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is a town in and the shire town (county seat) of Addison County, Vermont, United States. The population was 8,183 at the 2000 census. Middlebury is home to both Middlebury College and the Henry Sheldon Museum of Vermont History.
One of the New Hampshire grants, Middlebury was chartered by Colonial Governor Benning Wentworth on November 2, 1761. It was awarded to John Evarts and 62 others. The French and Indian Wars ended in 1763, and the first settlers arrived in 1766. During the Revolutionary War, much of the town was burned in Carleton's Raid on November 6, 1778. After the war concluded in 1783, settlers returned to rebuild homes, clear forests and establish farms. Principal crops were grains and hay.
Landowners vied for the lucrative honor of having the village center grow on their properties. A survey dispute with Salisbury led to the forfeiture of Gamaliel Painter's farm to that town, and his transition from farming to developing Middlebury Village near his and Abisha Washburn's mill, together with other mills that surrounded the Otter Creek falls. Industries would include a cotton factory, sawmill, gristmill, pail factory, paper mill, woolen factory, iron foundry, and marble quarry. The Rutland & Burlington Railroad first arrived on September 1, 1849.
Middlebury College, one of the United State's elite liberal arts colleges, was founded here in 1800. It is a member of the NESCAC and the so-called Little Ivy league. In the summer, the town plays host to the annual Middlebury College language schools, as well as the college's Bread Loaf Writers' Conference, the oldest surviving conference of its kind in the nation.
On October 22, 2007, central Middlebury was evacuated for a short time because of a train derailment; the Middlebury Union Middle School served as the evacuation headquarters.