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Spindleville, Massachusetts

50 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1886 and the latest in 1989. It stands in Hopedale town. It lies in ZIP code area 01747. It stands on Willow Brook. The Survey maps it on the Blackstone quadrangle.

Spindleville within Worcester County

Then and now

1886 to 1989

The same ground, surveyed 103 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of Spindleville, surveyed 1989
Topographic sheet of Spindleville, surveyed 1886

Topographic sheets covering this place

21 surveys from 50 printed 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

13,451 words on this township

History of Worcester County, Massachusetts, published 1889 names this settlement in its chapter on Hopedale Town. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

Look at any section of the business world during any fourteen years of operations, and see how many firms or corporations gained more and lost less, according to ability and means, than our little community. The writer knows of several individuals, once for its own successful operations. The Machine Company and Dutcher Temple Company have respectively gorid water-power privileges, supplemented with steam-power for all needful occasions and purposes. The three companies thus far described have large, handsome brick edifices, besides wooden ones, affording them over one hundred and sixty thousand square feet of convenient room, or over three acres of flooring. The firm of "A. A. Wescott & Sons" manufacture spindles for the Drapers. They have a flourishing establishment, situated a mile south of the others on a good waterfell, long previously occupied for more ordinary uses. They execute a creditable amount of business in their line, and are building up a respectable little village called Spindleville. Taking all these companies together, they have practical working control over patents and improvements thereon to the number of nearly four hundred - covering a vast variety of ingenious and useful mechanism now deemed indispensable in the vfell-furnished cotton and woolen manufactories of the United States. Their annual sales are estimated at from one million dollars to one million two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, their employes of all grades at from six hundred to eight hundred and their pay-roll at about six thousand dollars per week. Their employes are generally of superior skill, as well as moral character, receive better compensation, perhaps, than the average in our country, and have never made a strike for higher wages. To obtain an adeqate idea of the nature, variety and extent of Hopedale manufactures, the inquisitive reader is referred to the "Sixth Descripdve Catalogue " of " George Draper & Sons," as presented in an " Illustrated Pocket Hand-Book," compiled by \V. N. Goddard and published in 1887. Contemporary with this successful manufacturing enterprise was a large livery and transportation business, handling thousands of tons of iron, coal, etc., annually, conveying the mail and passengers several times a day and furnishing horses and carriages to the inhabitants. Later has followed the Hopedale Elastic Fabric Company, incorporated December, 1886 - William F. Draper, president ; E. L. O-sgood, treasurer and selling agent ; and William Lapworth, superintendent. Brick factory, 100 feet long by 50 wide, 3 stories high, with boiler-house cutside ; capital stock, $100,000; 100 operatives, 80 of them females; annual sales, about $200,000; orders crowding and business thrifty. Mr. Lapworth is the genius of this enterprise, having the honor of projecting, introducing here and most skillfully superintending it.

Passage source: History of Worcester County, Massachusetts, 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 Hopedale Town.

Fires near this place

114 since 2002

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 114 fires within 5 miles of Spindleville between 2002 and 2020, burning about 224 acres in total. None started naturally. 39 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/incendiarism39
Debris and open burning24
Missing data/not specified/undetermined23
Smoking10
Recreation and ceremony10
Equipment and vehicle use6
Railroad operations and maintenance1
Power generation/transmission/distribution1

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
4 September 2018Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
28 September 2015Recreation and ceremonyunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlBELLINGHAM
27 September 2015Smokingunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlBELLINGHAM
27 September 2015Recreation and ceremony1.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlBELLINGHAM
25 September 2015Equipment and vehicle use2.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlBELLINGHAM
21 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
21 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undetermined1.4 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
8 August 2015Recreation and ceremony1.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Worcester County

Specimens collected near this place

12 of 410 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 410 specimens collected within 10 miles of Spindleville between 1844 and 1975: 171 Plantae, 136 Animalia, 98 Fungi, 3 Unrecorded, 2 Chromista. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. B. Seymour, A. P. D. Piguet, A. R. Hodgdon; F. L. Steele 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 Chilonectria coryli (Fuckel) Ellis & Everh.Chilonectria coryli (Fuckel) Ellis & Everh.1896Henderson
Specimen of Coryneum pulvinatum KunzeCoryneum pulvinatum Kunze1897D. Murray
A photograph of the species Trichophorum planifolium, not of this specimenTrichophorum planifolium (Spreng.) Palla1844Collector unspecifiedUxbridge
A photograph of the species Carex vesicaria, not of this specimenCarex vesicaria L.1848J. W. Robbins
A photograph of the species Potamogeton epihydrus, not of this specimenPotamogeton epihydrus Raf.1848J. W. RobbinsUxbridge
A photograph of the species Potamogeton bicupulatus, not of this specimenPotamogeton bicupulatus Fernald1854W. J. RobbinsUxbridge
A photograph of the species Carex brevior, not of this specimenCarex brevior (Dewey) Mack.1855J. W. Robbins
A photograph of the species Carex normalis, not of this specimenCarex normalis Mack.1855J. W. Robbins
A photograph of the species Carex siccata, not of this specimenCarex siccata Dewey1855J. W. Robbins
A photograph of the species Carex straminea, not of this specimenCarex straminea Willd. ex Schkuhr1855J. W. Robbins
A photograph of the species Hyla versicolor, not of this specimenHyla versicolor LeConte, 18251857Weinland, David Friedrich
Phyllosticta pyrina Sacc.1893R. A. Harper

All 410 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries near this place

10 of 13 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 13 workings within 5 miles of Spindleville: 9 past producers, 3 producers, 1 unknown. 3 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Granite. 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
Castellucci and SonsGranitePast ProducerGranite
H E FletcherGranitePast ProducerGranite
Milford Pink Granite QuarryGranitePast Producer
Milford QuarryGraniteProducer
Carl A MolinariSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast ProducerSedimentary
Carl A. Molinari PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
High Street PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Highway PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Richard C HillSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast ProducerSedimentary
Rosenfeld PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionProducer

Every working recorded in Worcester County

Storms near this place

2 since 2017

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Spindleville in 2 storm reports between 2017 and 2020: 1 thunderstorm wind, 1 flood. 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
August 2017Thunderstorm WindSpindleville$2,000At 411 PM EST, trees were reported down on South Main Street in Milford.
June 2020FloodSpindleville-In Hopedale, flooding was reported at the intersection of Adin Street and Mendon Street (Route 16).

Every storm recorded in Worcester 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
White City0.7 miles50
Hopedale1.3 miles42
Mendon1.4 miles50
South Milford1.6 miles50
Milford1.9 miles42
Rocky Hill3.4 miles41
North Milford4.8 miles42
Wheelockville5.1 miles50

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 Q122548736The 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 611582. 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.