East Orleans, Massachusetts
33 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1887 and the latest in 1993. It stands in Orleans town. It lies in ZIP code area 02653. It stands on Hopkins Island. The Survey maps it on the Orleans quadrangle.
Then and now
1887 to 1993The same ground, surveyed 106 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.


Topographic sheets covering this place
33 sheetsMatched 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.
- 1887 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1889 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1893 USGS Wellfleet quadrangle1:62500
- 1942 USGS Nauset quadrangle1:125000
- 1944 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:31680
- 1944 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:31680
- 1944 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:31680
- 1946 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:24000
- 1946 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:25000
- 1947 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1947 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1947 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1947 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1947 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1948 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1957 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1962 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:24000
- 1962 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:24000
- 1963 USGS Providence quadrangle1:250000
- 1974 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:24000
- 1974 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:25000
- 1974 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:25000
- 1977 USGS Orleans quadrangle1:25000
- 1986 USGS Chatham quadrangle1:100000
- 1993 USGS Chatham quadrangle1:100000
In the 1890 county history
30 words on this townshipThe 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 Orleans Town covers the township.
Read the chapter on Orleans Town - 30 words.
Fires nearby
69 since 1993The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 69 fires within 5 miles of East Orleans between 1993 and 2020, burning about 40 acres in total. 9 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/undetermined | 25 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 15 |
| Debris and open burning | 9 |
| Natural | 9 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 6 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 3 |
| Fireworks | 1 |
| Smoking | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 September 2018 | Natural | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | not named |
| 28 September 2015 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | 1946 |
| 24 September 2020 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | not named |
| 22 September 2020 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | not named |
| 22 September 2020 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | not named |
| 5 August 2015 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | 1520 |
| 3 August 2018 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | not named |
| 3 August 2015 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control | 1025 |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Specimens collected nearby
12 of 3,007 shownMuseums hold 3,007 specimens collected within 10 miles of East Orleans between 1819 and 1975: 1,482 Animalia, 1,180 Plantae, 165 Fungi, 68 Bacteria, 57 Chromista, 55 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. B. Seymour, A. R. Hodgdon, A. R. Alan Hodgdon 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 | Species | Year | Collected by | Where, as recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Laminaria caperata Bachelot de la Pylaie, 1824 | 1819 | Collector unknown | ||
![]() | Carya tomentosa (Lam.) Nutt. | 1840 | Collector unspecified | |
![]() | Stenotomus chrysops (Linnaeus, 1766) | 1860 | William Bemis | Cape Cod Bay, Wellfleet Harbor |
![]() | Alosa mediocris (Mitchill, 1814) | 1871 | MCZ team | Brewster, Cape Cod, Massachusetts |
![]() | Bittiolum alternatum (Say, 1822) | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
![]() | Buccinum undatum Linnaeus, 1758 | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
| Gastropoda | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod | |
![]() | Helix Linnaeus, 1758 | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
![]() | Hydrobia minuta (Totten, 1834) | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
![]() | Lacuna vincta (Montagu, 1803) | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
![]() | Littorina littorea (Linnaeus, 1758) | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
![]() | Littorina rudis (Maton, 1797) | 1872 | Smith, S. I.; Harger, O., U.S. Fish Commission | Cape Cod |
All 3,007 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.
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 | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| Orleans | 1.1 miles | 33 | |
| Tonset | 1.4 miles | 33 | |
| Weeset | 1.6 miles | 33 | |
| Nauset Heights | 2.0 miles | 33 | |
| Rock Harbor | 2.0 miles | 33 | |
| Namskaket | 2.5 miles | 33 | |
| South Orleans | 2.6 miles | 33 | |
| Eastham | 3.1 miles | 33 |
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.
| Wikidata item Q122556925 | The 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 616855. 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.










































