Massachusetts is known for a lot of things: sports, Dunkin, leafs, weather, great music, and towns with weird names.
I decided to do something totally arbitrary and weird and decided to rank every town in Massachusetts by the length of their town name.
There is one clear winner, and it’s an incredibly unique name that makes me, a guy from the midwest, feel very insecure.
Here are all the names of all the towns ranked by the number of letters. See where your town is! (easy way to do that is just hit cntrl-f and type in your town name).
The shortest?
Lee. That doesn’t even qualify for a prefix for most towns in our state, but it is unique that it is the only town with only 3 letters in its name.
Towns with less than 10 characters
Congrats on almost being notable, but not quite. This is like being the Brian Hoyer of towns.
Avon 4 Ayer 4 Dana 4 Gill 4 Hull 4 LYNN 4 Otis 4 Peru 4 Rowe 4 Stow 4 Ware 4 Acton 5 Adams 5 Ashby 5 Athol 5 Barre 5 Dover 5 Essex 5 Heath 5 Lenox 5 Savoy 5 Truro 5 Upton 5 Wales 5 AGAWAM 6 Alford 6 Auburn 6 Becket 6 Berlin 6 Bolton 6 Bourne 6 Canton 6 Carver 6 Conway 6 Dalton 6 Dennis 6 Dracut 6 Dudley 6 Easton 6 Erving 6 Goshen 6 Granby 6 Groton 6 Hadley 6 Hanson 6 Hawley 6 Holden 6 Hudson 6 Leyden 6 Ludlow 6 MALDEN 6 Marion 6 Medway 6 Mendon 6 Millis 6 Milton 6 Monroe 6 Monson 6 Nahant 6 Natick 6 NEWTON 6 Norton 6 Oakham 6 Orange 6 Oxford 6 PALMER 6 Paxton 6 Pelham 6 QUINCY 6 REVERE 6 Rowley 6 SALEM* 6 Saugus 6 Sharon 6 Sutton 6 Warren 6 Wenham 6 Weston 6 WOBURN 6 AMHERST 7 Andover 7 Ashland 7 Bedford 7 Belmont 7 Berkley 7 BEVERLY 7 BOSTON* 7 Boxford 7 Chatham 7 CHELSEA 7 Chester 7 Clinton 7 Colrain 7 Concord 7 Danvers 7 Dedham* 7 Dighton 7 Douglas 7 Duxbury 7 Eastham 7 Enfield 7 EVERETT 7 Florida 7 GARDNER 7 Gosnold 7 Grafton 7 Halifax 7 Hampden 7 Hancock 7 Hanover 7 Harvard 7 Harwich 7 Hingham 7 Holland 7 HOLYOKE 7 Ipswich 7 Lincoln 7 LOWELL* 7 Mashpee 7 Maynard 7 MEDFORD 7 MELROSE 7 METHUEN 7 Milford 7 Needham 7 Newbury 7 Norfolk 7 Norwell 7 Norwood 7 Orleans 7 PEABODY 7 Raynham 7 Reading 7 Roxbury 7 Russell 7 Rutland 7 Seekonk 7 Shirley 7 Spencer 7 Sudbury 7 Swansea 7 Tisbury 7 Tolland 7 Walpole 7 WALTHAM 7 Wareham 7 Warwick 7 Wayland 7 Webster 7 Wendell 7 Whately 7 Whitman 7 Windsor 7 Abington 8 Acushnet 8 AMESBURY 8 Aquinnah 8 Ashfield 8 Boylston 8 Brewster 8 Brighton 8 Buckland 8 Carlisle 8 Charlton 8 Cheshire 8 CHICOPEE 8 Chilmark 8 Cohasset 8 Egremont 8 Falmouth 8 FRANKLIN 8 Freetown 8 Hamilton 8 Hardwick 8 Hatfield 8 Hinsdale 8 Holbrook 8 Hopedale 8 Kingston 8 Leverett 8 Medfield 8 Merrimac 8 Millbury 8 Montague 8 Monterey 8 Pembroke 8 Plympton 8 Prescott 8 RANDOLPH 8 Rehoboth 8 Richmond 8 Rockland 8 Rockport 8 Sandwich 8 Scituate 8 Sherborn 8 Somerset 8 Sterling 8 Stoneham 8 TAUNTON* 8 Townsend 8 Uxbridge 8 Westford 8 Westport 8 Westwood 8 WEYMOUTH 8 WINTHROP 8 Wrentham 8 Yarmouth 8 Arlington 9 ATTLEBORO 9 Billerica 9 Blandford 9 BRAINTREE 9 Brimfield 9 BROCKTON* 9 Brookline 9 Dartmouth 9 Deerfield 9 Dunstable 9 Fairhaven 9 Granville 9 Greenwich 9 Groveland 9 HAVERHILL 9 Holliston 9 Hopkinton 9 Hyde Park 9 Lakeville 9 Lancaster 9 LAWRENCE* 9 Leicester 9 Lexington 9 Littleton 9 Lunenburg 9 Lynnfield 9 Mansfield 9 Middleton 9 Millville 9 New Salem 9 Pepperell 9 Petersham 9 Plymouth* 9 Princeton 9 Rochester 9 Royalston 9 Salisbury 9 Sheffield 9 Shelburne 9 Southwick 9 Stoughton 9 Templeton 9 Tewksbury 9 Topsfield 9 Tyringham 9 Wakefield 9 WATERTOWN 9 Wellesley 9 Wellfleet 9 WESTFIELD 9 Wilbraham 9 Towns with exactly 10 letters
Now we’re talking! A town with more letters than the post office at the north pole on December 13th!
