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The Town of Westport, Massachusetts, a natural haven nestled securely between Dartmouth, Massachusetts, and the eastern edge of Rhode Island, about an hour’s drive South of Boston, offers beautiful country settings and magnificent beach and waterfront areas. Bordered to the North-West by South Watuppa Pond and Sawdy Pond, and, boasting over eight miles of direct frontage on Buzzards Bay and approximately thirty-five miles of shoreline between the East and West Branch of the Westport River and its estuary, Westport has much to offer freshwater and saltwater enthusiasts alike.
Settled in 1670 and incorporated in 1787, Westport has a heritage rich in American history. The western-most portion of the coastal tract (stretching from what is now Fairhaven) that was purchased from the Wampanoag Indians in 1652 by the elders of the Plymouth Colony, the land was subsequently sold in smaller parcels to Quakers and Baptists who were seeking to escape religious persecution. Westport Point had originally been used by the Indians as a summer encampment, called "Pacquachuck" or "cleared hill", where they engaged in farming and fishing. Known historically for its whaling industry and rum-running enterprises, the Westport coastline has developed into a favorite Mecca for beach-loving tourists and summer residents. Horseneck Beach has been maintained as a State Reservation by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the Department of Environmental Management since 1956, and the Cherry & Webb Beach is managed by the Town, offering tourists and residents magnificent stretches of sandy white beaches and the whimsical drifts of dunes.
Agriculture and fishing remain vital components of Westport’s economy, but tourism has grown dramatically since the 1960’s when Interstate 195 and Route 88 were constructed to provide easy access to Horseneck Beach. Although Westport has become more of a bedroom community, in recent years, for people working in Boston and Providence, its population of nearly fourteen thousand has had little impact on the rural flavor of its sixty-one square miles.
Sit back, now, and enjoy a brief tour of the beautiful Town of Westport!
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