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

South Billerica, Massachusetts

41 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1886 and the latest in 1988. It stands in Billerica town. It lies in ZIP code area 01821. It stands on Pages Brook. The Survey maps it on the Billerica quadrangle.

South Billerica within Middlesex County

Then and now

1886 to 1988

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 South Billerica, surveyed 1988
Topographic sheet of South Billerica, surveyed 1886

Topographic sheets covering this place

41 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 Billerica town, in the words of 1908.

1908, Billerica Town

Crosby

14. Josiah, son of Josiali. 5, b. 1704, Aug. 5; m. 1729-30, Feb. 3, Elizabetli French, dau. of William, 7. She d. 1739, Nov. 27. He d. before 1743. Killed by the Indians says tradition. Ch. Josiah. b. 3730, Nov. 24. He was in the military service in 1747, on the C-onnecticut river, and narrowly escaped with his life by swimming the river from the anibusead(ยป in which French.

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Fires nearby

41 since 2008

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 41 fires within 5 miles of South Billerica between 2008 and 2020, burning about 27 acres in total. None started naturally. None 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
Debris and open burning26
Missing data/not specified/undetermined12
Recreation and ceremony3

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
17 August 2015Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
2 July 2015Missing data/not specified/undetermined1.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
9 June 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
6 June 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
25 June 2020Debris and open burning1.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
17 June 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
8 May 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
8 May 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Middlesex County

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 806 shown

Museums hold 806 specimens collected within 10 miles of South Billerica between 1898 and 1975: 316 Plantae, 315 Animalia, 159 Fungi, 6 Unrecorded, 4 Chromista, 4 Protozoa, 2 Bacteria. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by ?, A. B. Seymour, A. B. Seymour & M. D. Feigley 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 Trientalis borealis Raf.Trientalis borealis Raf.1900A. P. Chute
Aglaospora profusa (Fr.) De Not.1898Collector unspecified
A photograph of the species Boletus griseus, not of this specimenBoletus griseus Frost1898H. Webster
A photograph of the species Cladonia rangiferina, not of this specimenCladonia rangiferina (L.) Weber1898Francis P DanielsArlington Heights
A photograph of the species Cucurbitaria elongata, not of this specimenCucurbitaria elongata (Fr.) Grev.1898J. G. Hall
A photograph of the species Dumetella carolinensis, not of this specimenDumetella carolinensis (Linnaeus, 1766)1898Collector(s): Will C. ColtLincoln
Araiospora pulchra Thaxt.1900Thaxter, R.Stony Brook
A photograph of the species Betula alleghaniensis, not of this specimenBetula alleghaniensis Britton1900E. F. Williams
A photograph of the species Boletus frostii, not of this specimenBoletus frostii J.L.Russell1900A. W. Flint
A photograph of the species Buteo lineatus, not of this specimenButeo lineatus lineatus (Gmelin, 1788)1900Kenrick, H LLexington
A photograph of the species Cephalanthus occidentalis, not of this specimenCephalanthus occidentalis L.1900M. RodmanConcord.
A photograph of the species Corylus americana, not of this specimenCorylus americana Walter1900E. F. Williams

All 806 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries nearby

5 within 5 miles

The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of South Billerica: 3 past producers, 1 occurrence, 1 plant. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Copper, Titanium. 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
Dynamet Tech--Burlington, Ma.TitaniumPlant
Carlisle DepositCopperOccurrence
Cu ProspectCopperPast Producer
D R RaymondSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast ProducerSedimentary
Thomas Quinn Co IncSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast ProducerSedimentary

Every working 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
Nutting Lake0.9 miles41
Bedford Springs0.9 miles41
Riverside1.4 miles41
Rio Vista1.7 miles41
Billerica2.2 miles41
River Pines2.5 miles41
Bedford2.6 miles48
Pinehurst2.8 miles41

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 Q122558586The 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 611874. 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.