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

Polpis, Massachusetts

32 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1889 and the latest in 1994. It stands in Nantucket town. It lies in ZIP code area 02554. It stands on Millbrook Creek. The Survey maps it on the Siasconset quadrangle. It stands 23 feet above sea level.

Polpis within Nantucket County

Then and now

1889 to 1994

The same ground, surveyed 105 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of Polpis, surveyed 1994
Topographic sheet of Polpis, surveyed 1889

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 county-history sources

17,013 words on this township

Illustrated Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Taunton, New Bedford, Fall River; a Guide and Souvenir to the Famous Resorts and Noted Cities of Southeastern Massachusetts, with Maps, List of Hotels, Rates, Time-tables, Etc, published 1889 names this settlement in its chapter on Nantucket Town. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

Nantucket is the name of a county, a township, an island, and a town. As a county and a township it is the same, embracing the main island, Tuckernuck, Muskeget, the two Gravelly Islands, and, when cut off by the sea, Smith's Point Island. On the island is the town itself, the village of Siasconset, the summer resorts of Surfside and Wauwinet, and many separately named localities or districts, as Coatue, Squam, Quaise, Polpis, North Pasture, Middle Pasture, and South Pasture, the Plains, Maddequet, and Great Neck.

Passage source: Illustrated Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Taunton, New Bedford, Fall River; a Guide and Souvenir to the Famous Resorts and Noted Cities of Southeastern Massachusetts, with Maps, List of Hotels, Rates, Time-tables, Etc, published 1889.

tality of S. H. Jenks, editor of the /zguzrer. Indeed, it was at his suggestion, that Admiral Coffin established the Coffin school. The present efficient High head of and facing Gay Street, and accommodates beside the High School, a grammar and intermediate department of two grades each, and also a primary school. Inthe Town building on Orange Street there are two schools, an inter-- mediate and a primary. At each of the suburban villages, 'Sconset, Polpis, Madasket, and Tuckernuck, there is one school.

Passage source: Illustrated Martha's Vineyard, Nantucket, Taunton, New Bedford, Fall River; a Guide and Souvenir to the Famous Resorts and Noted Cities of Southeastern Massachusetts, with Maps, List of Hotels, Rates, Time-tables, Etc, published 1889.

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 Nantucket Town.

Fires near this place

11 since 2005

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 11 fires within 5 miles of Polpis between 2005 and 2020, burning about 4 acres in total. None started naturally. 4 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/undetermined5
Arson/incendiarism4
Other causes1
Smoking1

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
27 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
1 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
20 August 2005Arson/incendiarismunder an acreMassachussetts State Fire Marshal's Officenot named
22 July 2005Arson/incendiarism1.0 acresMassachussetts State Fire Marshal's Officenot named
8 May 2017Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
30 May 2006Smokingunder an acreMassachussetts State Fire Marshal's Officenot named
14 May 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
23 April 2017Arson/incendiarismunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Nantucket County

Specimens collected near this place

12 of 4,079 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 4,079 specimens collected within 10 miles of Polpis between 1825 and 1974: 2,691 Plantae, 866 Animalia, 382 Fungi, 111 Chromista, 22 Unrecorded, 7 Bacteria. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A AND P STARRETT, A. B. Seymour, A. Cohen 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 Anemone quinquefolia L.Anemone quinquefolia L.1900M. A. Day
A photograph of the species Rumex maritimus, not of this specimenRumex maritimus var. fueginus (Phil.) Dusén1825Collector unspecifiedMartha's Vineyard. Block Id.
A photograph of the species Chrysopsis falcata, not of this specimenChrysopsis falcata (Pursh) Elliott1827F. A. Greene
A photograph of the species Platanthera flava, not of this specimenPlatanthera flava (L.) Lindl.1827T. A. GreeneNantucket.
Desmodium rigidum (Elliott) DC.1829Oakes
A photograph of the species Ceramium cimbricum, not of this specimenCeramium cimbricum H.E.Petersen1831not recordedNantucket.
A photograph of the species Gloeosporium polygoni, not of this specimenGloeosporium polygoni Dearn. & House1836Guba E. F.Nantucket Co. Cultivated Fields on Hummock Rd.
Chondria dasyphylla (Woodward) C.Agardh1848M. L. Owen
A photograph of the species Ludwigia palustris, not of this specimenLudwigia palustris (L.) Elliott1849J. L. Russell
A photograph of the species Acer rubrum, not of this specimenAcer rubrum L.1899Nellie F. Flynn
A photograph of the species Aletris farinosa, not of this specimenAletris farinosa L.1899Flynn, N. F.Nantucket
Ambrosia artemisiifolia L.1899Nellie F. Flynn

All 4,079 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries near this place

3 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 3 workings within 5 miles of Polpis: 2 past producers, 1 producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction. 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
Cape Cod and Islands PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Glowacki PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionProducer
Nantucket Construction CompanySand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer

Every working recorded in Nantucket 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
Pocomo1.1 miles32
Quaise1.2 miles32
Middle Pasture (historical)1.6 miles32
Squam1.7 miles31
Quidnet1.8 miles31
Sesachacha1.9 miles31
Chadwicks Folly1.9 miles31
Plainfield (historical)2.3 miles31

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 PolpisAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q7225976The 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 616949. 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.