Of Moscows and Missionaries

Just a stone’s throw from our offices here in Vermont is a little town named Moscow. Well, perhaps “town” would be stretching it a bit. But there is a reduced speed limit. And a general store where they sell tshirts pointing out that the local population (354 souls) is rivaled by the number of deer and moose.

Moscow, Vermont has nothing to do with how Russian Life ended up being published out of Vermont’s capital city. It is all just an interesting coincidence.

The town, which rests on the Little river, was founded back in 1886. It was just a sawmill then. And it seems that local residents, which included plenty of immigrants from Europe, would be called to town meetings by someone banging on the two-storey high bandsaw at the mill. The sound reminded some present of the broken tsar’s bell in Moscow (from which some immigrants came). The name stuck.