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

Brewster, Massachusetts

32 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1887 and the latest in 1994. It stands in Brewster town. It lies in ZIP code area 02631. The Survey maps it on the Orleans OE W quadrangle. 2,028 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 30 feet above sea level.

Brewster within Barnstable County

Population over time

2 figures

Brewster grew from 2,000 to 2,028 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

YearPeople Change
20102,000
20202,028+28 (+1%)

Then and now

1887 to 1994

The same ground, surveyed 107 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of Brewster, surveyed 1994
Topographic sheet of Brewster, surveyed 1887

Topographic sheets covering this place

32 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.

In the 1890 county history

30 words on this township

The county history of 1890 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for the smaller places. Its township is covered in full.

The chapter on Brewster Town covers the township.

Read the chapter on Brewster Town - 30 words.

Fires nearby

56 since 2015

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 56 fires within 5 miles of Brewster between 2015 and 2020, burning about 26 acres in total. 3 started naturally. 3 were 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
Missing data/not specified/undetermined24
Debris and open burning13
Equipment and vehicle use10
Recreation and ceremony3
Arson/incendiarism3
Natural3

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

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
24 September 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
22 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
22 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
17 September 2017Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
5 August 2015Equipment and vehicle useunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control1520
2 August 2018Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
2 August 2015Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control2597
16 August 2020Recreation and ceremonyunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Barnstable County

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 4,246 shown

Museums hold 4,246 specimens collected within 10 miles of Brewster between 1819 and 1975: 2,409 Animalia, 1,389 Plantae, 240 Fungi, 106 Chromista, 68 Bacteria, 33 Unrecorded, 1 Protozoa. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. B. Seymour, A. R. Hodgdon, A. R. Hodgdon 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.

Image SpeciesYear Collected by Where, as recorded
Laminaria caperata Bachelot de la Pylaie, 18241819Collector unknown
A photograph of the species Carya tomentosa, not of this specimenCarya tomentosa (Lam.) Nutt.1840Collector unspecified
A photograph of the species Alosa mediocris, not of this specimenAlosa mediocris (Mitchill, 1814)1871MCZ teamBrewster, Cape Cod, Massachusetts
A photograph of the species Bittiolum alternatum, not of this specimenBittiolum alternatum (Say, 1822)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Buccinum undatum, not of this specimenBuccinum undatum Linnaeus, 17581872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
Gastropoda1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Helix Linnaeus, not of this specimenHelix Linnaeus, 17581872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Hydrobia minuta, not of this specimenHydrobia minuta (Totten, 1834)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Lacuna vincta, not of this specimenLacuna vincta (Montagu, 1803)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Littorina littorea, not of this specimenLittorina littorea (Linnaeus, 1758)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Littorina rudis, not of this specimenLittorina rudis (Maton, 1797)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod
A photograph of the species Lunatia heros, not of this specimenLunatia heros (Say, 1822)1872Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish CommissionCape Cod

All 4,246 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Storms nearby

10 since 2006

The National Weather Service names Brewster in 10 storm reports between 2006 and 2019: 3 thunderstorm wind, 3 flood, 2 lightning, 1 hail. 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.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
July 2019Thunderstorm WindWest Brewster$20,000In Brewster, a large tree was down on Stony Brook Road. A tree and power lines were down on Run Hill Road. Numerous other trees were down throughout the town.
August 2017Flash FloodSouth Brewster$12,000At 1139 PM EST, a basement was flooded on Robbins Hill Road in Brewster. At 1215 AM EST, the Ocean Edge Mansion on Main Street had flooding in the parking lot and the west wing of the building. At 1220 AM EST, a basement was reported flooded on Endicott Lane. At 1 AM EST, a basement was flooded on Lunds Farm Way.
August 2018LightningEast Brewster$10,000At 11:30 AM EST, lightning struck a condominium on Sea Pines Drive in Brewster and started a fire.
August 2018LightningWest Brewster$5,000At 10:17 AM EST, lightning struck a house on Red Top Road in Brewster, starting a house fire.
July 2006Thunderstorm WindBrewster$5,000no account filed
July 2006Thunderstorm WindBrewster$2,000no account filed
August 2018FloodSouth Brewster-At 11:58 AM EST, Sheep Pond Drive and Clark Road were closed due to flooding.
October 2017FloodWest Brewster-Stony Brook Mill area of western Brewster was flooding. A Storm Total of four and one-half inches of rain was measured by amateur radio in Brewster.
July 2015FloodWest Brewster-Main Street was flooded and closed for 20 minutes.
June 2011HailBrewster-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Barnstable 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.

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
East Brewster1.3 miles32
South Brewster1.5 miles31
West Brewster1.8 miles31
Pleasant Lake3.2 miles31
Namskaket4.2 miles33
East Dennis4.4 miles31
North Harwich4.9 miles31
South Orleans4.9 miles33

Elsewhere

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

Wikipedia article on BrewsterAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q4962731The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 615907. 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.

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.