Northbridge claims to history include: Native American Nipmuc lands, Colonel John Spring, who led the Uxbridge militia training company in the American Revolution, Samuel Spring, Revolutionary War Chaplain, the Residence of Ezra T. Benson 1830–1832, the birthplace of President Millard Fillmore's mother, Phoebe, and home to the Whitin Machine Works from 1831 to 1964.

Colonel John Spring, who had agitated for the new town of Northbridge, and later reversed his position, led a company of men in the Massachusetts Militia in the Revolution.

Samuel Spring, John's son, became a Revolutionary War Chaplain commissioned in the militia at the Siege of Boston, and who also served in the Invasion of Canada (1775) under Colonel Benedict Arnold.

[2] Samuel carried Benedict Arnold and Aaron Burr, his Princeton classmate, off of separate battlefields.

[4] The textile machine company and industrial village was written up as one of the Harvard studies of history in business.

[4] Northbridge stands as a testament to the success of mill villages throughout the 19th and 20th centuries when production was expanding so greatly that immigrant labor from Canada, the Netherlands and Armenia was imported.

Home of Lookout Rock, through which the bike trails pass and which overlooks the river below, the outskirts of the valley's community have a number of horse farms.

[5] Today most of the mill buildings are no longer used to full capacity, however, they do offer incubator space to small businesses.

Northbridge is part of the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor Commission and is working with its neighboring communities to "promote the region's special character and sense of history".

[6] The reservoir of the West Hill Dam flood control project and recreation area also lies within the town limits of Northbridge.

Several goals of the town are: "to strengthen the local economy through developing and reusing industrial areas as well as retaining existing businesses"; and, "to keep Northbridge as a desirable place to live through preserving and revitalizing the village centers, maintaining and expanding town services, and protecting natural resources".

Situated between Interstates 90 (Mass Pike), 146, 395, and 495, Northbridge has highway access to and from major cities such as Worcester, Providence and Boston.

The nearest commuter rail station into Boston is located in nearby Grafton, approximately nine miles away.

If completed, the trail would connect the town to Worcester's downtown Union Station, as well as to Woonsocket, Providence, and Newport.