Vermont
Vermont names 2 different subjects across the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. Each is set out below. 1 of them is described by more than one encyclopedia.
Vermont a State in the North Atlantic Division of the North American Union
Described by 2 of the 6 encyclopedias.
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
a State in the North Atlantic Division of the North American Union; bounded by Quebec, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and New York; admitted to the Union, March 4, 1791; number of counties, 14; capital, Montpelier; area, 9,564 square miles; pop. (1890) 332,422; (1900) 343,641; (1910) 355,956; (1920) 352,428. Topography. The surface of the State is mountainous, being traversed from N. to S. by the Green Mountains, which culminate in Mansfield Mountain in the N. W. with an altitude of 4,300 feet. The State is drained in the E. by the affluents of the Connecticut river, which forms its entire E. boundary line, and in the W. by those rivers entering Lake Champlain, which forms over onehalf its W. boundary. The principal rivers are the Passumpsic, Wells, White, Black, West, and Deerfield, flowing into the Connecticut; and Otter Creek, Winooski, Lamoille, and Missisquoi emptying into Lake Champlain. Lake Memphremagog on the Canadian border receives the Clyde and several other small streams. The rivers are not navigable, but afford excellent water power. There are numerous small lakes, the principal ones being Willoughby, Maidstone, Seymour, Dunmore, Austin, and Bombazine. Several large large islands in Lakes Champlain and Memphremagog belong to the State, North and South Hero, Isle la Motte, and the peninsula of Alburg, with the former, constituting Grand Isle county. Geology and Mineralogy. - The principal geological formations are of Azoic and Silurian origin, the entire State being covered with glacial drift. Laurentian deposits occur in the S. W., and Lower Silurian and Primordial rocks occur along Lake Champlain. Old sea beaches, lake and river terraces, and terminal moraines abound in fossils, and make geological research exceedingly interesting. The State is famous for its marbles. They occur in many localities, especially in Bennington and Rutland counties, and are found in many colors. Iron, silver, gold, galena, and zinc occur in small deposits, and other mineral products are amethysts, feldspar, mica, chalcedony, jasper, garnets, tourmaline, and asbestos. The product of the granite quarries is over $5,000,000 annually, slate over $1,000,000, and talc about $500,000. The metal production is of little importance. Agriculture.- Vermont is a farming State and produces all the cereals, but stock raising and dairy farming are the principal agricultural industries. It is especially noted for its production of maple sugar. The acreage, value and production of the principal crops in 1919 was as follows: corn, 40,000 acres, production 2,120,000 bushels, value $3,710,000; oats, 110,000 acres, production 3,960,000 bushels, value $3,564,000; hay, 910,000 acres, production 1,456,000 tons, value $29,266,000; potatoes, 25,000 acres, production 3,125,000 bushels, value $4,906,- 000. Manufactures. The extensive water power, timber land, and stone quarries of Vermont give it a prominent place among manufacturing States. There were in 1914, 1,772 manufacturing establishments, employing 32,704 wage earners. The capital invested amounted to $79,847,000; the amount paid in wages was $18,617,000; value of materials was $42,706,000; and the value of the finished product $76,991,000. The principal articles of manufacture are lumber and timber, dairying products, marble and granite tombstones and monuments, paper and wood pulp, flour and grist, woolen goods, hosiery and knit goods. Banking. On Oct. 31, 1919, there were reported 48 National banks in operation, having $4,935,000 in capital, $4,220,000 in outstanding circulation, and $9,341,000 in United States bonds. There were 0.241.0mutual insavings banks with $110,241,000 savings deposits. Education.