Old Home Day used to be a tradition where town residents who moved away would return one day a year.

Now it is simply a reason to have a party, and this year’s party for Pembroke residents is truly special. The town is celebrating its 250th anniversary during Pembroke-Allenstown Old Home Day.

Since half of 500 is 250, the celebration has been named the semiquincentennial (half of five centuries), or Semi-Q for short.

The events begin on Friday, Aug. 21, at 6 p.m., with the Pembroke vs. Allenstown softball game at Memorial Field in Pembroke.

“Thanks to Regis Lemire, the softball game is coming together and we have coaches and umpires and 11 players from Pembroke and four from Allenstown,” said Fred Kline, Semi-Q committee chairman. “Between additional contacts and people we will draft, Regis is confident that the game will go well.”

Kline added that, thanks to the efforts of resident Lorette Girard, Friday’s concession will be donated and prepared by the folks at Studio Three, a local business.

“We also we will be selling T-shirts and November ball tickets there, Kline said. “We have volunteers for the cashier’s job, including Alane Rapazza, state representative, Dianne Schuett and many others.”

A raffle will take place at the softball game for tickets to see the Wailers, of Bob Marley fame, at the Casino Ballroom. These are skybox seats, and the show is Aug. 26. Four tickets were donated by Bryan Christiansen of Comcast.

Saturday, Aug 22, is the official Old Home Day for both Pembroke and Allenstown. So, of course there is a parade, run jointly by both towns.

“The parade will start at 10 a.m.,” Kline said. “It will begin at School Street in Allenstown. Then it goes to Main Street and crosses the bridge into Pembroke. It proceeds up Broadway to Pleasant Street and then down to Memorial Field.”

Parade goers will get a sweet treat as they watch the town’s parade float. It includes a three-layer 6-foot-wide, 6-foot-tall cake. There is also a Semi-Q breakfast, including pancakes, at the Jewell Lodge from 7 to 10 a.m. and a walk-through window at the corner of Main and Union streets from 8 a.m. to noon, including homemade muffins.

The cost is $4 for breakfast for adults, $2 for children and $1.50 for a muffin and coffee. Also featured in the parade is the old horse-drawn town hearse.

Tours will be conducted by the Historic Society during the weekend of Old Home Day, starting each day at 2 p.m. from the Pembroke Town Hall, and the Grange will host an open house on Saturday from 1 to 5 p.m. and on Sunday, Aug. 23, from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

A bit of history According to the community Web site, Pembroke’s history began in 1725 when Captain John Lovewell (sometimes Lovell) and his intrepid band of Indian fighters, recruited from the towns around Dunstable, Mass., decided to drive the Indians out of what is now New Hampshire.

According to best available information, Francis Doyen, one of Lovewell’s soldiers and his wife were the first white inhabitants who ever wintered in the township, 1728-1729, and they may have been the first permanent settlers, says the Web site.

Pembroke was formed through three land grants. The Bow grant was granted in May 20, 1727. The Mason grant, presently known as the Masonian claim of 1621, was granted by the Council of New England, established in Plymouth, County of Devon, England. The Suncook grant of Aug. 6, 1728, was granted by His Majesty’s Province of the Massachusetts Bay in New England in General Court. The inhabitants of Buck Street and Bow, having boundaries adjacent to the Suncook boundary line, became discontented with the Township of Bow. They petitioned the New Hampshire House of Representatives to be joined with Suncook.

In 1736, members of the Congregational Church chose the Rev. Aaron Whittemore to be pastor. Sometime near the period of incorporation, the Presbyterians built their own meetinghouse “on a little knoll covered with a pine grove on the west side of Pembroke.” The first pastor was the Rev. Daniel Mitchell. Eventually the Congregational and Presbyterian churches were reunited in Pembroke.

Incorporation of Pembroke was granted on Nov. 1, 1759, “authorizing the levying and collecting such Province Tax as shall be imposed upon them by law as any other Town or Parish in this Province.”

On the passage of the act of incorporation, the Plantation of Suncook ceased to be and the Town of Pembroke took its place in the sisterhood of the Commonwealth of New Hampshire to enjoy all the rights and privileges belonging to towns.

About 1807, three men came to Pembroke: Dr. Abel Blanchard, the Rev. Abraham Burnham and Boswell Stevens Esq. Dr. Blanchard was not a person of good health and began to fail about 1817. He died March 15, 1818. In his will dated Jan. 15, 1818, Dr. Blanchard (having no family of his own and after making bequests to his friends) left the rest of his property to found a “public school or academy in Pembroke.” The school (although for many years called “Blanchard Academy”) was incorporated June 25, 1818, as Pembroke Academy. Fire has destroyed the original buildings, but the academy, now a public high school serving Allenstown, Pembroke, Epsom, Chichester and Deerfield, continues to be a vital institution in Pembroke.