Independent New Hampshire Journalism · Northfield, NHThe 40-year term of Seabrook Station’s federal operating license was counted from October 17, 1986, the day the plant received a zero-power license. Two later federal actions moved the end to 2050. The same date in New Hampshire’s record holds a royal land grant, a militia brigade at Saratoga, a Yankees third baseman from Penacook and a police officer’s death in Manchester.
Audio edition (9:55): a synthetic voice reads the article. The images, fact check and sources are on this page.
On October 17, 1986, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued Seabrook Station a zero-power operating license, nearly a decade after, by a UPI count, 1,414 people were arrested at the construction site on the Seacoast. A 2005 commission notice said the license term ran 40 years from that date, to October 17, 2026. The end date was moved twice, by a 2005 license amendment and a 2019 license renewal, and the commission’s reactor page lists the license as expiring March 15, 2050. Seabrook leads a date that also carries a royal governor’s land grant on the far side of the Connecticut River, a New Hampshire brigade closing on Burgoyne’s army, a ballplayer from Penacook, two submarines launched on the Piscataqua and the death of a Manchester police officer.
October 17, 1986
Seabrook gets its first license, and a 40-year clock starts
The plant’s road to that license ran through a decade of fights, as a United Press International chronology of the project laid them out in 1988. A federal licensing board approved construction 2 to 1 in June 1976. In May 1977, 1,414 protesters were arrested at the site. Cost estimates climbed from $3.3 billion to $9 billion for two reactors between 1979 and 1984, and in March 1984 the owners conditionally canceled the second reactor, then about 25 percent complete. In September 1986, a month before the first license, Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis, citing safety concerns, refused to submit emergency evacuation plans, according to UPI.
A notice the Nuclear Regulatory Commission published in the Federal Register in December 2005 describes the license term this way: 40 years from the date of the zero-power operating license, “which was issued on October 17, 1986,” ending October 17, 2026. The full-power license did not come until March 15, 1990. In 2005 the plant’s licensee, FPL Energy Seabrook, asked the commission to recapture the roughly 41 months between the two licenses and run the term to March 15, 2030. The commission’s staff issued that amendment on December 22, 2005. On March 12, 2019, the commission issued a renewed license authorizing operation through March 15, 2050. The commission’s reactor page lists NextEra Energy Seabrook as the operator and the plant 13 miles south of Portsmouth.
Each change was announced in the Federal Register. The October 17, 2026 end date was superseded on December 22, 2005, more than 20 years before it would have arrived.
October 17, 1764
A royal governor in Portsmouth grants 3,000 acres across the Connecticut
Gov. Benning Wentworth signed a grant of 3,000 acres to John Walker of Portsmouth on October 17, 1764, under King George III’s proclamation of October 7, 1763, which rewarded officers of the war just ended. The charter names Walker as a former captain-lieutenant in a corps of rangers under Maj. Joseph Gorham, and places the tract at the south corner of Stratton, on land the state’s 1895 editors identify as now part of Wardsborough (today Wardsboro), Vermont, west of the Connecticut River. The grant came with conditions: Walker had to plant and cultivate five acres of every 50 within five years, white and other pines fit for masting the Royal Navy were reserved to the king, and the rent was a single ear of Indian corn a year for ten years, then a shilling of proclamation money per 100 acres, payable at the Council Chamber in Portsmouth. Province Secretary Theodore Atkinson Jr. recorded the charter the same day. The text survives in The New Hampshire Grants, the volume of charters the state printed in 1895.
