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

East Watertown, Massachusetts

46 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1893 and the latest in 1989. It stands in Watertown City. It lies in ZIP code area 02472. It stands on Meetinghouse Hill. The Survey maps it on the Newton quadrangle.

East Watertown within Middlesex County

Then and now

1893 to 1989

The same ground, surveyed 96 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of East Watertown, surveyed 1989
Topographic sheet of East Watertown, surveyed 1893

Topographic sheets covering this place

46 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 1908 county history

70,495 words on this township

The county history of 1908 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for the smaller places. Its township is covered in full.

The chapter on Watertown City covers the township.

Read the chapter on Watertown City - 70,495 words.

Fires nearby

54 since 2015

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 54 fires within 5 miles of East Watertown between 2015 and 2020, burning about 104 acres in total. None started naturally. 23 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
Arson/incendiarism23
Missing data/not specified/undetermined13
Recreation and ceremony6
Debris and open burning6
Smoking3
Misuse of fire by a minor2
Equipment and vehicle use1

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
8 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
4 September 2018Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
3 September 2018Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
3 September 2018Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
2 September 2018Equipment and vehicle useunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlBROOKLINE
2 September 2017Recreation and ceremonyunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlQUINCY
18 September 2016Arson/incendiarismunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlMELROSE
18 September 2015Arson/incendiarismunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlMELROSE

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Middlesex County

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 2,209 shown

Museums hold 2,209 specimens collected within 10 miles of East Watertown between 1898 and 1975: 954 Animalia, 692 Plantae, 495 Fungi, 29 Protozoa, 17 Bacteria, 13 Chromista, 9 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by ?, A B Seymour, A B. Proper 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
Specimen of Lysimachia × producta (A.Gray) FernaldLysimachia × producta (A.Gray) Fernald1900A. P. Chute
Specimen of Trientalis borealis Raf.Trientalis borealis Raf.1900A. P. Chute
Aglaospora profusa (Fr.) De Not.1898Collector unspecified
A photograph of the species Antennaria howellii, not of this specimenAntennaria howellii subsp. canadensis (Greene) R.J.Bayer1898Williams, E.F.
A photograph of the species Antennaria parlinii, not of this specimenAntennaria parlinii subsp. fallax (Greene) R.J.Bayer & Stebbins1898not recorded
A photograph of the species Antennaria plantaginifolia, not of this specimenAntennaria plantaginifolia (L.) Hook.1898not recorded
A photograph of the species Boletellus russellii, not of this specimenBoletellus russellii (Frost) E.-J.Gilbert1898H. Webster
A photograph of the species Acanthis flammea, not of this specimenAcanthis flammea flammea (Linnaeus, 1758)1900ZAPPEY, W RROSLINDALE
A photograph of the species Acer carpinifolium, not of this specimenAcer carpinifolium Siebold & Zucc.1900A. K. HarrisonHarvard Botanic Garden, Cambridge.
A photograph of the species Acer palmatum, not of this specimenAcer palmatum var. dissectum (Thunb.) Miq.1900A. K. HarrisonHarvard Botanic Garden, Cambridge.
A photograph of the species Agaricus brunnescens, not of this specimenAgaricus brunnescens Peck1900Morris, G. E.Waltham
A photograph of the species Alnus incana, not of this specimenAlnus incana subsp. rugosa (Du Roi) R.T.Clausen1900J. Murdoch, Jr.Roxbury

All 2,209 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries nearby

7 within 5 miles

The federal mineral resources record lists 7 workings within 5 miles of East Watertown: 5 plants, 2 past producers. 5 still produce. What was taken out: Iron, Lead, Tantalum, Niobium (Columbium). Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where SiteCommodity StatusRecorded
C. J. MabardySand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Nrc Inc--Newton, Ma.Tantalum, Niobium (Columbium)Plant
Us Gypsum Co--BostonGypsum-AnhydritePast Producer
(Facility) Cambridge Smelter CoLeadPlant
Industrial Serv. Centers--CambridgeIronPlant
Somerville Smelting Co.LeadPlant
Wheelock-Lovejoy--Cambridge, Ma.IronPlant

Every working recorded in Middlesex County

Storms nearby

1 since 2021

The National Weather Service names East Watertown in 1 storm report between 2021 and 2021: 1 thunderstorm wind. 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 2021Thunderstorm WindEast Watertown$1,000In Cambridge, a tree was down on Fresh Pond Parkway. A tree was down on Antrim Street.

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.

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
Payson Park0.7 miles46
Mount Auburn0.8 miles46
Strawberry Hill0.8 miles46
Larchwood1.1 miles46
Watertown1.1 miles46
Coolidge Hill1.3 miles46
Huron Village1.5 miles46
Waverley1.7 miles46

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 612309. 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.