Major funding for the production of Our Hometown Nashua was provided by.

Crown Uniform and Linen Service.

Lovering Volvo Cars.

Millyard Technology Park Southern New Hampshire Health the Law Family Companies and the New Hampshire Lottery with additional support by and by viewers like you.

Thank you.

In the 1600s, this was a fur trading center in the early 1800s.

It became the first planned mill town in the state.

A carefully designed grid of streets linking factories, worker housing and commercial spaces.

In the 1940s, this town's big business, the textile mills went away and the city had to reinvent itself, which it has done spectacularly.

Welcome to our hometown.

I'm Rebecca Rule.

We're in Nashua, New Hampshire's Gate City.

When the folks from Grow Nashua developed spaces in the city for community gardens, they know that those gardens will grow more than just tomatoes and okra.

Started the organization about seven years ago.

My wife and I were out in our in our yard here in Nashua, and we have a little garden and we wanted to kind of just enjoying the spring, you know, that nice time of season when you get it, just get out in the garden and you're just like, This is great.

I just want to be outside.

The sun's out.

But it got us to thinking, what if we had more spaces in our city where people could grow their own food?

In Nashua, here we have a lot of immigrant and refugee families that live here.

So our thought process was kind of how could we help those families who come from another country and may be used to growing their own food and now are in Nashua and they live in the inner city and they don't really have space to actually do that.

And the idea was kind of like, let's create these spaces where people can come to grow the food that they need to grow, but also have a space where people from different walks of life could be in a place and kind of interact to realize that we're really all more alike than we are different.

And so we had 20 different families from 12 different countries in the space.

So it was neat because we had this we kind of saw our vision kind of became reality.

And then from there, we we've just added different locations in the different sections of the city so that people have something close to them.

When you start to have people from different countries that are growing foods, you realize that often times they can't get the foods that are traditionally from their countries that are part of their favorite recipes that they want to cook for their children.

We as Grow Nashua can go out as an organization and find the seeds and start the seedlings and then give them to the families.

And the families are thrilled because, like I said, they can't get them from the grocery store very often.

So now they can grow them fresh.

And that's that's the best.

What our goal is and our vision is to really create this interconnected community that can share resources with one another and can really listen to one another and support one another in a way that is looking at all of the people in Nashua rather than just the people who normally have their voices at the table.

So what we're looking at at Grow Nashua is how do we empower more everyday people from Nashua to know that they can do things that make a difference in the community?

At the end of the day, that's what this is all about.

This isn't about I mean, it is about the food, but it's more about like those human interactions because the people that garden with us and grow with us and that we we help and we serve and we learn from them and they learn from us.

Those are the people that I love to interact with and are, you know, they become like family.

And that type of trust is what you need if you're going to really get anything done in the community.

When Nashua was largest business, pulled up stakes and moved out, it left behind empty mills and thousands unemployed.

It was a devastating loss, but it was also an opportunity.

153 years ago, we started in Lowell, Massachusetts.

My great great grandfather, Walter Henry, came from England knowing of the pin industry, primarily servicing the textile industry.

So at the time was Textron.

Mills was operating and owning a large massive portion of the Nashua mail space here, if not all of it.

They left like the Baltimore Colts in the middle of the night.

I make it a little dramatic, but so they were gone.

Devastated, right?

Nashua unemployment skyrocketed.

Vacancy in the mills.

Nashua was pretty devastated.

We saw the opportunity coming from Lowell, a much larger facility of able to kind of shape the facility the way we wanted to, where we needed to for for production purposes.

So that opportunity brought us up here in 1949.

Today, in 2023, we're still manufacturing textile pins that we manufactured in 1870.

The lifespan of this pin for a specific product in this specific industry blows my mind, and everything that we make goes into something else, right?

So we don't make a finished a finished part per se.

So we're making a small little precision component that goes into assembly, that goes into an air handling system for an airplane.

Our family has really been tied to the community, really from the foundation of my grandfather and moving up here in 1949.

We've always been, you know, treated fairly and treated well in the city.

It's, you know, we look forward to that always.

It's a great business environment for us.

Yeah.

This community has been a bit of a melting pot since colonial times.

But three or four generations back, beginning in the 1930s, Irish, Greek and Eastern European immigrants came to work in the mills and raised their families.

Companies even recruited from the Canadian Maritimes.

The first synagogue in New Hampshire was built in 1899 on French Hill.

These immigrants worked hard and their investment in this community created prosperity and a quilt of diversity.

Today, their descendants understand the value of welcoming people from away.

