Plymouth

Formed June 2, 1685 (7^th county)

Plymouth County (530,820), Plymouth* (7,667), Brockton (105,654)

The 2007 red brick Modern courthouse replaced the 1820 courthouse.  It is located on Obery Street at South Street.  Massachusetts State Highway 3 is one block south of the site.  Perry Dean Rogers is the courthouse architect.  There are augmenting courthouses in Brockton, Hingham, and Wareham.  The county and the county seat are named for Plymouth, England.  Plymouth County was the birthplace of 2 Massachusetts Governors, Levi Lincoln, Sr. and William L. Douglas.  The county was established on June 2, 1685 as the 7^th county with Plymouth as the only county seat. 

Plymouth government includes a treasurer (executive.)  It has 3 Commissioners (legislative.)  Eleven District Court Judges and Ten Probate/Juvenile Court Judges serve Plymouth County (judicial.)  Plymouth County is in eastern Massachusetts.  Boston, Massachusetts is northwest of the county.  The county center is 5 miles Northwest of Plymouth.  The county is surrounded clockwise by the Atlantic Ocean, and Barnstable, Bristol, Norfolk, and Suffolk counties. 

The area of the county is 661 square miles.  It is 5 out of 14 in the state.  It ranks 7 out of 14 in population in the state.  It has a density of 803.1 persons per square mile making it 6 out of 14 in the state.  Plymouth County has 25.3% of its population in its incorporated areas.  Interstate Highway 195 originates in the county and heads southwest into Bristol County.  Interstate Highway 495 also begins in Plymouth County and goes northwest into Bristol County.  United States Highway 6 enters from Barnstable County, southeast, and exits into Bristol County, southwest.  United States Highway 44 originates in the county and travels west into Bristol County.  The county looks like a bowl of ice cream on its side with a scoop missing from the middle.  Plymouth is located in the southeast corner of the county.  Brockton is in the northwest corner of the county.  Plymouth is the county seat and Brockton, as the only incorporated city, is the largest city.  Plymouth is 1.4% of the county population while Brockton is 19.9% of the county population.  This county is in the Boston-Cambridge-Quincy Metropolitan Statistical Area.