Sprinkled through the crowd were about 40-50 undecided first-time Republican voters. Some came because their curious. Others came with family and friends.
Chris Dawes, 17, attends a high school not far from Manchester. He turns 18 in a few weeks.
He thinks he'll give his first vote to Hatch, the U.S. senator from Utah.
"I like his moral stands, his views on constitutional amendments, and his policies on foreign areas," Dawes says, resting a Hatch sign on his shoulder.
Crystal Montaine, a first-time voter from Kingswood College in New Hampshire, held a "McCain 2000" sign with a group of friends.
"He's fair and honest and he has a lot of courage," she says, as a crowd of people chanted the candidate's name behind her. "He'll do a lot for our country."
Ballot-casters like Montaine and Dawes are important in New Hampshire because in primary states where two candidates vie for the support of the state party organization, new electors can cast the deciding votes.
Campaigns are using the internet to make their pitches. McCain has his own "McCain U" site, www.mccaininteractive.com. Students can join McCain groups at their own colleges and receive e-mail messages tailored to their concerns. Texas Gov. George W. Bush's campaign employs staffers full-time to recruit younger voters.
Still, the most important pitch is the direct appeal, which McCain alone seems to have mastered.
When the other candidates arrived for the debate Thursday night, they stopped to speak to a throng of television cameras before chatting with supporters.
McCain, seconds after getting off his bus, made a bee-line to a crowd of young boosters.
According to Freimann, such small gestures make a difference.
Harvard students watching last Thursday's debate at the IOP told a pollster they were most impressed by McCain, though they also gave a thumbs-up to Alan L. Keyes '72 and Bush.
Still, most national polls show that Bush has a healthy lead over McCain in almost every state--a disparity that is not ignored by McCain's campaign.
"On some level, McCain really speaks to and about youth," says Travis K. Larson, a McCain spokesperson.