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

West Townsend, Massachusetts

42 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1893 and the latest in 1988. It stands in Townsend town. It lies in ZIP code area 01474. It stands on Willard Brook. The Survey maps it on the Townsend quadrangle.

West Townsend 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 West Townsend, surveyed 1988

Topographic sheet of West Townsend, surveyed 1893

Compare 1893 against another survey:

Topographic sheets covering this place

42 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 Townsend town, The inset identifies its exact source book and publication year.

From History of the Town of Townsend, Middlesex County, Massachusetts : from the Grant of Hathorn's Farm, 1676-1878, published 1878 - Townsend Town

Lawyers And Physicians

In 1814, he married Roxanna Warren, daughter of Moses Warren. She survived him, and afterward married Elisha Glidden. Colonel Hastings died, June 6, 1821, and at his solicitation, he was buried with military honors, at Townsend Centre. The Townsend Light Infantry, Captain Levi Warren, was in attendance as a guard of honor, and discharged "the last farewell shot'' at the portals of his sepulchre.

Read the rest of this passage

In the county-history sources

102,465 words on this township

History of the Town of Townsend, Middlesex County, Massachusetts : from the Grant of Hathorn's Farm, 1676-1878, published 1878 names this settlement in its chapter on Townsend Town. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

It is ditiicult to reach its summit, with a team, from the west. Just before the present lull in business, the high price of lumber caused the removal of the original growth from one hundred acres near its highest point, at the price of ten thousand dollars. Many proud and stately conifers, which withstood the wintry winds of more than a centur\-, yielded to the woodman's axe, falling to the rock bound surface with a crash like a clap of "live thunder." Thus disappeared about the last remnant of the "old growth" in Townsend. It is' covered mostly like West Hill with a voung growth of timber.

Passage source: History of the Town of Townsend, Middlesex County, Massachusetts : from the Grant of Hathorn's Farm, 1676-1878, published 1878.

"History is a velvet study, and recreation work. What a pitie it is to see a proper gentleman to have such a crick in his neck that he cannot look backward ! Yet no better is he who cannot see behind him the actions which long since were performed. History maketh a young man to be old ; privileging him with the experience of age, without either the infirmities or inconveniences thereof. Yea, it not only maketh things past, present ; but enableth one to make a rationall conjecture of things to come."

Passage source: History of the Town of Townsend, Middlesex County, Massachusetts : from the Grant of Hathorn's Farm, 1676-1878, published 1878.

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 Townsend Town - it names this place 4 more 4 times.

Fires near this place

22 since 2010

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 22 fires within 5 miles of West Townsend between 2010 and 2020, burning about 11 acres in total. 1 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 burning	13
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	5
Power generation/transmission/distribution	1
Natural	1
Recreation and ceremony	1
Fireworks	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
27 August 2015	Natural	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
25 July 2015	Recreation and ceremony	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
8 June 2017	Debris and open burning	1.0 acres	New Hampshire Division of Forest and Lands	not named
7 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
30 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
26 June 2020	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Massachusetts Bureau of Forest Fire Control	not named
24 June 2016	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	2.0 acres	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

10 of 108 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. Museums hold 108 specimens collected within 10 miles of West Townsend between 1900 and 1974: 35 Protozoa, 32 Animalia, 21 Fungi, 16 Plantae, 4 Unrecorded. 10 distinct Species records are shown. Collected by A. K. Moore, B. N. Gates, C. M. Litch 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 pomiformis (Leers) Rostaf., 1875	1926	Collector unspecified
Alopecurus aequalis Sobol.	1930	M. L. Fernald; C. A. Weatherby
Hemaris thysbe Fabricius, 1775	1930	not recorded	Lunenburg
Coccyzus erythropthalmus (A.Wilson, 1811)	1950	Collector(s): James Lee Peters	Groton
Salix sericea Marshall	1950	B. N. Gates	Bordering Leominster water supply; Fitchburg.
Crematogaster Lund, 1831	1974	E. V. Gregg	Wayside park, 6 mi E of Los Fresnos

All 108 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 West Townsend: 8 past producers, 2 producers. 2 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.

Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
Maine New Hampshire Granite Corp	Granite	Past Producer	Granite
Mason Quarry	Granite	Producer
Adams Excavating Co	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Harbor Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
R L Robichaud	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Raymond Heywood	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer	Sedimentary
Raymond Heywood Pit and Plant	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Robert L. Robichard Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Townsend Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Townsend Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Producer

Every working recorded in Middlesex County

Storms near this place

5 since 1995

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names West Townsend in 5 storm reports between 1995 and 2024: 5 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.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	West Townsend	$5,000	A large tree was downed by thunderstorm winds.
August 2018	Thunderstorm Wind	West Townsend	$2,000	At 6:05 PM EST, thunderstorm winds brought a tree and wires down on West Meadow Road in Townsend.
July 2023	Thunderstorm Wind	West Townsend	$800	In Townsend, a tree was down on wires on Barker Hill Road near Turnpike Road. Report relayed by amateur radio.
June 2024	Thunderstorm Wind	West Townsend	$500	In Townsend, a tree was down along New Fitchburg Rd in the area of Pearl Hill State Park.
October 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	West Townsend	-	no account filed

Every storm 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
Rogersville (historical)	1.6 miles	44
Townsend	2.0 miles	42
Old City	2.8 miles	42
South Row	3.6 miles	42
Townsend Harbor	4.0 miles	42
Ashby	4.2 miles	44
South Village	4.5 miles	44
Burkinshaws Factory	6.8 miles	39

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 Q122571884

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 610816. 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.