In its natural state this territory was all covered with evergreen and hardwood trees. It had large deposits of limestone, occasionally mixed with marble, and some granite. There were sporadic outcroppings of iron ore, and the sands of some of the streams showed considerable traces of gold. The soil was hard and rocky, but when cultivated supported a good growth of vegetation. During colonial times this region lay in an unbroken wilderness, until the coming of the French and Indian War, when a military road was cut through under the direction of General Amherst, running from Charlestown, New Hampshire, to Fort Ticonderoga, New York. This line of march lay through the south part of the town, crossing the Black River at the head of the two beautiful lakes and running over the hill towards the valley of the Otter Creek. When settlers began to come in around the time of the Revolution, the grandfather of my grandfather, Captain John Coolidge, located a farm near the height of land westward from the river along this military road, where he settled in about 1780. He had served in the Revolutionary army and may have learned of this region from some of his comrades who had known it in the old French wars, or who had passed over it in the campaign against Burgoyne, which culminated at Saratoga. He had five children and acquired five farms, so that each of his descendants was provided with a homestead. His oldest son Calvin came into possession of the one which I now own, where it is said that Captain John spent his declining years. He lies buried beside his wife in the little neighborhood cemetery not far distant. The early settlers of Plymouth appear to have come mostly from Massachusetts, though some of them had stopped on the way in New Hampshire. They were English Puritan stock, and their choice of a habitation stamps them with a courageous pioneering spirit. Their first buildings were log houses, the remains of which were visible in some places in my early boyhood, though they had long since been given over to the sheltering of domestic animals. The town must have settled up with considerable rapidity, for as early as 1840 it had about fourteen hundred inhabitants scattered about the valleys and on the sides of the hills, which the mountains divided into a considerable number of different neighborhoods, each with a well-developed local community spirit. As time went on, much land was cleared of forest, very substantial buildings of wood construction were erected, saw mills and grist mills were located along the streams, and the sale of lumber and lime, farm products and domestic animals, brought considerable money into the town, which was laid out for improvements or found its way into the country store. It was a hard but wholesome life, under which the people suffered many privations and enjoyed many advantages, without any clear realization of the existence of either one of them.