It makes for good policy, good business, and a lot of good food.

There were different sections and when people came, they went with those they knew.

So that is why we had French Hill, we have the Greek section, and it translates to today.

And because of that generation, so many businesses, especially in our downtown, are there.

But I feel so lucky to have witnessed it and and been a part of it and just saw what hard work accomplished.

My aunts used to sell Greek pastries from their house, so I grew up learning how to bake, how to sell.

I used to help them at 7-8 years old, prior to the fire, there was a sign Makreena's Bake Shop Bakery would hang at 25 Vine, And when that fire happened, my mother took that sign for me, and that sign proudly is up at my shop today.

It's really a community gathering space Nashua's a very welcoming community and the people who want to be involved.

The network is so vast and so big and they want you to succeed.

There are so many people in this city who do so good for so many.

Everyone wants to help.

And I'm proud of the community I live in and I'm proud of the people in this community growing up in Nashville.

You just learned that it was just a very big, small town.

There are we're a melting pot of so many immigrants and, you know, people who came before us and families that came to make our community better.

But the immigrants that came over and settled our community were so hardworking, so dedicated.

And I think because I was raised in a very ethnic household, that I understand that there's going to be things that families need and do and expect and question because they're coming from other cultures in other countries.

And what we need to do is get to know them and work with them and see where we can, you know, meet people.

And when we do that, when we help families, so we help parents and meet needs, we're helping children and it all trickles down to what's really good and best for the child.

And that's one of the reasons I love working at the Adult Learning Center is I see it every day.

I see new families coming in.

They may be from countries other than Greece or Canada or Nova Scotia.

They may be from more Latino type countries or Asian countries or wherever.

It doesn't matter.

They're coming to make a better life for themselves, for their children, for our community.

And they're doing it.

And it's happening.

In 1842, a rift over where to put town hall north or south of the river divided the township of Nashua.

Mill workers, farmers and tradespeople lived on the South Side.

Business people, politicians and professionals lived on the North Side.

Both wanted the new town hall.

The question was put to a vote and the workers won.

There were more of them.

The residents on the north side were not happy, so they hired a lawyer, Franklin Pierce, to see what could be done.

Not much, apparently.

So later that year, the North Siders seceded and formed a new town, Nashville.

It took 11 years of hard feelings and economic and political damage before the two sides decided they'd be better off as one.

In 1853, they reunited under a new charter as the city of Nashua.

Why would the Black Heritage Trail run straight through Nashua?

The story from this stop on Amherst Street might surprise even diehard sports fans.

So Branch Rickey was running as the general manager of the Dodgers in the 1940s, and in 1946 he brought three African American players into the system.

We all know Jackie Robinson, but his first year in 1946, he played in Canada.

In the same year, Branch Rickey brought to Nashua, the Nashua Dodgers, a minor league team for the Dodgers, Roy Campanella and Don Newcomb.

And they played for the Nashua Dodgers in 1946.

Well, then, in 1947, Dodgers sent Jackie Robinson to the Major League team in Brooklyn.

Don Newcombe and Ray Campanella.

Roy Campanella stayed here in Nashua and played another season.

Then in the subsequent two years, the Dodgers sent for Roy Campanella and then Don Newcomb to the Dodgers.

So they became the second and third African-American players to play in the American American League.

Roy Campanella made the Hall of Fame eventually, and Don.

Newcomb was Rookie of the Year.

He was the most valuable player at one point, and he had a great career as well.

But for Nashua, this is important and we're very proud of this, that when those two players, Campanella and Newcomb, came to Nashua and played here, they were.

This was actually the first racially integrated team in the United States.

And we're we're going to celebrate this with the inclusion of the Holman Stadium where they played and which still exists in the Black Heritage Trail.

They were amazing players and they were able to break it here, felt very comfortable here.

Unfortunately, Campanella, he passed away much too young after an accident and subsequent health problems.

But Newcomb, I think, passed away in the last two years and up to the end he would always talk about Nashua and basically say that it was one of the places that they felt totally comfortable that he and his teammate would easily talk about Nashua.

From then on, it was just a special place.

We're starting a new segment here on our home town.

It's called Our Hometown Student Filmmakers.

We asked student filmmakers in Nashua High schools to produce stories about Nashua as they see it.

Their segments will all be showing up on our website soon.

But here's one that reinforces the welcome nature of this community.

Yeah, so the hearing teachers I've had throughout my years have been really nice.

Elementary school to fifth grade was the best.

The kids, the friends that I would meet there were so curious and wanted to learn sign language and they wanted to try to communicate with me.

