Very nearly half a century had elapsed since the publication of Fox's History of Dunstable, and Nashua had grown from a village of six thousand inhabitants or thereabouts, to a city of more than triple that size. No systematic effort at preserving the account of its growth or the events leading to its present condition had been made. The importance of such a work was understood and appreciated by its citizens, but the task was recognized as a formidable one, involving much labor with but little probability of adequate compensation.