Northfield Minnesota, located in the southeastern part of the state, is a lovely college town that boasts not one, but 2 thriving private colleges. Carleton College and St. Olaf are both located here and their student populations give a decidedly youthful feel to the town. Hence their motto - "Two colleges, one town". Northfield's population grew 14% in the past…...

Mesquite is an extremely popular retirement town in southeastern Nevada, almost in Arizona and Utah. Mesquite was originally settled by Mormons as a farming community in the Virgin River Valley. Casinos arrived here in the 1970's. The town markets itself as a low key alternative to Las Vegas. The population increased over 125%  between 2000 and 2020 (to about 21,000…...

Danbury is a small city in western Connecticut of about 81,000. It was formerly called the Hat City because it was a center of hat manufacturing.  There is a very large mall in town now on a former industrial site. This part of northwestern Connecticut on Candlewood Lake and near the Hudson River is very beautiful....

One of America's most famous college towns is Ann Arbor, Michigan (population 123,000). It is home to the University of Michigan, whose 40,000 students dominate the town (in a nice way) culturally, economically, and demographically. The city has strict zoning regulations which make life difficult for developers but result in an extremely pleasant small town environment. Many alumni and midwesterners…...