Multiple sources cite the October 8, 1633 town meeting held in Dorchester, Mass., as the first recorded town meeting in America. The Dorchester Atheneum, a web site devoted to the history of Dorchester, Massachusetts, states:

“Dorchester claims the credit of having been the first plantation to establish the New England town meeting by selectmen, when on the 8th of October, 1633, it passed an order establishing that form of town government.”

“One of the seven selectmen in Dorchester was appointed the moderator because of ‘intemperate clashings in our towne meeting,’” according to State University of New York Professor of Political Science Joseph Francis Zimmerman in his book, “The New England Town Meeting: Democracy in Action.”