Ludlow is an incorporated

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

within the

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

Ludlow Ludlow ( ) is a market town and civil parish in Shropshire (district), Shropshire, England. It is located south of Shrewsbury and north of Hereford, on the A49 road (Great Britain), A49 road which bypasses the town. The town is near the conf ...

, Windsor County,

Vermont Vermont () is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, New York (state), New York to the west, and the Provinces and territories of Ca ...

, United States. It is sometimes called Ludlow Village, to distinguish it from the surrounding town of the same name. The population was 773 at the 2020 census.

History

Ludlow Woolen Mills is a prominent feature of the village and its history. The

mill Mill may refer to: Science and technology * Factory * Mill (grinding) * Milling (machining) * Millwork * Paper mill * Steel mill, a factory for the manufacture of steel * Sugarcane mill * Textile mill * List of types of mill * Mill, the arithmetic ...

was first built for

woolen Woolen (American English) or woollen (Commonwealth English) is a type of yarn made from carded wool. Woolen yarn is soft, light, stretchy, and full of air. It is thus a good insulator, and makes a good knitting yarn. Woolen yarn is in contrast t ...

manufacture in 1834 and operated until 1837, when the business failed in the economic panic of that year. After sitting vacant for a time, it was sold and had resumed operation by 1853. The mill complex, by then including a

machine shop A machine shop or engineering workshop is a room, building, or company where machining, a form of subtractive manufacturing, is done. In a machine shop, machinists use machine tools and cutting tool (machining), cutting tools to make parts, usua ...

sawmill A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logging, logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes ...

, and

boardinghouse A boarding house is a house (frequently a family home) in which lodgers rent one or more rooms on a nightly basis and sometimes for extended periods of weeks, months, or years. The common parts of the house are maintained, and some services, su ...

, changed hands again in 1856 and 1864. The original building, which was five stories tall, burned in 1865 and was rebuilt as the three-story brick building that remains today. By 1885 it was known as the "Ludlow Woolen Company" and included sections for

spinning Spin or spinning most often refers to: * Spin (physics) or particle spin, a fundamental property of elementary particles * Spin quantum number, a number which defines the value of a particle's spin * Spinning (textiles), the creation of yarn or thr ...

carding In Textile manufacturing, textile production, carding is a mechanical process that disentangles, cleans and intermixes fibres to produce a continuous web or sliver (textiles), sliver suitable for subsequent processing. This is achieved by passi ...

weaving Weaving is a method of textile production in which two distinct sets of yarns or threads are interlaced at right angles to form a fabric or cloth. Other methods are knitting, crocheting, felting, and braiding or plaiting. The longitudinal ...

, dressing, finishing and

dyeing Dyeing is the application of dyes or pigments on textile materials such as fibers, yarns, and fabrics with the goal of achieving color with desired color fastness. Dyeing is normally done in a special solution containing dyes and particular ...

wool. In 1899, it employed 130 people and produced 150,000 yards of wool cloth annually. Early in the 20th century the mill took the name "Verd Mont Mills Company", but later it was called the "Gaymont Woolen Mill".

General Electric General Electric Company (GE) was an American Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1892, incorporated in the New York (state), state of New York and headquartered in Boston. Over the year ...

acquired it in 1952 and retained ownership until 1976.

Black River Academy The Black River Academy is a historic school building on High Street in the village of Ludlow, Vermont. Chartered in 1835, the school served as the town high school until 1938. The present building, a Richardsonian Romanesque structure built in ...

was chartered in Ludlow in 1835 and operated as a school, serving as the Town of Ludlow's public

high school A secondary school, high school, or senior school, is an institution that provides secondary education. Some secondary schools provide both ''lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper secondary education'' (ages 14 to 18), i.e., ...

until 1938, when a new school was built. The original academy building burned early in the school's history, and the school operated in a church for 44 years until a new school building was built in 1888.History of Black River Academy
, Black River Academy Museum website, accessed October 9, 2009
, Black River Academy Museum website, accessed October 9, 2009 Notable alumni of the Black River Academy include U.S. President

Calvin Coolidge Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; ; July 4, 1872January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States, serving from 1923 to 1929. A Republican Party (United States), Republican lawyer from Massachusetts, he previously ...

; Rotary founder Paul P. Harris;

John Garibaldi Sargent John Garibaldi Sargent (October 13, 1860March 5, 1939) was an American lawyer and government official. He served as United States Attorney General during the administration of President Calvin Coolidge. Biography John G. Sargent was born in Ludl ...

, who was

U.S. Attorney General The United States attorney general is the head of the United States Department of Justice and serves as the chief law enforcement officer of the federal government. The attorney general acts as the principal legal advisor to the president of the ...

during Coolidge's presidency; and Vermont governor William W. Stickney. After the school closed, the Richardsonian school building was used for a time and run by Harriet Fife Bostock as a

convalescent home A sanatorium (from Latin '' sānāre'' 'to heal'), also sanitarium or sanitorium, is a historic name for a specialised hospital for the treatment of specific diseases, related ailments, and convalescence. Sanatoriums are often in a health ...