October 17, 1777
A New Hampshire militia brigade helps close the ring at Saratoga
Burgoyne’s British army surrendered at Saratoga, New York, on October 17, 1777, and New Hampshire men were in the force around it. The National Park Service lists New Hampshire among the states whose Continental soldiers and militia served in the American army there. Its landmark nomination for the Moffatt-Ladd House in Portsmouth says William Whipple, a signer of the Declaration of Independence named that July to command the First New Hampshire militia brigade, led four regiments of 1,353 men to New York, helped encircle and besiege the British from October 10 to 17, and was present at the surrender. The National Constitution Center adds that Gen. Horatio Gates named Whipple one of two men to settle the terms. Those terms, the Articles of Convention, are dated October 16, the day before, and promised Burgoyne’s men passage to Britain if they did not serve again in North America; the Park Service records that Congress suspended them on December 27, 1777, and the surrendered troops, known as the Convention Army, became de facto prisoners of war.
October 17, 1908
Red Rolfe, the ballplayer from Penacook, is born
Robert Abial “Red” Rolfe was born in Penacook on October 17, 1908, according to his Society for American Baseball Research biography and a Concord history item. He graduated from Dartmouth in 1931, debuted with the New York Yankees on June 29 that year and played third base for teams that, by SABR’s count, won six pennants and five World Series, with four All-Star selections of his own. He went home to Dartmouth as athletic director in 1954 and retired in 1967. He died July 8, 1969.
October 17, 1944
Two submarines launched on the Piscataqua in one day
Portsmouth Naval Shipyard launched two submarines with back-to-back hull numbers on October 17, 1944: USS Runner (SS-476) and USS Conger (SS-477). The Navy’s Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships records that Runner had been laid down that July 10 and was sponsored by the wife of her prospective commanding officer, Comdr. R. H. Bass, who took command when she was commissioned on February 6, 1945; Conger was commissioned eight days later. The yard that built them carries Portsmouth’s name and sits across the Piscataqua on Seavey Island, in Kittery, Maine, according to the Navy’s shipyard history.
October 17, 2003
Sununu wins the Senate’s Golden Gavel
The U.S. Senate’s own New Hampshire timeline records that on October 17, 2003, Sen. John Sununu of Bedford received his first Golden Gavel Award, given for presiding over the Senate for 100 hours in a single session. He received a second in 2006.
October 17, 2006
Officer Michael Briggs dies, and New Hampshire’s first death sentence since 1977 follows
Manchester Police Officer Michael L. Briggs died on October 17, 2006, the day after he was shot. The New Hampshire Supreme Court’s 2013 opinion in State v. Addison records that Michael K. Addison shot Briggs in the head at about 2:45 a.m. on October 16 in Litchfield Lane, an alley in Manchester, to evade apprehension by the police, and that Briggs never regained consciousness. A jury convicted Addison of capital murder on November 13, 2008, and the superior court imposed a death sentence on December 22, 2008. In 2013 the New Hampshire Supreme Court affirmed the conviction, called the sentence the first imposed in New Hampshire since the state’s current capital scheme was enacted in 1977, and held its review of the sentence open for a further opinion on proportionality. In 2019 the Legislature repealed the death penalty over Gov. Chris Sununu’s veto, as InDepthNH reported at the time; Granite State Report has covered the later appeal separately.
What the date teaches
Most of New Hampshire’s October 17 lives in paper. A charter recorded by the province secretary the day it was signed. A brigade’s march written into a federal landmark nomination. A court opinion that fixes a policeman’s last day. And a federal license whose 40-year term was extended twice, each time with a notice in the Federal Register, so that its October 17, 2026 end date never came due. The record was public each time. Somebody had to read it.
— Granite State Report
Your Turn
Tell us: were you at Seabrook in 1977, or do you hold letters, photographs or town records from the plant’s licensing fights? Do you have family papers from a New Hampshire soldier at Saratoga? Write to granitestatereport@gmail.com. A reply that adds to the record may be added here with its date.
