to call the event, which has for years been referred to as a “massacre.”
“One person’s ‘massacre’ is another person’s ‘successful attack,’” Eames said. “But if we’re trying to remember the trauma, we can’t leave out the trauma.”
Another sticking point was the theft of Wabanaki land by European settlers and colonization that precipitated the massacre. One draft included the phrase “questionable treaty” to describe the Treaty at Pemaquid, a 1693 peace and trade treaty between the English and the Indigenous tribes in the area.
“I mean, from a historian’s point of view, that treaty, as all the treaties were, were ‘questionable’ because you had a culture that had a written language dealing with a culture that had no written language,” Eames said.
Others countered, asking: For whom was the treaty “questionable” and what does that really mean?
Ideas continued to swirl about the specific language on the sign and perspectives it should include. The Durham Historic Association, which sponsored the original marker, was represented at the table by Janet Mackie, who suggested the voices of the early settlers of Durham be featured on the new sign.
“There are still people living in Durham today whose ancestors were massacred,” Mackie said in a mediated session, though no one claiming familial ties to those killed spoke at the meetings.
Nadine Miller represented the state’s Department of Transportation. She agreed at a January meeting that both Indigenous and settler perspectives should be featured.
“I would think in a town where I was living and I had young children, I would find a sign would be a really great educational opportunity for young children to go to and talk with their parents about,” Miller said. “And in my mind, for my child, I would want them to know both sides of a story.”
Selig, the Durham town administrator, watched the process from the start. He says final wording has been sent to the state for approval, and he’s glad the sign will be back up, though it is unclear how soon that will happen. He said he and many others consider the “Oyster River Massacre” a seminal moment in Durham’s history, an event that could have wiped Durham from the map in its infancy.
“Controversies like this offer an opportunity to demand attention to an issue, to a topic. And while we have people’s attention, it helps to instill a deeper sense of history and appreciation for that history and the complexity of that history,” Selig said.
After the group’s last meeting in March, they agreed on a final version, one that was put together by the Durham Historical Association. It omitted the word “Indian,” named Wabanaki leaders who were there, and didn’t implicate them in the breaking of the peace treaty, rather that they were convinced to do so by the French. The title also no longer includes the word “massacre.” Instead, it was replaced by a dispatch sent to Boston after the attack: “Oyster River… is Layd Waste”
As the culmination of years of background conversations and more than six hours of facilitated debate over every word, the Durham Historical Association’s version was sent to the state Division of Historical Resources. Despite originally suggesting the community conversations, the state countered with its own version and turned it over to the panelists for review and sign-off. They’ll have to find consensus — again — before it’s sent to the foundry where the text will be cast in metal. If they don’t, the state can move forward with its own version, just as they would’ve if the conversations hadn’t happened at all.
Much of the debate was about what really happened in 1694, and — most of all — why such violence felt warranted. But for some, if the picture of that early morning at Oyster River isn’t captured in full, the sign isn’t worth being there at all.
“If the final decision is to write a sign or to finalize a sign that’s not based on the facts, then I hope the sign never goes back up,” David Strong said.
These articles are being shared by partners in the Granite State News Collaborative. For more information, visit collaborativenh.org.
New Hampshire
‘Not cosmetic’: NH lawmaker wants state to cover GLP-1 drugs for weight loss – Concord Monitor
Two years ago, Sue Prentiss got a sobering reality check at her doctor’s office. The news was blunt: She qualified for bariatric surgery, a procedure for patients whose weight poses life-threatening risks.
She was aware of her weight and had tried everything from high-intensity workouts to weight loss programs and diets. Nothing seemed to help until she started taking GLP-1 medications.
Prentiss said between then and now, she had lost almost 80 pounds.
But at a $500 out-of-pocket monthly fee, every refill is a financial pinch.
“I’m just getting by, but I’m so much healthier, and if this can work for me, think about everybody else’s life where this would impact,” said Prentiss, a state senator.
To keep up with the cost, she’s made hard choices like cutting back on retirement contributions and squeezing her budget wherever possible.
Now, Prentiss is sponsoring Senate Bill 455, which would require the state to provide GLP-1 medications under the state Medicaid plan as a treatment for people with obesity.
