Turnpike Station

Turnpike Station was the flag stop of the Billerica and Bedford Branch railroad where the line crossed the old Middlesex Turnpike, about 1,300 feet southeast of Concord Road and north of Nuttings Lake. Trains stopped there only when signaled. The directories of 1901 and 1912 list it as "Turnpike (flag) Station (B. & B. Branch), Dennis O'Keefe, agent, Old Middlesex turnpike", and the classified directory of 1932 still lists "Turnpike Station, Old Turnpike rd" among the town's railroad passenger stations, after Billerica, East Billerica, North Billerica and South Billerica. The name was also used for the neighborhood around the crossing: in its day-book for June 28, 1912, the magazine Billerica reported that "Mrs. Jessie Stinchour's dwelling at Turnpike Station burned to the ground." Her house, the Jessie E. Stinehour House, stood on the lot next to the station.

The first railroad here was the two-foot gauge Billerica and Bedford Narrow-Gauge Railroad of 1877 and 1878, which built no station houses; its trains stopped at marked places, and later accounts list "Turnpike (Nuttings Lake)" among its stops. In the fall of 1884 the Boston and Lowell Railroad bought rights of way for a standard-gauge branch over the old route, two rods wide, as shown on a "Location Plan of the Bedford and Billerica branch" dated October 1, 1884. Among the grants were those of Martin Lane and Mrs. Lucy Jaquith, whose lands met the railroad at the turnpike crossing: in 1932 the Jaquith land still lay on both sides of the turnpike west of the track, and the former Lane place, by then David A. Long's, on the north side of the road. Each grant was void unless the corporation would "construct and operate over my said land a standard gauge railroad" within a year, and the land was to revert to the owner "should the operation of this railroad ever be discontinued." The branch opened on May 1, 1885, and the Boston and Maine ran it from 1887 as part of its Lexington Branch.

The station agent was Dennis O'Keefe, who in 1868 had bought the 25-acre farm on the southwest side of the turnpike a short way east of the crossing (the Benjamin L. Judkins House) and in 1883 added an acre "by the Middlesex Turnpike so called." The 1901 directory lists him as "station agent, Turnpike R. R. station and farmer, h. Old Middlesex turnpike n. R. R. station", and the directories of 1916 and 1919 give the same, with the station under the "B & M R R Lexington Branch." He died on November 25, 1922, aged 82. The 1931 directory still gives "Mrs F O'Keefe agt", although the executrix of Mary Frances O'Keefe's will had sold the farm in April 1930; that year's directory also lists a Boston and Maine station agent, Thomas Long, living on the Turnpike road, at the former Lane place that he and his wife had bought in 1929. The town fire department's record for 1894 has a still alarm on May 26, 1894 for the "Flag station B. & M. R. R.," with a loss of $50, in the same weeks as the fires in the woods near Nutting's Pond. Boston and Maine timetables of 1906, 1918, 1923, 1930 and 1941 list Turnpike as a station on the Lexington Branch.

The station was a very small building. The county commissioners' layout of the Middlesex Turnpike, ordered July 12, 1932, shows it on sheet 2 as a building about 26 by 9 feet, set lengthwise beside the track on its east side just south of the turnpike, on Boston and Maine land between the track and the land of Frederick P. Morris, and across the road from David A. Long's house. The plan of 1933 that moved the turnpike between the railroad and Concord Road begins at the track and does not show it.

Passenger trains between Bedford and North Billerica ended on December 31, 1931 (the Bedford Depot Park timeline gives the last trains as December 31, 1932). Freight trains used the branch for three more decades, and the employees' timetable of April 1941 still lists Turnpike, but no later record of the building has been found. The Interstate Commerce Commission approved abandonment of the branch from Billerica Centre to Bedford in 1962. The rail bed south of the turnpike is now town land, and the station stood at its north end, beside the Middlesex Turnpike opposite 423 and 430 Middlesex Turnpike.

References

1. Nashua City Station, "Turnpike": Boston and Maine Lexington Branch station in Billerica in timetables of 1906, 1918, 1923, 1930 and 1941
2. Lowell Suburban Directory 1916: "Turnpike (flag) Station (B & M R R Lexington Branch) Dennis O'Keefe agent Old Middlesex turnpike"
3. Lowell Suburban Directory 1919: "TURNPIKE (flag) (B & M R R Lexington Branch) Dennis O'Keefe agt"; O'Keefe "agt Turnpike R R sta and farmer h Old Middlesex turnpike n R R sta"
4. Lowell Suburban Directory 1932, classified, Railroad Passenger Stations, Billerica: "Turnpike Station Old Turnpike rd"
5. Billerica (magazine), July 1912, Billerica Day-Book, June 28, 1912: "Mrs. Jessie Stinchour's dwelling at Turnpike Station burned to the ground"
6. Annual Report of the Town of Billerica (year ending Feb. 1895), fire record: "May 26, 1894. Flag station B. & M. R. R.; still alarm. Loss, $50.00"
7. Wikipedia, Billerica and Bedford Railroad: stops of the narrow gauge include "Turnpike (Nuttings Lake)"
8. Bedford Depot Park, "Bedford's Railroad History": branch opened May 1, 1885; last passenger trains to Lowell via Billerica on December 31 (listed under 1932)

Deed References Expand all

Recorded is Book/Page at the Middlesex North Registry of Deeds unless noted.