Our Town: The Lure of Londonderry

About a decade ago, Neal Fegan and his family had a decision to make: Move to Paris for work or stay in suburban Londonderry, a southern New Hampshire town known for its apple orchards and family-friendly charm, where Fegan and his wife had settled to raise their kids. 

Londonderry won over the City of Lights. 

Neal Fegan is better known around Londonderry as Ubah Guy Neal. The most common comment he hears when he drops people off at their houses? “Looks like someone needs to cut the grass!”

“We love it here. You know, when we moved in, the neighbors came over with cookies and said, ‘Welcome to the neighborhood,’ ” Fegan says. “You don’t find that many places, and we knew that we picked the right place when those types of things happened.”

Today, Fegan is a local celebrity: He’s “Ubah Guy Neal,” offering ride services throughout southern New Hampshire, often driving to Boston as many as four times a day. During the most recent school vacation, he drove 1,200 miles in 48 hours. He’s driven through every Londonderry street (multiple times) and talked with hundreds
of neighbors. 

“You get the lowdown on a whole lot of things,” Fegan says. “You get a lot of gossip, like when I pick people up after they’re coming back from their trips, they want to know what’s been going on, what’s happening, what’s been going on in town.”

The answer to what’s happening in town these days often involves construction. Londonderry is one of New Hampshire’s fastest-growing towns, according to the state. Between April 2020 and July 2025, the town’s population grew by 6.9% to 27,800 residents. 

In recent years, there’s been a number of mixed-use development projects with industrial and office buildings, residential and retail, like Woodmont Commons, which includes 603 Brewery and Beer Hall as an anchor tenant. 

Last year, O’Neil Cinemas reopened a movie theater in town at the site where the family-owned theater first opened. This year, Moose Hill Orchards, the oldest orchard in New Hampshire, submitted plans to the town for a restaurant at Mack’s Apples farm market.

Those and other projects highlight a growing town.  

“I would say we are probably more of a big town now,” says Carmel Shea, who’s lived in Londonderry for 26 years and opened O’Shea’s Caife & Tae in 2018. “Not quite a city. Just more options.”

Julie and Stephen Lee have been involved in the Concert on the Common series for many years. It’s a year-round labor of love for the couple. Photo Courtesy of Stephen Lee

Shea opened the coffee shop in part to give the community more options to work and hang out with friends without feeling rushed. The shop’s motto is “Enter as Strangers, Leave as Friends,” and its name hearkens back to the town’s Scottish and Irish roots. 

“It’s a great town,” Shea says. “It’s a supportive town. People who live here are invested in the community. They’re invested in your success. They want to see small businesses be successful.”

Nutfield roots

Scots-Irish immigrants came to Londonderry, then known as Nutfield, in 1719. In Nutfield, they planted the first potatoes in North America on a plot that is in today’s Derry, says David Ellis, a member of the town’s historical society. 

The Mack family started farming in the area in the 1730s, eventually planting apple trees. Today, Moose Hill Orchards and Mack’s Apples are a Londonderry staple, drawing people in for apple picking in the fall and ice cream cones in the summer. 

It’s hard to overstate the influence the Mack family has had on the town, says Linda Green, president of the Londonderry Historical Society. The late Andy Mack Sr. gave the historical society land. That land is home to Morrison House Museum, Parmenter barn and Clark blacksmith shop and sits near the town’s common. 

Linda Green and David Ellis of the Londonderry Historical Society, which hosts educational events at its property. The venue also welcomes weddings a few times a year.

During the summers, the Concerts on the Common is a staple community event, a free concert series on Wednesday evenings. For the past two decades, Stephen and Julie Lee have been involved in organizing the event series. 

“What keeps us involved, I think it’s just the love of the event,” Julie Lee says. “We get so much energy from the crowd and from the folks, and being able to see old neighbors and see all the concertgoers that have come to us every single week for years and years and years, and they’re friends now. We just love to see everybody, and we love to be out on the common, and we love the music.”

The couple, twice named Londonderry citizens of the year, moved to Londonderry in 1987 to raise their family. Early concerts featured karaoke nights and free entertainment, drawing maybe 50 people. Now, there’s easily 500 people, sometimes 1,000, on any given night, plus multiple food trucks and a Saturday kids’ concert. 

“There’s just nothing like a really good band on a really nice night on the common,” Stephen Lee says. 

Linen was the early industry in Londonderry. Early settlers made high-quality linen, so high-quality that others outside of Londonderry tried to sell linen under the pretense that it was manufactured here. Eventually, an act was passed allowing Londonderry linen-producers to put a seal on their linen to prove where it came from, Ellis says.

Nearly 300 years later, the entrepreneurial streak is still strong in Londonderry, and in recent years a number of new residents have brought boutique fitness studios, restaurants, bars and more offerings to the town. 

“I would say Londonderry community members really love to support Londonderry, whether that be in the school systems or local business owners,” says Ashley Marand Iwanicki, founder of The Collective Studios, an exercise studio offering indoor cycling, Pilates and yoga classes. In addition to the fitness classes, the studio also aims to be a third space in the community, where people can connect with friends. 

“Year after year, we are so impressed with the way that our community members support our business and the way that we spend time caring and supporting them. It very much feels like this symbiotic relationship, where we’re not just providing a service for people, it’s also people that genuinely care about us.”

Gary and Tory Sessa outside of the sourdough shed. People drive from all over to pick up their share of the weekly drop. photo Courtesy of Sessa’s Sourdough

‘Nothing is far’

People in Londonderry are proud of the town’s offerings and small-town feel. 

“One thing I love about Londonderry is, nothing is far,” Gary Sessa says. “It’s the perfect balance of a small town. You’re not driving forever to get to a restaurant.”

There’s a wide variety of restaurants to check out. The Coach Stop Restaurant and Dining is fine-dining in an 1810 building. Janie’s Uncommon Café is classic breakfast food. Lucciano’s Ristorante is an Italian restaurant with a gluten-free bakeshop. 

In 2024, Gary and Tory Sessa started making and selling bread out of a shed at their house. Now they’re a place where people are driving — from both near and far — to pick up sourdough bread, focaccia and pastries. Recently, the pair converted their basement into a food prep space. When they list their offerings on HotPlate, they’re sold out in minutes. 

Three years ago, Chris and Emily Ingham moved to Londonderry. They opened The Mallard, a restaurant offering 16 rotating taps and regular events like music bingo and trivia, in early 2026. One thing that’s stood out to Chris in the months since opening is the number of people who are going out to dinner with their neighbors. 

“That’s super unique and telling about how much people in this area care about this area, which is a really, really cool and unique component of the community,” he says. 

Gary and Tory Sessa outside of the sourdough shed. People drive from all over to pick up their share of the weekly drop.

The entrepreneurial spirit in Londonderry extends not only to businesses, but to community efforts. Over the past year, a group of friends and local basketball coaches have rallied support to restore the local basket-
ball courts. 

The courts, installed in the 1970s, were heavily used, but needed some upkeep, says Trevor O’Brien. 

He and a group of friends took an idea out of group chat — what if we tried to fix up the basketball courts? — and turned it into a nonprofit, Restore the Recs, with support from the town, local community and businesses. They raised more than $150,000 in cash and donated labor and materials, he says, and will continue to fundraise for maintenance.

“From the beginning, we’ve had local places more than willing to help out and lend money and opportunities,” O’Brien says. “We kind of knew we could do this because we knew we had people in the community that we could lean on.”

The renovated courts reopened this summer. They’re near the town’s playground and its tennis courts and baseball fields. On a nice summer day, the place hums with activity — much like the rest of Londonderry.