As of January, New Hampshire’s Medicaid program has ended coverage for GLP-1 drugs like Saxenda, Wegovy and Zepbound for weight loss. The state still covers the medications when they’re part of a treatment plan for other chronic conditions, such as type 2 diabetes, certain cardiovascular diseases, severe sleep apnea and Metabolic Dysfunction-Associated Steatohepatitis (MASH).
According to the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services, the state paid managed care organizations $49.5 million to cover GLP-1 medications between July 1, 2025, and June 30, 2026. The policy change in January reduced that cost to $41 million.
With these drugs gaining popularity, the state estimated that if were to resume covering GLP-1s for weight loss, it would need to spend an additional $24.2 million on top of the $41 million per fiscal year.
Jonathan Ballard, chief medical officer at DHHS, said the agency opposes the bill, which would require Medicaid coverage for anyone with a body mass index above 30 seeking GLP-1 medications specifically for weight loss.
Ballard said the state cannot afford such an expansion when budgets are already tight.
“The department does not have this money today,” he said. “So, living within the realities of our current budget, there will be significant trade-offs. We will have to cut other things that are very important to the health and well-being of New Hampshire to pay for this unless there’s some change.”
GLP-1 drugs carry a steep price tag that puts significant pressure on state budgets, particularly within Medicaid programs. Several states, including California, Pennsylvania and South Carolina, have moved to drop coverage of these medications for weight loss.
Prentiss initially drafted her legislation with private insurers in mind, but later pivoted to focus on Medicaid to serve more vulnerable populations. She is covered by commercial insurance and said the outcome of the bill will not personally affect her.
Lost coverage
GLP-1 medications mimic a natural hormone in the gut that helps regulate blood sugar, digestion and appetite.
Sarah Finn, section chief for obesity medicine at Dartmouth Health, said she has seen firsthand the impact on her patients after the state dropped Medicaid coverage for weight-loss GLP-1 drugs.
Without access to these medications, patients experience increased hunger, cravings and persistent “food noise,” as their bodies attempt to return to a higher fat percentage, a process known as metabolic adaptation, she said.
“This is the reality of the state I’m in right now, where I don’t have options except bariatric surgery for my Medicaid patients and a lot of times patients don’t want to do a surgery,” said Finn, at a hearing for the bill on Wednesday. “What I have to tell that patient is there’s nothing I could do to advocate.”
The Department of Health and Human Services faced a $51 million budget cut when the New Hampshire Legislature passed its biennial budget last year, forcing the department to reduce several services.
While Prentiss acknowledges the financial strain on the department, she wants the state to consider the long-term impact of using GLP-1s to prevent chronic conditions like diabetes, which is largely linked to weight gain and can drive up costs for the state over time.
“By driving down obesity, we can drive down the costs that are related to it,” she said.
Prentiss remains on GLP-1 medications and said she feels much healthier than before.
She said that after a few months on the drugs, her blood sugar levels and kidney function began trending toward more normal ranges.
“It’s not cosmetic,” she said. “Obesity is a medical condition.”
In New Hampshire and across New England, nuclear energy is in the spotlight. But as plans for the region’s nuclear future are charted, some of the big questions that stirred New Hampshire in the 1980s remain unanswered.
Gov. Kelly Ayotte has called for New Hampshire to embrace new nuclear technology, while state legislators have introduced multiple bills to promote its development. Then, last week, Ayotte joined the rest of New England’s governors in a bipartisan joint statement calling for the region to pursue advanced nuclear technologies while championing its two existing nuclear power plants.
There are timeline and economic questions about the implementation of emerging nuclear technologies. But front-end logistics aside, some say there’s a bigger and enduring problem: How will we safely handle nuclear waste, in New Hampshire and nationwide?
The spent fuel that nuclear reactors spit out is hot and remains dangerously radioactive for thousands of years. The U.S. Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 requires it be safeguarded and separate from nearby populations for at least 10,000 years. The law also requires the United States to come up with a national system to facilitate that at a centralized location, but no plan has yet emerged.
The matter is close at hand in New Hampshire, from the hilly west of the state, where a federal proposal for a deep nuclear waste storage site once threatened to displace residents, to the Seacoast, where spent fuel from the Seabrook Station power plant is generated and stored. To activists, just how we will handle the hazardous material is a hanging question that challenges the wisdom of embarking on a new nuclear era.
