Structure · Built 1901 · Demolished 1953

Riverhurst Trolley Station

Riverhurst Trolley Station
Address Concord Road
Built 1901
Demolished 1953
Other Lot Structures Solomon Hill House (1742 - 1976)
Samuel Cole Blacksmith Shop (1835 - 1899)


The Riverhurst Trolley Station was the Lexington & Boston Street Railway's building on Concord Road at Riverhurst, in South Billerica, where the electric cars from Bedford passed the summer colony on the Concord River. It stood on the southeast side of the old road, opposite Meadow Lane and the Solomon Hill House, on a lot of 5,000 square feet that the company bought in 1901 and labeled on its plan "Land for Storage Battery Station."

The land was part of the twenty acres east of the road that Capt. Ralph Hill left to his son William Hill under his will of 1784. William Hill sold them to Sears Cook in 1815; after Cook's death his son Francis sold them in 1819 to Jonathan Hill, who in 1835 sold "twenty acres more or less" to Samuel Cole, blacksmith. Cole built his house and his Samuel Cole Blacksmith Shop there. His widow Mary sold the place in 1886 to Isaac L. Watts, and after a sale to Herbert F. Colby that ended with the farm going back to Watts, it passed in 1897 to Sarah L. Williams and then to Hannah Morrill, wife of John W. Morrill.

The Lexington & Boston Street Railway Company, incorporated in 1899, built its Billerica line along the Bedford road in 1900. In December 1899 it bought small lots on the road from D. J. Folsom, Joseph N. Pardee, Joseph Jaquith and the Morrills; the Morrill deed of Nov. 30, 1899 gave it a triangle of 9,910 square feet where the road made a sharp bend at the north end of the old Cole land, so the track could cut the corner. On June 26, 1901 the Morrills sold the company a second lot, 50 feet on "Bedford street" and 100 feet deep, "northeasterly of the house and barn of said Morrill," on condition that the railway build "a substantial four strand wire fence." Leonard Metcalf's plan of June 25, 1901 shows the lot still bare, with "Miss Jennie Nelson" across the road, so the building dates from 1901 or a little later rather than from the opening of the line.

When Hannah Morrill sold the farm to Edward M. and Fanny F. Mace in 1913, she excepted the two railway lots. The county's 1915 layout of Concord Road, made for the relocation that the County Commissioners ordered in December 1916, shows the road straightened past Riverhurst, the track cutting across the old bend, and a small rectangle on the road labeled "Boston & Lexington St. R.R." in front of the Mace barn. The Lexington & Boston was merged into the Middlesex & Boston Street Railway in 1912, and the Middlesex & Boston gave up its electric cars on the Billerica line about 1924.

On March 17, 1927 the Middlesex & Boston Street Railway, by its president Pitt F. Drew, sold the station lot to William H. Greene of Arlington, and the trustee of the company's 1912 bond mortgage released it. Greene sold it in 1930 to Helen Mikulskis of Boston, whose family had bought the rest of the old Cole farm from the Maces' guardian in 1928. When the Mikulskises sold the lot in 1946 to a private owner, the deed conveyed it "with the buildings thereon" and the furnaces and fixtures in them, so the old railway building was still standing and in use more than twenty years after the trolleys stopped. In 1953 the Commonwealth took the lot, as Parcel 45 of the Route 3 layout, along with most of the Mace and Mikulsky land; the site, the 1899 triangle and the Cole house lot are now within the highway.



Riverhurst Trolley Station
Lexington and Boston St. Ry. Co. Land for Storage Battery Station Bought from Hannah Morrill, South Billerica, 1901 (Plan 17/36)
Riverhurst Trolley Station
Concord Road (Bedford to Meadow Ln), 1915 (Plan 910/13)


Title References

Date Type Grantor Grantee Summary Recorded
1789 Will Capt. Ralph Hill of Billerica, gentleman His sons William Hill and Solomon Hill; his widow Abigail; daughters Hannah Miller, Bathsheba French, Naomi Hill and Sarah Hill Probate #11505
June 28, 1815 Warranty Deed William Hill of Billerica, yeoman Sears Cook of Billerica, gentleman 211/190 (South)
1816 Will Estate of Sears Cook of Billerica, gentleman His widow Abigail and son Francis Cook, executor and residuary devisee Probate #5053
August 3, 1830 Quitclaim Abigail Cook of Billerica, widow of Sears Cook Her son Francis Cook of Billerica, yeoman 296/431 (South)
January 19, 1830 Warranty Deed Francis Cook of Billerica, yeoman, and Elizabeth Cook his wife (dower) Jonathan Hill of Billerica, yeoman 293/432 (South)
May 23, 1835 Warranty Deed Jonathan Hill of Billerica, gentleman Samuel Cole of Billerica, blacksmith 341/485 (South)
August 28, 1886 Warranty Deed Mary Cole of Waltham, widow of Samuel Cole, "being unmarried" Isaac L. Watts of Waltham 183/445
October 20, 1890 Warranty Deed Isaac L. Watts of Bedford and Martha E. Watts his wife Herbert F. Colby of Bedford 219/545
February 13, 1897 Quitclaim Herbert F. Colby of Billerica and Abbie P. Colby his wife Isaac L. Watts of Arlington 281/575
February 13, 1897 Warranty Deed Isaac L. Watts of Arlington and Martha Eliza Watts his wife Sarah L. Williams of Bedford, wife of James Williams 281/576
August 17, 1897 Warranty Deed Sarah L. Williams of Bedford, widow Hannah Morrill of Wilmington, wife of John W. Morrill 287/400
December 4, 1899 Warranty Deed D. J. Folsom of Billerica (Lizzie E. Folsom his wife releasing dower) Lexington & Boston Street Railway Company 314/431
December 20, 1899 Warranty Deed John W. Morrill of Billerica and Hannah Morrill his wife, in her right Lexington and Boston Street Railway Company 315/53
June 27, 1901 Quitclaim John W. Morrill and Hannah Morrill his wife, in her right, of Billerica Lexington and Boston Street Railway Company 332/208
November 12, 1913 Warranty Deed Hannah Morrill of Billerica, unmarried Edward M. Mace and Fanny F. Mace his wife, of Hollis, N.H., joint tenants 514/228
December 29, 1916 County Order Middlesex County Commissioners (Levi S. Gould, Erson B. Barlow, Alfred L. Cutting) Town of Billerica (relocation of Concord Road) 566/189
April 8, 1927 Quitclaim Middlesex & Boston Street Railway Company, by Pitt F. Drew, president William H. Greene of Arlington 748/131
June 16, 1930 Partial Release of Mortgage Boston Safe Deposit and Trust Company, trustee William H. Greene of Arlington 791/417
June 16, 1930 Quitclaim William H. Greene of Arlington and Ida M. Greene his wife Helen Mikulskis of Boston 791/418
June 6, 1946 Quitclaim Peter Mikulskis and Helen M. Mikulskis his wife, of Boston A private buyer of Billerica 1045/255
October 2, 1953 Taking Ozeline Wise et al. Commonwealth of Massachusetts 1236/297

Recorded is Book/Page at the Middlesex North Registry of Deeds unless noted; Probate # is a Middlesex probate case, Ctf a Land Court certificate of title.