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

South Pepperell, Massachusetts

39 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1893 and the latest in 1988. It stands in Pepperell town. It lies in ZIP code area 01463. It stands on Mount Lebanon. The Survey maps it on the Pepperell quadrangle.

South Pepperell within Middlesex County

Then and now

1893 to 1988

The same ground, surveyed 95 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 Pepperell, surveyed 1988

Topographic sheet of South Pepperell, surveyed 1893

Compare 1893 against another survey:

Topographic sheets covering this place

39 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

24,897 words on this township

History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : Containing Carefully Prepared Histories of Every City and Town in the County, published 1880 names this settlement in its chapter on Pepperell Town. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

An act of incorporation was granted by the legislature of 1841, and a board of fifteen trustees chosen in accordance therewith. But the real estate having been originally conveyed in such a manner that the corporation could have no valid title to the property, the trustees could only superintend the management of the school. The interest in the school gradually decreased, and there is no record of any meeting of the trustees after March, 1855. The building stood ready for the occupancy of any respectable and competent person who might be willing to take possession and open a school. It was thus successively occupied for a shorter or a longer time by H. T. Wheeler, S. C. Cotton, D. W. Richardson, Miss Caroline A. Shattuck, and A. J. lluntoon. In 1860, A. J. Saunders opened a school, which he successfully maintained for several years.

Passage source: History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts : Containing Carefully Prepared Histories of Every City and Town in the County, published 1880.

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 Pepperell Town.

Fires near this place

33 since 2015

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 33 fires within 5 miles of South Pepperell between 2015 and 2020, burning about 24 acres in total. None 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
Debris and open burning	18
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	11
Arson/incendiarism	1
Equipment and vehicle use	1
Smoking	1
Recreation and ceremony	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
29 September 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
26 September 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
23 July 2016	Recreation and ceremony	1.3 acres	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	ANDOVER
26 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
10 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
9 May 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
8 May 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
8 May 2015	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Middlesex County

Specimens collected near this place

12 of 375 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 375 specimens collected within 10 miles of South Pepperell between 1900 and 1975: 241 Animalia, 62 Protozoa, 39 Plantae, 28 Fungi, 4 Unrecorded, 1 Chromista. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. C. Gibson, A. F. Newton, A. F. Newton, M. K. Thayer 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
Pholiota carbonaria (Fr.) Singer	1900	H. Webster	Groton.
unnamed	1926	F.A. Gilbert
Anavitrinella pampinaria (Guenée, 1857)	1926	not recorded	Lunenburg
Arcyria cinerea (Bull.) Pers., 1801	1926	Collector unspecified
Arcyria denudata (L.) Wettst., 1886	1926	F.A. Gilbert
Alopecurus aequalis Sobol.	1930	M. L. Fernald; C. A. Weatherby
Cistothorus stellaris (J.F.Naumann, 1823)	1930	Collector(s): James Lee Peters	Harvard
Colaptes auratus luteus Bangs, 1898	1930	Collector(s): James Lee Peters	Harvard
Epitheca cynosura (Say, 1840)	1930	Davis, E. M.	MA, Middlesex Co., Shirley
Hemaris thysbe Fabricius, 1775	1930	not recorded	Lunenburg
Lanius ludovicianus migrans W.Palmer, 1898	1930	Collector(s): James Lee Peters	Harvard
Molothrus ater ater (Boddaert, 1783)	1930	Collector(s): James Lee Peters	Harvard

All 375 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries near this place

10 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 10 workings within 5 miles of South Pepperell: 10 past producers. None of them 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.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Adams Excavating Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Black Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Harbor Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
J L Construction Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Pepperell Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Seven Oaks Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Seven Oaks Sand and Gravel Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Sharon Contracting Tc	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Tacey Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Tenney Street Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

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.

Place	Distance	Sheets
Paper Mill Village	1.3 miles	39
Burkinshaws Factory	1.9 miles	39
Pepperell	1.9 miles	39
Babbatasset Village	2.2 miles	39
East Pepperell	2.3 miles	39
Vose	2.5 miles	44
Hovey Corner	2.6 miles	39
Groton	2.7 miles	41

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 Q122560569

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 606475. 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.