Editing Kirby, Vermont (section)

==History==
The town was chartered to [[Roswell Hopkins]] in 1790; Hopkins served as Clerk of the [[Vermont House of Representatives|House of Representatives]] and [[Secretary of State of Vermont]], and he accepted the land grant in lieu of cash as payment for his government service.<ref>{{cite book |last=Grand Lodge of Vermont |date=1879 |title=Records of the Grand Lodge of Free and Accepted Masons of the State of Vermont, 1794-1846  |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SdCetmdkOGYC&pg=PA32 |location=Burlington, VT |publisher=Free Press Association |pages=32–34 |ref={{sfnRef|''Records of the Grand Lodge of Vermont''}}}}</ref> The grant Hopkins received was originally called Hopkinsville; it was later combined with a parcel from the town of [[Burke, Vermont|Burke]], and renamed Kirby.{{sfn|''Records of the Grand Lodge of Vermont''}}  Several ideas have been proposed for how the name Kirby was chosen; the most common is that it is a variant of the English [[Kirkby]], which means a village or settlement around a church.<ref>{{cite book |last= Capace |first=Nancy |date=2000 |title=Encyclopedia of Vermont |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gmVf7jGPpE0C&pg=PA329 |location=Santa Barbara, CA |publisher=Somerset Publishers |page=329 |isbn=978-0-403-09602-2}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Bardsley  |first=Charles Wareing Endell |date=1901 |title=A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GkAHAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA455 |location=New York, NY |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=455 |isbn=9785871144015 }}</ref>  By the time the town was organized in 1807, Hopkins had sold his interest and moved to [[Hopkinton, New York]].{{sfn|''Records of the Grand Lodge of Vermont''}}