-School attendance is compulsory for children from 6 to 15 years. No children under 16 who have not completed a nine year school course may be employed in railways, factories, mines, or quarries. There were in 1919, 61,059 enrolled pupils in the schools, which numbered 2,472. There were 3,023 teachers. The State has two normal schools. The institutions for higher education are the University of Vermont, Middlebury College, and Norwich University. Churches. The strongest denominations in the State are the Roman Catho lic; Congregational; Methodist Episcopal; Regular Baptist, North; Presbyterian; Protestant Episcopal; Universalist; Freewill Baptist; and Spiritualist. Finances. The total receipts for the fiscal year 1919, amounted to $4,221,582, and the disbursements to $4,795,598. There was a balance at the end of the year of $507,715. The bonded indebtedness of the State in that year was $741, 531. Railways. The total railway mileage in was 1,080. The chief lines are the Boston & Maine, the Central Vermont, and the Rutland railroads. Charities and Corrections. The institutions under the supervision of the State Board of Charities and Probations include the State Prison at Windsor; House of Correction at Rutland; Industrial School at Vergennes; Soldiers' Home at Bennington; School for Feebleminded; Hospital for the Insane at Waterbury; Sanatorium at Pittsford. There are ten hospitals under the control of the State. State Government. - The Governor is elected for a term of two years and receives a salary of $3,000 per annum. Legislative sessions are held biennially and are unlimited in length. The Legislature has 30 members in the Senate and 246 in the House, each of whom receives $3.00 per day and mileage. There are 2 Representatives in Congress. History. The first settlement by whites was made in 1724 on the site of the present town of Brattleboro. Immigration began to pour in in 1760-1768, during which period the soil had been claimed as part of the New Hampshire grant; whereupon, a counter claim was put forth by the governor of New York, under virtue of the grants from Charles II. to his brother, the Duke of York. On an appeal to the English crown, jurisdiction over the new territory was decided in favor of New York. This was the precursor of an armed strife which continued for 10 years between the New York authorities and the Vermont settlers under the leadership of Ethan Allen and others. This state of things was partially interrupted by the outbreak of the Revolutionary War. In 1777 Vermont declared her independence, and sought admission into the National Confederation. Difficulties intervened, however, and it was not till 1791 that she was admitted into the Union; having previously bought off the claims of New York with the sum of $30,000. Though not at the time a member of the confederated colonies, Vermont had played a distinguished part in the war of independence, and her "Green Mountain Boys" participated in some of the hardest fought battles of the war. In the War of 1812, the Vermonters added fresh laurels to their military record. During the Civil War Vermont furnished more than her quota of men, sending more than one-tenth of the whole population.
Aiton's Encyclopedia (1910)
one of the New England States. The name is French, meaning Green Mountain. Vermont is known as the Green Mountain State. It lies north of western Massachusetts, between New Hampshire and New York . The state is 157 miles in length from north to south, and from forty to ninety miles in width. Area, including water, 9,565 square miles. The waters of the state belong to the St. Lawrence, to the Connecticut, and to the Hudson River system. The scenic features of the state are the Green Mountains and Lake Champlain. MINERALS. The surface is mountainous. The state has great natural resources. It leads the Union in the production of cut and polished stone. The quarries yield a fine-grained marble of several beautiful colors to the value of $3,000,000 a year. Granite quarries yield another million and a half. There are rich supplies of slate, limestone, talc, and soapstone, mica, ochre, and kaolin. Deposits of iron and copper were considered profitable until of late. A considerable part of the state is forested. Lumber still leads the list of products. More maple sugar is manufactured in Vermont than in all the other states taken together. TRANSPORTATION. In early days communication was maintained with Boston by stage. Cattle were driven afoot to market. An annual trip to Boston with dairy products and poultry was taken usually in the sleighing season. This and the homecoming with precious purchases was the event of the year. Now canals connect Lake Champlain with the Hudson and the Connecticut. There are three trunk lines of railway, affording on an average a mile of track for every nine square miles of territory. AGRICULTURE. Although a state of varied industry, agriculture is the leading occupation. Wheat raising has been abandoned, because it is cheaper to buy Western flour than to raise it. Corn, oats, and other forage crops are raised. Merino sheep have given the state reputation for stock raising. HISTORICAL. Vermont was visited by white men under command of Champlain in 1609. He named the mountains and the lake. The first permanent English-speaking settlement grew up around a fort built in 1724 near the present site of Brattleboro. It was a stockade, erected by Massachusetts as a defense against the French and