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

Tower Hill, Massachusetts

46 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1886 and the latest in 1989. It stands in Wayland town. It lies in ZIP code area 01778. It stands on Hayward Brook. The Survey maps it on the Natick quadrangle.

Tower Hill within Middlesex 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 Tower Hill, surveyed 1989
Topographic sheet of Tower Hill, surveyed 1886

Topographic sheets covering this place

46 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 1908 county history

21,245 words on this township

The county history of 1908 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for the smaller places. Its township is covered in full.

The chapter on Wayland Town covers the township.

Read the chapter on Wayland Town - 21,245 words.

Fires nearby

80 since 1995

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 80 fires within 5 miles of Tower Hill between 1995 and 2020, burning about 57 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 9 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
Debris and open burning29
Missing data/not specified/undetermined23
Arson/incendiarism9
Recreation and ceremony7
Power generation/transmission/distribution5
Railroad operations and maintenance3
Smoking1
Natural1
Equipment and vehicle use1
Other causes1

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
5 September 2020Power generation/transmission/distributionunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
5 September 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
4 September 2018Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
23 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
22 September 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
3 August 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
28 August 2017Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire ControlFRAMINGHAM
24 August 2018Debris 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 1,789 shown

Museums hold 1,789 specimens collected within 10 miles of Tower Hill between 1898 and 1975: 1,135 Animalia, 339 Plantae, 297 Fungi, 9 Chromista, 6 Protozoa, 2 Bacteria, 1 Unrecorded. 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 Corvus brachyrhynchos brachyrhynchos C.L.Brehm, 1822Corvus brachyrhynchos brachyrhynchos C.L.Brehm, 18221900not recordedWayland
A photograph of the species Actaea pachypoda, not of this specimenActaea pachypoda Elliott1898Ernest Charles Smith
Aglaospora profusa (Fr.) De Not.1898Collector unspecified
A photograph of the species Antennaria howellii, not of this specimenAntennaria howellii subsp. canadensis (Greene) R.J.Bayer1898Williams, E.F.
A photograph of the species Antennaria parlinii, not of this specimenAntennaria parlinii subsp. fallax (Greene) R.J.Bayer & Stebbins1898not recorded
A photograph of the species Antennaria plantaginifolia, not of this specimenAntennaria plantaginifolia (L.) Hook.1898not recorded
A photograph of the species Agaricus brunnescens, not of this specimenAgaricus brunnescens Peck1900Morris, G. E.Waltham
A photograph of the species Agonopterix atrodorsella, not of this specimenAgonopterix atrodorsella Clemens, 18631900E. J. SmithSherborn
A photograph of the species Apantesis Walker, not of this specimenApantesis Walker, 18551900E. J. SmithSherborn
A photograph of the species Apatelodes torrefacta, not of this specimenApatelodes torrefacta J.E.Smith, 17971900E. J. SmithSherborn
Araiospora pulchra Thaxt.1900Thaxter, RolandStony Brook, Mass. [Massachusetts]
A photograph of the species Archips cerasivorana, not of this specimenArchips cerasivorana (Fitch, 1856)1900E. J. SmithSherborn

All 1,789 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries nearby

10 of 13 shown

The federal mineral resources record lists 13 workings within 5 miles of Tower Hill: 10 past producers, 2 producers, 1 unknown. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken, Peat. 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
Panlini Loam CoPeatPast ProducerPeat
Massachusetts Broken Stone CoStone, Crushed/BrokenPast Producer
Weston MineStone, Crushed/BrokenProducer
Arthur Scofield PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Burton PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Framington PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Hi-Way Pit and MillSand and Gravel, ConstructionProducer
New England Sand & Grv Co. Pit & PlSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Pepperell PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionPast Producer
Sand & Gravel PitSand and Gravel, ConstructionUnknown

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
Wayland1.3 miles46
Weston1.9 miles46
Weston Station2.4 miles46
Silver Hill2.7 miles48
Camp Mary Day2.9 miles46
Hastings2.9 miles48
Kendal Green3.1 miles48
South Lincoln3.2 miles48

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 612009. 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.