And that really inspired me and was very positive.

It was a great experience.

And yeah.

Nashua is not only the second largest city in New Hampshire, but in all of northern New England.

Still small by national standards, but plenty big for art to flourish on this urban canvas, just doing kind of local events to try to see if we can gather some people who have some talent here.

Because throughout the time, you know, I've seen hanging out with friends and stuff, it came to me like, Hey, people are actually pretty talented musically here.

What I decided to do one day was me, myself and a couple of friends.

This creates some sort of competition to make it kind of friendly.

And we came out with this weekly competition for hip hop, for battle rapping.

It kind of worked.

I mean, it was just one of those things where we spread the word around, Hey, we're having this competition online, social media, stuff like that.

And a lot of people came through and it was a great event.

I think Nashua has a huge talent of people with music.

The scene here is great.

I mean, there's so, so many local artists that are, you know, are going through.

Main Street sometimes getting booked through some of these venues here.

It's a very cool scene, very collective.

I think people just help each other out.

Nobody has a lot of egos.

A lot of people are just trying to help the cause in a way.

I'm very grateful to this city and everybody that's been here and supportive.

I grew up at the Boys and Girls Club when I was younger too, and I'm very grateful for the people that used to work there too.

They mold me into the man I am today and being a positive person and a great, great dad.

And not too long ago I was like, I want to say eight years ago I met up with my friend Jonathan Gonzalez.

We call him Gordie.

He put me on to a rap battle cipher league that he created himself called flow free or die.

At the time I was just trying to get in the league, trying to really battle rap people and try to see what the rap scene was like in Nashua.

It was always open arms, it was always open arms, anything that I put out here beats music, music videos.

I like the music scene in Nashua, it's respectful.

That's the one thing I like about it is respectful is not too much competition because people like to work together out here and I noticed the collaboration is really good.

That's the one thing I will say.

I like Nashua because everyone has an idea and they can do it from the hip hop scene to the rock scene too.

So that's from both sides for me.

And I like I like I like the support that's out here.

They really, really work together.

Well, I think I think Nashua has the canvas to do so they give you the canvas to draw what your expression is, your mindset, your ideas, and they give you the means and terms and the tools to do so, giving me a canvas to draw on.

That's all I need.

Upbeat music.

Positive Street Art.

The name is the mission.

We started by doing murals and art workshops, dance workshops and really fun events for the community that really pulled all the creative aspects of art together and urban art together.

How do we change the narrative of what street art is?

How how can we use this as an opportunity to opportunity to teach people that this is community building, This is placemaking, this is beautifying a community.

For us, it was bringing more of that urban art to Nashua, and we found that there are a lot of people that that really needed that here in the community over the past 11 years.

That's the beauty of beauty about graffiti that like it, it catches your attention into art.

You draw, it draws you into it, and then you can see how far you can go after that, because this fun stuff like catches kids attention and then you can like hold their attention and actually teach them everything that there need to be taught about art.

They want to learn more.

And so we we use that to our advantage as an opportunity to share what we do and inspire them in our own ways.

Changing the trajectory of what art was versus what it can be and how it can be transformative, how it can be healing, how it can build communities and create vibrancy within communities.

That, I think is it's what really inspires me.

We either think of a project we think is important to the community, we think it through, plan it out, and then outsource to the community for ideas and and funding.

And then we put that project out to the public.

Now, if it's like a commission, the client can have a complete perfect idea of what they want, even have pictures and is like, okay, I'm doing that right.

Sometimes they don't really know what they want yet and they're looking for more of a way to get there.

And then we kind of work together trying to figure out, you know, what things they like, especially what's the story behind themselves or their business, if that's what they're looking for.

And then we just kind of tailor something based on on what they're looking for after that.

So a lot of people know us by our murals.

We actually have just greatly expanded as of last summer.

I'm now the executive director and we have expanded the programing that we've done over the past ten, 11 years.

And we have a lot coming up with with art workshops, with dance workshops, with exhibits and and then community events.

We have a lot in store for 2023, and we can't wait to share with the community.

And we we really love the embrace that we've had since we've started growing more after the pandemic.

I really think that this has taken on a whole new level of really building the community.

This is why we named it Positive Street Art, because we wanted everything that we did to be a positive impact on the community.

Magic That's the subject of this next story, the magic that comes from cops and kids being on the same team.

The origins of PAL were Nashua police officers setting up shop and field days.

There used to be a box truck that was the next big step, and they'd fill it with stuff and just show up and entertain and and intermingle with kids.

