Monument Square Historic District

Photo: License: Public Domain

The Monument Square Historic District of Alton encompasses the 19th-century heart of the town, a roughly triangular open space formed by the junction of Main Street and Old Wolfeboro Road.

The square is lined by closely spaced buildings, most of which are 19th-century wood frame structures.

Although it was not intended to be the town center (which was originally planned to be further south), it rose in importance in the 1830s with the construction of the Cocheco House, built as a hotel but which also served as an American Legion hall. There are two brick buildings in the district: the town hall, a Romanesque brick building erected in 1893, and the Gilman Museum, built in the 1970s with sympathetic Colonial Revival styling.