Decorative drawing: a small American settlement seen from a low hill. Not a photograph of this place.

Billerica, Massachusetts

41 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1886 and the latest in 1988. It stands in Billerica town. It lies in ZIP code area 01821. It stands on Fox Hill. The Survey maps it on the Billerica quadrangle.

Billerica within Middlesex County

Then and now

1886 to 1988

The same ground, surveyed 102 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of Billerica, surveyed 1988

Topographic sheet of Billerica, surveyed 1886

Topographic sheets covering this place

41 sheets

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

What happened here

An account from the chapter on Billerica town, in the words of 1908.

1908, Billerica Town

Crosby

14. Josiah, son of Josiali. 5, b. 1704, Aug. 5; m. 1729-30, Feb. 3, Elizabetli French, dau. of William, 7. She d. 1739, Nov. 27. He d. before 1743. Killed by the Indians says tradition. Ch. Josiah. b. 3730, Nov. 24. He was in the military service in 1747, on the C-onnecticut river, and narrowly escaped with his life by swimming the river from the anibusead(» in which French.

Read the rest of this passage

Photographs

8 photographs, 1942

Taken for the Office of War Information and the Farm Security Administration, who photographed the country between 1935 and 1944. Works of United States government photographers, with no known restriction on use. Each opens its catalogue record.

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Stripping wire clean of its rubber is a law now. Even these small lengths of wire which at one time were thrown out will be stripped of all its rubber insulation which will then be reclaimes
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Dismantling a railroad wrecking crane
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Open air furnaces melting the lead from the huge locomotive driving wheels. The lead dripping can be senn being caught
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Almost a ton of lead in this small pile will be used over and over again. This lead was taken out of the locomotive drives wheels (see negative 1 [i.e 54699]) and is used to give wheel flywheel effect
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. From end of yard looking towards shop
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Sorting iron washers according to size. Many of these will be used over and over again
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. Tremendous piles of spikes will be sorted out according to size and put away in kegs for salvage purposes
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Boston and Maine railroad shops at Billerica, Massachusetts. The heavy sections of steel which were once proud boxcars but now fit only for scrap are being cut by these heavy shears so as to be made ready for shipping to steel mills
Freeman, Albert, photographer, 1942. Library of Congress

Fires nearby

55 since 2008

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 55 fires within 5 miles of Billerica between 2008 and 2020, burning about 31 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Debris and open burning	32
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	15
Recreation and ceremony	3
Railroad operations and maintenance	2
Misuse of fire by a minor	1
Equipment and vehicle use	1
Power generation/transmission/distribution	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
17 August 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
2 July 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
9 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
9 June 2020	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
8 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
6 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
25 June 2020	Debris and open burning	1.0 acres	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
17 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Middlesex County

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 632 shown

Museums hold 632 specimens collected within 10 miles of Billerica between 1898 and 1975: 290 Plantae, 244 Animalia, 85 Fungi, 6 Unrecorded, 4 Protozoa, 3 Chromista. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. B. Seymour, A. B. Seymour & M. D. Feigley, A. E. Feldman and others. Each is a physical object with a catalogue number, and each entry opens the museum's record. This is what was collected and kept, not a survey of what lives here - nothing can be concluded from a species being absent.

Species	Year	Collected by	Where, as recorded
Trientalis borealis Raf.	1900	A. P. Chute
Boletus griseus Frost	1898	H. Webster
Dumetella carolinensis (Linnaeus, 1766)	1898	Collector(s): Will C. Colt	Lincoln
Esox americanus Gmelin, 1789	1898	E. Preble	Maple Meadow Brook near Wilmington, Massachusetts
Exosporium pusillum P.Karst.	1898	King C. A.	Stony Brook
Lophodermium pinastri (Schrad.) Chevall.	1898	Hubbard F. T.; Hall G. G.	Lincoln
Phegopteris polypodioides Fée	1898	Chester C. Kingman	Reading.
Pipilo erythrophthalmus erythrophthalmus (Linnaeus, 1758)	1898	not recorded	Lincoln
Podura aquatica C.Linnæus, 1758	1898	not recorded
Rosa nitida Willd.	1898	C. H. Knowlton
Araiospora pulchra Thaxt.	1900	Thaxter, R.	Stony Brook
Betula alleghaniensis Britton	1900	E. F. Williams

All 632 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries nearby

1 within 5 miles

The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Billerica: 1 plant. All of them still produce. What was taken out: Titanium. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Dynamet Tech--Burlington, Ma.	Titanium	Plant

Every working recorded in Middlesex County

Storms nearby

24 since 1998

The National Weather Service names Billerica in 24 storm reports between 1998 and 2023: 11 thunderstorm wind, 6 hail, 3 heavy rain, 3 flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
December 2008	Flood	Billerica	$20,000	Jones Brook in Billerica overflowed its banks flooding a home.
September 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$10,000	Trees on Sterling Road and Pinewood Street were downed by thunderstorm winds.
July 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$6,000	Trees on Charm Street and Howard Road were downed by thunderstorm winds. One tree fell on a house on Charm Street.
February 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$5,000	A tree and a large branch on Baldwin Road in Billerica were downed by thunderstorm winds.
February 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$5,000	A tree on B Street in Billerica was downed by thunderstorm winds.
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$5,000	A tree and branches on River Street and Concord Street were downed by thunderstorm winds.
July 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$5,000	A large tree was downed by thunderstorm winds onto Technical Park Drive.
March 2022	Thunderstorm Wind	North Billerica	$1,500	In Tewksbury, a large tree branch was down on a house on Knollwood Road.
July 2018	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$1,000	At 12:28 PM EST, a thunderstorm over Billerica brought a large tree down between Friendship Street and Clinton Street.
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	$1,000	A large branch on Concord Avenue was downed by thunderstorm winds.
August 2023	Flash Flood	Billerica	-	In Billerica, several basements were flooded.
August 2023	Flood	East Billerica	-	In Wilmington, parts of Nichols St was flooded.
June 2017	Hail	Billerica	-	At 405 PM EST, an amateur radio operator reported dime-size hail at Billerica.
April 2017	Flood	Billerica	-	At 4:10 PM EST, media reported that the Concord River in Billerica had risen above its banks. At 6:34 PM EST, flooding was reported on Elsie Avenue in Billerica from the Concord River.
May 2010	Hail	Billerica	-	no account filed
July 2006	Hail	Billerica	-	no account filed
March 2003	Heavy Rain	Billerica	-	no account filed
August 2003	Hail	Billerica	-	no account filed
September 2002	Heavy Rain	Billerica	-	no account filed
July 2001	Hail	Billerica	-	no account filed
July 2000	Heavy Rain	Billerica	-	no account filed
July 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	-	no account filed
May 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Billerica	-	no account filed
August 1998	Hail	Billerica	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Middlesex County

Nearest settlements

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Place	Distance	Sheets
River Pines	1.1 miles	41
Nutting Lake	1.4 miles	41
North Billerica	1.9 miles	41
Rio Vista	2.2 miles	41
South Billerica	2.2 miles	41
East Billerica	2.3 miles	41
Riverside	2.4 miles	41
The Pines	2.5 miles	41

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 611766. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.

Specimens. Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), https://www.gbif.org/. Only records licensed CC0 or CC BY are used. Records licensed CC BY-NC are excluded because this site carries advertising. Images are checked individually and any whose licence is non-commercial, no-derivatives or unreadable is refused.

Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.