And that slowly became more formalized programs.

And now there's thousands of thousands of kids that are involved in football and cheerleading.

We've got the largest cross country program in the country at the elementary school level with a thousand kids.

And then we spent a lot of time in Nashua, tougher neighborhoods.

That's where we have these safe haven.

And it's full of kids every afternoon that are coming after school and doing homework and and succeeding and exceeding their expectations.

The mission of powers, cops and kids.

So it's still police officers working closely with young people and families.

It's pretty magical when young people can get together and you see both the police officer and the young person learning from each other.

And there's just some magic in that.

That's really what PAL's mission is.

We create all these great opportunities for young people to be active and engage with the community, and then we sprinkle in police officers and community stakeholders, and it's pretty wild to be a part of that.

That truck turned into storage units which turned into a building, and then the boxing program that we have ultimately landed in the top floor of that building.

So that building now houses a boxing gym on top floor after school program in between.

PAL actually bought the church that was next door and the building at the same time.

It's the old Greek church.

And we took what was the school then and turned it into this youth center that is the PAL Center.

The young people usually drive us programming-wise, you know, they'll tell us what do they think is cool and what do they want to be doing every afternoon?

They give us those those those hints, but they'll also tell us the bad things that are going on and how can we help sort of create opportunity for them to be part of that change.

I get a lot of credit for this kind of stuff, but really hundreds, hundreds of volunteers that do it every every year for for the community and for PAL.

You've heard a lot about what a welcoming place this is.

Well, making folks welcome is not just an idea, it's policy.

In 2016, Nashua joined the Welcoming America Initiative, which encourages everyone to promote understanding and an appreciation of diversity.

This next story is from someone who has experienced that support firsthand.

15 años.

Cuando llegue a los Estados Unidos, llegue a University.

Me tocó que empezar cuidando niños.

Me tocó empezar limpiando casas.

Trabajé en una lavandería que iba a querer llegar donde yo quería.

Tenía que aprender el idioma y mi mamá me decía todo esto va a pasar, va a llegar un momento en que va a lograr todo.

Y eso fue.

Pero sí, en ese momento sabía lo básico, lo que uno aprende en los países.

Hola, cómo estás?

Eso era lo que sabía.

Pero mi meta desde un principio que yo pisé este país y dije voy a tomar ventaja de las oportunidades.

Y mientras estaba esperando mi documentación y entré, conocí a María de Belén de Caridades Católicas, quien me llevó mi proceso migratorio y ella me recomendó Nacho a Community College y empecé a tomar clases ahí.

Como estudiante, ya después, con el tiempo, pasaron años.

Yo siempre quería ser capitana, consejera.

Entonces yo decía yo quiero ser consejera de Estudiantes.

Me salió el trabajo como coordinadora de I ll en el Nacho School, de ser que es una de mis pasiones, ayudar a tantos muchachos que llegan como uno, pero más jóvenes.

Yo creo que en Acho Community College fue como esa base para mí, porque ahora en día veo a muchas Claudia.

Y siempre digo cuando las dedico les digo ustedes pueden lograr todo lo que se propongan con dedicación y motivación.

De pronto, una de las memorias que yo más y de pronto que yo admiro mucho, es que de que cuando Nacho quiere hacer un festival y traer toda la comunidad junta, hay mucha gente trabajando para ese logro.

Y si van a hacer algo para el festival portugués de los Blaze, ahí, ahí, ahí está toda la comunidad.

Para los hispanos está toda la comunidad.

Si hay alguien enfermo y si se riega el comentario, la gente está ahí para ayudar y eso yo pienso que es como una conexión, es también muy familiar y eso es algo que me gusta.

Thank you to all of you who stepped up and shared your stories about what makes Nashua a true gate city, not just a gateway to New Hampshire, but for many to America.

This town is diverse, vibrant, and as these stories tell us, welcoming for more stories from Nashua, visit nhpbs.org/hometown.

I'm Rebecca Rule.

See you around town.

We have so much going on in in the town and in the city that it just makes it a better place for us.

People who really care about the community and want to make sure that it's an amazing place to thrive.

For the arts community in Nashua is a lot bigger and broader than I ever thought.

Nashua, it is a welcoming city.

Relationships that go back many generations.

So Nashua to me is home.

Major funding for the production of Our Hometown Nashua was provided by.

Crown Uniform and Linen Service.

Lovering Volvo Cars.

Millyard Technology Park Southern New Hampshire Health the Law Family Companies and the New Hampshire Lottery with additional support by and by viewers like you.

Thank you.