“There have been efforts over several decades here in New Hampshire to raise attention to this issue, but, obviously, we haven’t seen much real movement,” said Doug Bogen, executive director of the Seacoast Anti-Pollution League.
No stranger to nuclear waste
Three hundred or so million years ago, the long, fiery process that turned New Hampshire into the Granite State began. As magma seeped up into the crust from below and began to cool, seams of grainy, crystalline granite slowly formed.
The immense pockets of stone formed through this process are called plutons. When erosion washes away the sediments and soils around them, plutons can form mountains like the 3,155-foot Mount Cardigan. That peak is the crest of New Hampshire’s largest pluton: an approximately 60-mile long and 12-mile wide stretch of granite running through western New Hampshire.
In the 1980s, this swath of stone attracted an unexpected visitor: the United States Department of Energy, searching for a site to excavate a long-term storage facility for the nation’s nuclear waste.
Spent fuel remains radioactive for several million years, but its radioactivity decreases with time. The period of “greatest concern,” where levels of radiation are more dangerous to humans, lasts about 10,000 years, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.
So, to keep the waste contained over that period, the U.S. government plans to rely on a combination of engineering and favorable geology, according to Scott Burnell, senior public affairs officer with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. A long-term storage site is envisioned underground, because certain minerals can help shield radiation.
Granite is one such mineral. That’s what drew the department to western New Hampshire in the ’80s, Bogen recalled.
In 1986, the department announced that a 78-square-mile area on the pluton, centered around the town of Hillsborough, was one of a dozen sites across the country under consideration for a potential deep storage facility. Residents understood then that a number of surrounding towns would have been partially or entirely seized by the federal government through eminent domain to make way for the facility. Many were distraught.
“There weren’t any Yankees that were going to take that,” said Paul Gunter, a founding member of the anti-nuclear Clamshell Alliance.
The “Clams,” as well as the New Hampshire Radioactive Waste Information Network, which Gunter also co-founded; the Seacoast Anti-Pollution League; and other environmental groups, towns, and individuals mobilized quickly. In addition to organizing demonstrations, activists also circulated a warrant article opposing the generation and dumping of nuclear waste in New Hampshire. One hundred and thirty-seven towns ultimately voted to pass it, according to the New Hampshire Municipal Association.
Their opposition was multi-pronged, Gunter said. Organizers had health and safety concerns about the management of nuclear power and highly radioactive waste, including a lack of faith that the radiation would be safely isolated from human populations. They were also concerned about the proliferation of nuclear technology and the security risks that would come along with the transport of highly enriched nuclear fuel through their region. With some pacifist Quaker roots, the Clamshell Alliance also was, and remains, deeply opposed to nuclear weapons, Gunter said. They consider the matters of nuclear power and nuclear weapons inextricable.
News that New Hampshire was under consideration for a possible dump broke in January 1986. Later that year, the New Hampshire Legislature passed a law opposing the siting of such a dump in the state. When the Department of Energy dropped New Hampshire from its list, the storm seemed to have passed.
But while the Clams and others celebrated that, they continued to oppose the issue around which they had first come together: Seabrook Station nuclear power plant. At the time, then-Gov. John H. Sununu said he believed the two matters had to be considered separately. But Gunter said opposing the generation of nuclear waste went hand-in-hand with opposing its storage.
To this day, he said, the issues are often discussed separately, allowing the threat of nuclear waste to take a backseat in discussions and planning around nuclear energy.
New Hampshire’s high-level radioactive waste act was quietly repealed in 2011, and a subsequent attempt by the late former Rep. Renny Cushing to reintroduce legislation on the topic, opposing the siting of a high-level waste facility in New Hampshire, was defeated in 2020.
Where we are now
Hillsborough’s story has echoes elsewhere across the country. The most progress toward a potential deep storage site occurred at Nevada’s Yucca Mountain, where excavation took place, but the site was abandoned amid opposition from the state.
In broad strokes, a similar story has repeated in other instances where a site was proposed, Burnell said. But a spokesperson for the Department of Energy, the agency charged with finding a location, said their search continues nonetheless.
President Donald Trump’s administration has taken a new tack, framing the search for a waste facility along with potential new development as a search for a “nuclear lifecycle innovation campus.” The move comes as Trump has attempted to bolster the U.S. nuclear industry, calling for a surge in nuclear generation and development with multiple executive orders.
