Salisbury, Massachusetts

Salisbury is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, home to a popular summer resort beach town community situated on the Atlantic Ocean north of Boston on the New Hampshire border. The area that is now Salisbury was once territory of the Pentucket tribe of Pennacook Indians. It was settled by the English in 1638 and incorporated in 1639 as Salisbury, after Salisbury in Wiltshire, England. The original roads at the center of the town formed a compact semicircle, which allowed the residents to quickly reach the garrison house in case of attack. Those roads still exist today, though the current they form is triangular, bounded by Elm Street, School Street and Bridge Road.

The town is home to Salisbury Beach State Reservation, a park that includes the entire seacoast and a small portion inland, as well as the Ram Island and Carr Island State Wildlife Management Areas. The town contains three villages, Salisbury Beach, Salisbury Plains (in the northwest corner of town) and Browns Point (between Salisbury Beach and the center of town).

The town lies along the northern end of U.S. Route 1, which enters the town via the Newburyport Turnpike Bridge and heads in a roughly S-shaped route through the center of town to the New Hampshire border. The town also constitutes the northern termini of Interstate 95 in Massachusetts, as well as of Interstate 495, which lies just one-quarter mile into the town at I-95 Exit 59.