Ashburnham 10 Bellingham 10 Blackstone 10 Boxborough 10 Brookfield 10 Burlington 10 CAMBRIDGE* 10 Charlemont 10 Chelmsford 10 Clarksburg 10 Cummington 10 Dorchester 10 Edgartown* 10 FITCHBURG* 10 Foxborough 10 FRAMINGHAM 10 Georgetown 10 GLOUCESTER 10 Huntington 10 LEOMINSTER 10 Longmeadow 10 Marblehead 10 Marshfield 10 Montgomery 10 Nantucket* 10 Northfield 10 Oak Bluffs 10 Plainfield 10 Plainville 10 Shrewsbury 10 Shutesbury 10 SOMERVILLE 10 Sturbridge 10 Sunderland 10 Swampscott 10 Washington 10 Wilmington 10 Winchendon 10 Winchester 10 WORCESTER* 10 Towns with 11 letters
Getting closer but still nowhere near the top!
BARNSTABLE* 11 Belchertown 11 Bernardston 11 BRIDGEWATER 11 CHARLESTOWN 11 EASTHAMPTON 11 FALL RIVER* 11 GREENFIELD* 11 Hubbardston 11 MARLBOROUGH 11 Middlefield 11 New Ashford 11 NORTH ADAMS 11 Northbridge 11 Phillipston 11 PITTSFIELD* 11 Sandisfield 11 Southampton 11 SOUTHBRIDGE 11 Stockbridge 11 Westborough 11 Westhampton 11 Westminster 11 Worthington 11 Towns with 12 letters!
Believe it or not we’re only a little over half way there at this point. EXCITING RIGHT?!
Chesterfield 12 Lanesborough 12 Mattapoisett 12 NEW BEDFORD* 12 NEWBURYPORT* 12 NORTHAMPTON* 12 Northborough 12 Provincetown 12 South Hadley 12 Southborough 12 SPRINGFIELD* 12 Tyngsborough 12 West Newbury 12 West Roxbury 12 West Tisbury 12 Williamsburg 12 Williamstown 12 Towns with 13 letters
Who says it’s an unlucky number? NOT THE FINE PEOPLE OF WEST BOYLSTON!
Middleborough 13 New Braintree 13 North Andover 13 North Reading 13 West Boylston 13 Towns with 14 letters!
Ok uhhh….so here’s a weird thing…there are no towns with 14 letters in their name. Literarlly every number since 3 is represnted but not 14. I find that weird, how about you?
Towns with 15 letters in their name!
RIGHT BACK ON TRACK BABY!
East Brookfield 15 East Longmeadow 15 New Marlborough 15 West Brookfield 15 Surely there can't be more than one town with 16 letters in its name can there be?
Uh duh! There’s SEVEN!
East Bridgewater 16 Great Barrington 16 Mount Washington 16 North Brookfield 16 West Bridgewater 16 WEST SPRINGFIELD 16 West Stockbridge 16 The final two
First up is North Attleborough with 18 letters, which is shockingly NOT the longest name…
YOUR WINNER
It should come as no surprise to anyone who loves Massachusetts or just loves the films of Casey Affleck…but the town in Massachusetts with 21 letters to its incredibly long name is…
MANCHESTER BY THE SEA!!!!