“The Nuclear Lifecycle Innovation Campuses Initiative is a new effort to modernize the nation’s full nuclear fuel cycle,” a spokesperson for the department’s Office of Nuclear Energy said in an email. That would involve a federal-state partnership with funding for a nuclear technology facility where many stages of the process could be colocated, they said, naming fuel fabrication, enrichment, reprocessing, and “disposition of waste” as some of what would occur at such a site.
The deadline for states to submit “statements of interest” for hosting sites was April 1, and the spokesperson said “dozens” of responses had been filed. But they declined to say whether New Hampshire was among those, and the New Hampshire Department of Energy did not immediately respond to the same question.
In the meantime
Spent fuel generated at Seabrook Station is initially stored in 40-plus-foot-deep pools of water for preliminary cooling, then moved to steel-and-concrete casks, according to Burnell and NextEra spokesperson Lindsay Robertson. The concrete casks remain on-site on a concrete pad, Burnell said. Until another plan is developed, this is the case for spent fuel generated at reactors across the nation.
The storage facilities in use at Seabrook were tested and built to government standards, intended to withstand “extreme weather,” Robertson said. She declined to say how much spent fuel was generated or stored at Seabrook Station.
Since coming online in 1990, Seabrook Station has generated a significant portion of New England’s power without generating much news. Yet Gunter said his concerns about the station and storage of its spent fuel have not been ameliorated with the passage of time.
“They’ve been affirmed,” he said.
Gunter has concerns about concrete degradation and wiring at Seabrook Station and other power plants nationwide. Regarding waste, Gunter and Bogen said they worry about sea level rise affecting the storage area; Seabrook Station is located adjacent to tidal marshland. And, lacking a national plan for more long-term storage of nuclear waste, they wonder what will happen to the material currently stored on a temporary basis at Seabrook if no such plan emerges.
Gunter said his concerns about nuclear waste are part and parcel to his overall opposition to nuclear power, including those generators already in use.
“The new reactors are still on paper. The real threat is really in the day-to-day operation of aging nuclear power plants that are way past their shelf life,” he said.
Nuclear power plants are expensive to construct, creating what Bogen called the “opportunity cost” of embracing them at the expense of other sources of power generation. He and Gunter see renewable energy, principally through offshore wind, as safer and faster to deploy, and were disappointed to see politicians renew their focus on nuclear energy.
“It is coming back in a rebranding, which this industry is very well versed in,” Gunter said. “… Nuclear waste is going to be a persistent hazard over geological spans of time, while the electricity is going to be a fleeting benefit.”
Bogen said he wanted to see more reinforcement of the waste stored at Seabrook in a model called hardened on-site storage. But in terms of dealing with future waste, he and Gunter believe the best solution would be to stop generating it altogether.
“If you find yourself in a hole,” Bogen said, “the first thing you do is stop digging.”
Conversely, the New Hampshire Department of Energy does not see the question of nuclear waste as a barrier to further development in the state, according to an email from department Legislative Liaison Megan Stone. The nuclear roadmap that Ayotte’s March executive order directed the department to craft would include consideration of the “nuclear lifecycle,” including storage and “disposition” of waste, Stone said.
Then, she alluded to the expectation that a federal plan would emerge. “Dry cask storage is a safe and effective method of storing spent nuclear fuel until it is collected by the federal government,” she said.
A motorcyclist from Douglas was killed in a crash on Friday, April 17 in Campton, New Hampshire.
Police in Campton identified the victim as Elias Alexandro Ramos, 18, of Douglas. He was pronounced dead at the scene, police said.
The crash occurred shortly before 11 a.m. on Route 3. The initial investigation indicates Ramos was traveling north on a Honda motorcycle when it went off the road and into a guardrail, police said. He was thrown from the motorcycle.
It appears speed or alcohol were not factors in the crash, according to police. Ramos wore a helmet, although it may not have been properly worn, police said.
The crash remains under investigation.
Ramos was due to graduate from high school in the spring. He had dreams of becoming a mechanic, according to his older brother, Alexander.
“He was so mature for his age, already having the next couple of years planned out,” said Alexander in an email to the Telegram & Gazette.
On a GoFundMe page he created to help with family expenses after his brother’s death, Alexander wrote of the way Elias would bring joy and laughter to those around him.
“Elias had a gift for making people smile, and he was always there to help anyone in need,” he wrote.
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