Fact check
| # | Claim | Status | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The NRC issued Seabrook’s zero-power operating license on Oct. 17, 1986; the 40-year term then ran to Oct. 17, 2026. | VERIFIED | Federal Register, Vol. 70, No. 243 (Dec. 20, 2005), FR Doc. E5-7515 |
| 2 | Full-power license March 15, 1990; 2005 request to run the term to March 15, 2030, recapturing about 41 months. | VERIFIED | Federal Register, FR Doc. E5-7515 |
| 3 | Amendment issued Dec. 22, 2005, setting March 15, 2030. | VERIFIED | NRC Weekly Information Report SECY-06-0004 (Jan. 5, 2006) |
| 4 | Renewed license issued March 12, 2019, through March 15, 2050; operator NextEra Energy Seabrook; 13 miles south of Portsmouth. | VERIFIED | Federal Register, FR Doc. 2019-04821; NRC reactor page, Seabrook Station Unit 1 |
| 5 | 1976 construction approval 2–1; 1,414 arrests in May 1977; cost estimates $3.3 billion to $9 billion; second reactor conditionally canceled March 1984; Dukakis refused emergency evacuation plans in September 1986. | ATTRIBUTED | UPI, “Seabrook’s troubled 16 years” (Jan. 29, 1988) |
| 6 | Wentworth granted 3,000 acres to John Walker of Portsmouth on Oct. 17, 1764, under the 1763 proclamation; terms as described; recorded by Theodore Atkinson Jr. the same day; land now in Wardsboro, Vt. | VERIFIED | The New Hampshire Grants (State Papers, 1895), charter and editors’ note |
| 7 | Whipple led four New Hampshire militia regiments, 1,353 men, helped besiege Burgoyne Oct. 10–17, 1777 and was present at the surrender. | VERIFIED | National Park Service, Moffatt-Ladd House landmark nomination |
| 8 | Gates named Whipple one of two men to settle the terms. | ATTRIBUTED | National Constitution Center, “William Whipple” |
| 9 | The Articles of Convention are dated Oct. 16, 1777; Congress suspended them Dec. 27, 1777. | VERIFIED | Avalon Project, Articles of Convention; NPS, “After Saratoga” |
| 10 | Red Rolfe was born in Penacook on Oct. 17, 1908; career facts as described. | ATTRIBUTED | SABR BioProject, “Red Rolfe”; The Concord Insider (2015) |
| 11 | USS Runner and USS Conger were launched Oct. 17, 1944 at Portsmouth Naval Shipyard; commissioning dates and sponsor as described. | VERIFIED | Naval History and Heritage Command, DANFS, “Runner II (SS-476)” and “Conger (SS-477)”; NAVSEA, “PNSY History” fact sheet (shipyard location) |
| 12 | Sununu received his first Golden Gavel on Oct. 17, 2003 and a second in 2006. | VERIFIED | U.S. Senate, “States in the Senate: New Hampshire Timeline” |
| 13 | Briggs was shot Oct. 16, 2006 and died Oct. 17; conviction Nov. 13, 2008; sentence Dec. 22, 2008; first death sentence since the 1977 statute. | VERIFIED | State v. Addison, 165 N.H. 381 (2013) |
| 14 | The Legislature repealed the death penalty in 2019 over Gov. Sununu’s veto. | ATTRIBUTED | InDepthNH (May 30, 2019) |
Write to the editor. Confidentiality is respected where possible.
granitestatereport@gmail.com
Editor’s note. The Seabrook license dates come from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s notices in the Federal Register and its own reports; the construction history, costs, arrests and the Massachusetts evacuation dispute are UPI’s. The 1764 grant follows the charter printed in the state’s 1895 volume of the New Hampshire Grants. Whipple’s brigade follows the National Park Service’s landmark nomination; his role in setting the terms is the National Constitution Center’s account. Red Rolfe’s birth and career rest on SABR and the Concord Insider, which differ on when his Yankees career began in earnest; SABR’s researched biography is the stronger source. The Briggs entry follows the New Hampshire Supreme Court’s opinion; the 2019 repeal is InDepthNH’s report.
Corrections: Granite State Report corrects verified errors promptly and appends a dated note identifying what changed and when. The corrections policy and the corrections register are public, and correction notes are never removed.
