The Town of Lancaster is a bedroom community serving the more urban
Clinton, Leominster and Worcester. The town has little industry, but does
contain some working farms.
Lancaster offers a spread of municipal services to its residents, and the
school system, which includes one elementary and one middle school, has
long held a high reputation for academic excellence, although municipal
budget cuts are causing concern among residents about the continuance of
the town's school standards. The town's high school students attend the
Nashoba Valley Regional High School, which also has a strong academic
reputation.
Lancaster is the site of a half-dozen private schools, including South
Lancaster Academy, the Dr. Franklin Perkins School, a comprehensive service
agency for children, adolescents, adults and senior citizens, and the
Atlantic Union College, a Seventh-Day Adventist school. A significan
number of town residents are Adventists and the group hosts a gathering
of their co-religionists from around the country each summer.
Lancaster has only one restaurant and no taverns, having been a dry town
since its incorporation in 1653. As residents note, "It's a quiet, little town."