. Since 1972 it has housed the Black River Academy Museum and Historical Society, a museum of local history. Part of the village was listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...

in 2007 as the Ludlow Village Historic District. The district includes 26

contributing properties In the law regulating historic districts in the United States, a contributing property or contributing resource is any building, object, or structure which adds to the historical integrity or architectural qualities that make the historic distr ...

over an area of . The district is located along a section of Main Street (

Vermont Route 103 Vermont Route 103 (VT 103) is a north–south state highway in southern Vermont, United States. It runs from U.S. Route 5 (US 5) in Rockingham in the east to US 7 in Clarendon near Rutland in the west. The Vermont Country Store's second bra ...

) and Depot Street and includes the former Ludlow Woolen Mills (now housing a

condominium A condominium (or condo for short) is an ownership regime in which a building (or group of buildings) is divided into multiple units that are either each separately owned, or owned in common with exclusive rights of occupation by individual own ...

and several retail businesses),

post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...

, meeting hall, Black River Academy,

fire house __NOTOC__ A fire station (also called a fire house, fire hall, firemen's hall, or engine house) is a structure or other area for storing firefighting apparatuses such as fire engines and related vehicles, personal protective equipment, fire hos ...

, and several

church Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a place/building for Christian religious activities and praying * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian comm ...

es, businesses, and residences.

Geography

According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the village has a total area of 1.4 square miles (3.5 km²), all land.

Demographics

At the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 958 people, 437 households, and 221 families residing in the village. The

population density Population density (in agriculture: Standing stock (disambiguation), standing stock or plant density) is a measurement of population per unit land area. It is mostly applied to humans, but sometimes to other living organisms too. It is a key geog ...

was 707.2 people per square mile (274.0/km²). There were 731 housing units at an average density of 539.6/sq mi (209.1/km²). The racial makeup of the village was 97.70%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, 0.31%

Black Black is a color that results from the absence or complete absorption of visible light. It is an achromatic color, without chroma, like white and grey. It is often used symbolically or figuratively to represent darkness.Eva Heller, ''P ...

African American African Americans, also known as Black Americans and formerly also called Afro-Americans, are an Race and ethnicity in the United States, American racial and ethnic group that consists of Americans who have total or partial ancestry from an ...

, 0.10% Native American, 0.42% Asian, 0.52% from other races, and 0.94% from two or more races.

Hispanic The term Hispanic () are people, Spanish culture, cultures, or countries related to Spain, the Spanish language, or broadly. In some contexts, Hispanic and Latino Americans, especially within the United States, "Hispanic" is used as an Ethnici ...

or Latino of any race were 0.31% of the population. There were 437 households, out of which 20.8% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 38.7% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 9.4% had a female householder with no husband present, and 49.4% were non-families. 40.7% of all households were made up of individuals, and 16.9% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.06 and the average family size was 2.79. In the village, the population was spread out, with 19.3% under the age of 18, 6.8% from 18 to 24, 29.4% from 25 to 44, 21.5% from 45 to 64, and 23.0% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 42 years. For every 100 females, there were 83.5 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 82.3 males. The median income for a household in the village was $29,698, and the median income for a family was $40,703. Males had a median income of $31,250 versus $20,455 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the village was $19,824. About 6.7% of families and 9.5% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including 9.1% of those under age 18 and 7.9% of those age 65 or over.

Notable people

* Paul A. Chase, Associate Justice of the

Vermont Supreme Court The Vermont Supreme Court is the highest judicial authority of the U.S. state of Vermont. Unlike most other states, the Vermont Supreme Court hears appeals directly from the trial courts, as Vermont has no intermediate appeals court. The court ...

Ida May Fuller Ida May Fuller (September 6, 1874 – January 31, 1975) was a Vermont schoolteacher and legal secretary. She was most notable as the first beneficiary of recurring monthly Social Security payments. Early life Fuller was born at her family's Jew ...

, first recipient of a

Social Security Welfare spending is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specifically to social insurance ...

check * Joseph F. Radigan, United States Attorney for Vermont *

John G. Sargent John Garibaldi Sargent (October 13, 1860March 5, 1939) was an American lawyer and government official. He served as United States Attorney General during the administration of President Calvin Coolidge. Biography John G. Sargent was born in Lud ...

United States Attorney General The United States attorney general is the head of the United States Department of Justice and serves as the chief law enforcement officer of the Federal government of the United States, federal government. The attorney general acts as the princi ...

* Hiland J. Spaulding, Wisconsin state legislator * William W. Stickney,

Governor of Vermont The governor of Vermont is the head of government of the U.S. state of Vermont. The officeholder is elected in even-numbered years by direct voting for a term of two years. Vermont and bordering New Hampshire are the only states to hold guberna ...

* William H. Walker, Associate Justice of the

* Julius A. Willcox, Associate Justice of the

Images

File:Black River High School at Ludlow VT.jpg, Black River High School in Ludlow File:Ludlow VT Fire Department.jpg, Fire Department

References

External links

Ludlow town and village website

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ludlow (Village), Vermont Incorporated villages in Vermont Villages in Windsor County, Vermont