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

West Cummington, Massachusetts

35 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1886 and the latest in 1997. It stands in Cummington town. It lies in ZIP code area 01026. It stands on Deer Hill. The Survey maps it on the Worthington quadrangle.

West Cummington within Hampshire County

Then and now

1886 to 1997

The same ground, surveyed 111 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet of West Cummington, surveyed 1997
Topographic sheet of West Cummington, surveyed 1886

Compare 1886 against another survey:

Topographic sheets covering this place

35 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.

Fires nearby

4 since 2016

The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 4 fires within 5 miles of West Cummington between 2016 and 2020, burning about 7 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
Missing data/not specified/undetermined2
Equipment and vehicle use1
Debris and open burning1

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
3 May 2020Debris and open burningunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
22 April 2018Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
18 April 2016Equipment and vehicle use6.0 acresMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named
15 March 2020Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreMassachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Controlnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Hampshire County

Specimens collected nearby

12 of 247 shown

Museums hold 247 specimens collected within 10 miles of West Cummington between 1825 and 1975: 101 Plantae, 75 Animalia, 70 Fungi, 1 Unrecorded. 12 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. Gurney, A. K. Harrison, A. M. Rogers 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
A photograph of the species Carex pauciflora, not of this specimenCarex pauciflora Lightf.1825Collector unspecifiedAshfield. [Inferred county from precise loc.]
A photograph of the species Veratrum viride, not of this specimenVeratrum viride subsp. viride1847not recordedBrunswick and Goshen
A photograph of the species Halenia deflexa, not of this specimenHalenia deflexa (Sm.) Griseb.1868Collector(s): Henry Griswold JesupCummington
A photograph of the species Botrychium matricariifolium, not of this specimenBotrychium matricariifolium (Döll) A.Braun ex Koch1873H. G. Jesup
Botrychium virginianum subsp. typicum R.T.Clausen1873Jesup, H.G.Goshen.
A photograph of the species Phegopteris connectilis, not of this specimenPhegopteris connectilis (Michx.) Watt1873H. G. Jesup
A photograph of the species Botrychium lanceolatum, not of this specimenBotrychium lanceolatum (S.G.Gmel.) Ångstr.1874H. G. Jesup
A photograph of the species Potamogeton gramineus, not of this specimenPotamogeton gramineus L.1875H. G. JesupAshfield Pond
A photograph of the species Diervilla lonicera, not of this specimenDiervilla lonicera Mill.1881Bassett, F.L.Ashfield
A photograph of the species Lithobates clamitans, not of this specimenLithobates clamitans (Latreille, 1801)1892not recordedWorthington
A photograph of the species Lithobates palustris, not of this specimenLithobates palustris (LeConte, 1825)1892not recordedWorthington
Laportea canadensis (L.) Wedd.1902F. F. ForbesAshfield.

All 247 specimens within 10 miles, at the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.

Mines and quarries nearby

10 within 5 miles

The federal mineral resources record lists 10 workings within 5 miles of West Cummington: 4 past producers, 3 occurrences, 2 producers, 1 prospect. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Manganese, Talc-Soapstone, Iron, Gemstone. 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
Betts Manganese MinesManganese, Iron, GemstoneProducer1830, 1925
Betts Mn Mines TaconicManganese, IronPast Producer
Packard Manganese OccurrenceMica, FeldsparOccurrenceFeldspar, Mica
Whetstone QuarryQuartzProducerQuartz
Whetstone QuarryStonePast Producer
Talc ProspectTalc-SoapstoneOccurrenceMetamorphic
Talc ProspectTalc-SoapstoneProspect
Anson Betts Manganese MineManganesePast Producer1938
Frizzell PitManganesePast Producer
Packard Manganese OccurrenceManganeseOccurrence

Every working recorded in Hampshire County

Storms nearby

2 since 2013

The National Weather Service names West Cummington in 2 storm reports between 2013 and 2013: 1 hail, 1 thunderstorm wind. 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
May 2013Thunderstorm WindWest Cummington-A wind gust to 59 mph was reported in West Cummington.
May 2013HailWest Cummington-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Hampshire 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
Bryant Four Corners2.5 miles35
Plainfield3.2 miles34
Cummington4.4 miles35
West Worthington4.8 miles35
Worthington Corners5.9 miles35
Swift River6.6 miles38
Worthington Center6.7 miles35
Lithia7.4 miles38

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 Q122540787The 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 607981. 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.