The Pittsfield plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
Mostly cloudy
Partly cloudy; warmer
Partly cloudy
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
−1° on Nov. 17, 1967, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1868. Next is 0° in 1972.
Pittsfield’s center stands about 500 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 400 ft to 1,160 ft, a difference of 760 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Belknap Mountain, about 2,380 ft, 15 miles north.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Lower part of Rangeley Formation (metaclastic), from the Silurian, 434 to 445 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 18×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Metaclastic. Age: Silurian, 434 to 445 million years old. About 12 mi of the line.
Pelitic-schist, metasandstone. Age: Silurian, 434 to 445 million years old. About 8 mi of the line.
Granite. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Quartzite, metasedimentary. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Pittsfield reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Berry Pond Brook, the Suncook and the Merrimack: about 100 river miles.
85 miles of the trip are on the Merrimack.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Pittsfield; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Pittsfield has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 83° in July; winter nights fall to about 13° in January. A normal year brings about 68 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 42 inches of water.
On November 14 Pittsfield normally reaches 49° and falls to 29°. The record high is 71°, in 1989; the record low 7°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.92 in, fell in 2009.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1868 from the Concord Area threaded record (Concord Municipal Airport, 11 miles southwest, 160 ft lower). NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
