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

Oakland, Massachusetts

33 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1885 and the latest in 1987. It stands in Taunton City. It lies in ZIP code area 02780. It stands on Fall Brook. The Survey maps it on the Norton quadrangle.

Oakland within Bristol County

Then and now

1885 to 1987

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 Oakland, surveyed 1987

Topographic sheet of Oakland, surveyed 1885

Topographic sheets covering this place

33 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 Taunton city, The inset identifies its exact source book and publication year.

From History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men, published 1883 - Taunton City

The Weather

How all the people are enjoying this nice weather we are having! Real summer weather. But to the farmers, or some in certain lines of farming, this moderate weather is "not so good." These premature samples of springtime are unfortunate, especially for the peach orchardist. As every groWar knows, peach trees are susceptible to cold weather, and if it does grow very cold again, and there is every likelihood of it, there will be much wood killed and a very small fruit yield in our section this coming season.

Read the rest of this passage

In the county-history sources

195,005 words on this township

History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men, published 1883 names this settlement in its chapter on Taunton City. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

The original church building of this parish was on the glebe, in Oakland, West Taunton. It is remembered to have been there till 1815, when it was blown down in the September gale of that year and never rebuilt. The sacred inclosure, where He the buried dead, marks the spot which should be held dear by the flourishing St. Thomas' Church, who now worship in a costly stone edifice elsewhere. The glebe was conveyed to the wardens of the church and their associates by deed bearing date March 19, 1743. It was purchased by subscription " for the sole benefit and profit of the Rector, for the time being, of St. Thomas, standing near Three-Mile River, in Taunton." The subscribers to the glebe were twenty-six, to the amount of £528 10s. Thomas Cobb was the largest donor, his subscription amounting to £120. Rev. John Lyon was the " first resident minister." There were occasional supplies, of whom Rev. John Graves is mentioned. Mr. Lyon's first recorded baptism was in 1765, but he may have begun labor earlier. The people paid him his salary " to his good acceptance" we are told, an example of promptness which was needed in those times.

Passage source: History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men, published 1883.

The Oakland Union and Arlington Street Society and Sabbath-School. - Beside the regularly organized churches in the city, there are union meetings sustained, as at Oakland and Arlington Street Chapel. There was once a Six-Principle Baptist Church in that part of Taunton called Oakland, organized in Rehoboth in 1789, but removed to Taunton on the death of Elder Round, in 1824, and worshiped in a school-house. In 1840, Rev. Josephus W. Horton became their minister, and a small meeting-house was built. Mr. Chesbrough, connected with the Oakland Mill, was instrumental also in building a small chapel where Episcopal services were held. Both these meetings in time were discontinued, and in 1874 what was called the Oakland Union was organized, uniting most of the Christian elements, and sustaining with a good measure of success a Sabbath-school and a regular Sabbath preaching service by the different ministers of the city. The officers of the union the present year are, George T. Bullock, president; L. L. Short, vice-president; J. Gegenheimer, secretary; John Willis, treasurer; Joseph S. Tidd, Alfred Stall, Oliver H. Crossman, S. L. Reed, E. 0. Wilmarth, Lorenzo Bushee, Alfred Wilmarth, executive committee; Allen Burt, trustee for three years.

Passage source: History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men, published 1883.

He purchased the old cutting-mill dam and privilege, with surrounding land, ravine, and rocks, of the heirs of Samuel Leonard. Then he purchased the old Leonard & Dean slitting-mill, and saw-mill dam and privilege above, to enable him to make back flowage without damage, and then raised the dam ten feet. With the aid and experience of Silas Shepard and Samuel Crocker he erected a cotton-factory (stone and brick) one hundred feet in length, completing it the season of 1818. The basement was a machine-shop and nail-factory, and in the upper stories looms and cotton machinery. In 1821 another mill was built, near the dam, about the same size, both containing about one hundred and fifty looms. Some years later an addition was built, connecting the Mills, for a weave-shop. Silas Shepard had the superintendence, until he left for building his Oakland Mill in 1827, and was succeeded by Ezekiel B. Leonard and Elisha Copeland. Elias Strange had charge of the machineand nail-shop before he removed to the brick mill. Horatio Leonard & Co. built a small rolling-mill at the west end of the dam, under the brow of the hill (now hospital farm), which was operated a few years, when the machinery was disposed of.

Passage source: History of Bristol County, Massachusetts, with Biographical Sketches of Many of Its Pioneers and Prominent Men, published 1883.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Taunton City - it names this place 11 more 11 times.

Fires near this place

63 since 2003

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 63 fires within 5 miles of Oakland between 2003 and 2020, burning about 53 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 1 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
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	30
Debris and open burning	14
Smoking	7
Recreation and ceremony	5
Fireworks	2
Arson/incendiarism	1
Power generation/transmission/distribution	1
Misuse of fire by a minor	1
Equipment and vehicle use	1
Natural	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
16 September 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
3 August 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
28 August 2007	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Massachussetts State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
13 August 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachussetts State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
13 August 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachussetts State Fire Marshal's Office	not named
11 August 2020	Misuse of fire by a minor	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
10 August 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
10 August 2020	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Bristol County

Specimens collected near this place

12 of 1,271 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 1,271 specimens collected within 10 miles of Oakland between 1855 and 1975: 867 Animalia, 327 Plantae, 70 Fungi, 6 Chromista, 1 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by ?, A E Schuyler, A. A. Eaton 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
Apocynum cannabinum L.	1855	F. C. Seymour	Rehoboth
Astur Lacepède, 1799	1860	C. D. Lincoln	Taunton
Carex panicea L.	1863	J. H. Dean
Carex L.	1864	J. H. Dean	Taunton.
Carex vulpinoidea Michx.	1864	J. H. Dean
Hypoxis hirsuta (L.) Coville	1874	not recorded
Chelidonium majus L.	1875	not recorded
Lygodium palmatum (Bernh.) Sw.	1875	not recorded
Berberis vulgaris L.	1876	not recorded
Empidonax minimus (W.M.Baird & S.F.Baird, 1843)	1877	C.P. Snow	Taunton, North
Chaetura pelagica (Linnaeus, 1758)	1878	C. F. Snow	MASSACHUSETTS: Bristol County; Taunton
Coccyzus erythropthalmus (A.Wilson, 1811)	1878	not recorded	Taunton

All 1,271 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries near this place

10 of 12 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 12 workings within 5 miles of Oakland: 7 past producers, 4 producers, 1 unknown. 4 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Taunton Plant	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Allen R. Nelson Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Gary Nelson Excavating Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
King Trucking Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer
Landfill Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Mc Cabe Sand and Gravel Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Mccabe Sand & Gravel Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Unknown
Mccabe Sand and Gravel Company Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer
Pine Street Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Raynham Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Bristol County

Storms near this place

2 since 2009

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Oakland in 2 storm reports between 2009 and 2020: 1 hail, 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.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
June 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Oakland	$1,500	In Taunton, trees and wires were down on Crane Avenue South.
July 2009	Hail	Oakland	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Bristol 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
Whittenton Junction	1.4 miles	33
Westville	1.7 miles	33
Britanniaville	1.8 miles	33
Norton Furnace (historical)	2.2 miles	33
Meadow Brook	2.4 miles	33
Whittenton	2.5 miles	33
Taunton	2.7 miles	33
Wades Corner	2.7 miles	33

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 612503. 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.