Indians. The territory of the present state was claimed in part by New Hampshire, by Massachusetts, and by New York. The northern boundary of Massachusetts was agreed upon readily, but New York still laid claim to all territory west of the Connecticut River. New Hampshire laid claim to all territory east of a line from the western border of Massachusetts to Lake Champlain. The dispute between New York and New Hampshire was still unsettled at the close of the Revolutionary War. The Green Mountain Boys, active and courageous under the lead of bold Ethan Allen,--the same who had demanded the surrender of Ticonderoga in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress, and who had led them on the field of Bennington,--then asserted their independence. March 4, 1791, Vermont was admitted to the Union, the first state to join the original thirteen. The early settlers were of English origin, largely from Connecticut and Massachusetts. The state has maintained a high reputation for sobriety, intelligence, industry, and economy. The younger people have migrated westward in great numbers, contributing not a little to the shaping of institutions in the newer states. In 1900 the population was reported at 343,641. It has increased but little in the past fifty years. The state government is modeled on the type common in the United States . The general assembly of one house was changed to the two-house form in 1836. There are fourteen counties. Montpelier is the capital. The old plan of school districts, small republics they have been called, was changed to the township plan in 1892. In 1840 there were fifty-three academies. In 1904 seventeen of the stronger survived; the rest had been reorganized as high schools or had been supplanted by them. There were at this date seventy-seven free high schools. The University of Vermont, located at Burlington, maintains the usual literary and scientific courses and departments of law and medicine. Middlebury College is located in the village of that name. STATISTICS. The following statistics are the latest to be had from trustworthy sources: Land area, square miles 9,135 Water area 430 Population (1906) 350,373 Burlington 21,070 Rutland 11,961 Barre 8,448 No. counties 14 Members of state senate 30 Representatives 246 Salary of governor $1,500 U. S. representatives 2 Presidential electors 4 Assessed valuation of property $172,000,000 Bonded indebtedness $1,165,000 State revenue $1,350,000 Acres of improved land 2,000,000 Agricultural Products-- Corn, bushels 2,499,000 Wheat, bushels 23,000 Oats, bushels 2,664,000 Potatoes, bushels 1,971,000 Tobacco, pounds 347,000 Butter, pounds 42,000,000 Cheese, pounds 5,000,000 Wool, pounds 1,050,000 Domestic Animals-- Horses 93,000 Mules 331 Milk cows 291,000 Other cattle 221,000 Sheep 223,000 Goats 102 Swine 99,000 Fowls 850,000 Manufacturing establishments 1,699 Capital invested $62,658,000 Wages and salaries $17,323,000 Raw material $32,425,000 Output of manufactures $60,083,000 Silver output $2,500 Copper output, pounds 696,000 Marble output $4,596,000 Slate output $1,447,000 Granite output $693,000 Miles of railway 1,073 Teachers in public schools 3,984 Pupils enrolled 66,524 Percentage of male teachers 8.4 Average monthly salary of teachers $31.45 Average annual expenditure per pupil $26.14 See Marble ; Sugar ; Allen
Vermont UNIVERSITY OF, and State Agricultural College
Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)
UNIVERSITY OF, and State Agricultural College, a coeducational, non-sectarian institution in Burlington, Vt.; founded in 1791; reported at the close of 1919: Professors and instructors, 110; students, 658; number of graduates, 5,500; president (acting), Guy W. Bailey, A. B.
What Has Changed in the Last Century
When Collier's wrote this in 1921 Vermont had just recorded a falling population — 352,428 in 1920, down from 355,956 a decade earlier; today it holds about 645,000 people, still the second least populous state, and Montpelier remains the smallest state capital in the country. The one-town-one-vote House of 246 members described here was swept away after the reapportionment rulings of the 1960s; the House now seats 150 members elected from equal-population districts, while the Senate still has 30. The marble, granite and slate quarries and the dairy farms survive, and Vermont still makes roughly half of all United States maple syrup, but the state's economy now leans heavily on ski tourism and, from the 1950s, semiconductor manufacturing at Essex Junction. Politically the change is sharper still: the Republican stronghold of 1921 elected the independent socialist Bernie Sanders to Congress and became, in 2000, the first state to create civil unions for same-sex couples.
Written for this edition, 2026.