SOMERSWORTH

city, Strafford county, southeastern New Hampshire, U.S., on the Salmon Falls River. With Dover and Rochester it forms a tri-city area. The site was settled before 1700 as part of Dover. The parish of Summersworth, organized in 1729, was separately incorporated as a town in 1754. Development began after 1820 when Isaac Wendell acquired water rights along the Great Falls for textile milling, bleaching, and dyeing. The Boston and Maine Corporation Railroad arrived in 1843, and other industries, chiefly shoe manufacturing, followed. In 1849 the southern half of the town was set off and incorporated as Rollinsford, and Somersworth (officially renamed) became a city in 1893. Industries produce electric meters, rubber products, and circuit boards. Pop. (1990) 11,249; (1996 est.) 11,515.