Dickenson Block Fire of 1903

On Wednesday morning, January 21, 1903, fire destroyed the Dickenson Block at Billerica Centre and spread to the neighboring King's Block. Both buildings stood on the west side of Boston Road just south of the Town Common, on the lot where Martin's Block and the Center Fire Station later stood, and both belonged to Edward A. King, a carpenter and builder. The fire engineers' list of fires for the year records it in one line: "Alarm at 9.55 A. M. Dickenson Block, property of E. A. King. Cause spark from stove. Practically a total loss. Building $1500; contents $500. Fire spread to King's Block, property of E. A. King. Damage $42.50."

The land had been part of the homestead of the Richardson and Dickinson families on the corner of the Common. A cider mill stood on it by 1875, and Mary L. Dickinson owned it until her death in 1900. In December 1900 her sons Edward F. and William H. Dickinson sold the 15,737 square feet "with the buildings thereon" to King, who borrowed $3,000 on it from the Trustees of the Howe School and made the old buildings over into stores and tenements. The name of the burned block evidently came from the Dickinsons. The records do not say which of King's two buildings was the old cider mill; the three-story gambrel building that survived on the lot, later known as Martin's Block, was identified in a 1973 survey with the mill shown on the maps of 1875 and 1889.

The fire showed the weakness of the fire service at the Centre. Hose Company No. 2 at the Centre then had a hose wagon, a hook and ladder truck and the old hand engine Hero No. 2, kept in the town's engine house and stable. In the same report the engineers, L. W. Buckley, Warren Holden and Charles A. Wright, wrote that the department at the centre "is in as good shape as can be expected, with poor drainage from town stable, and can only be improved by a new building for the fire department." They recommended that a committee be appointed to look into the building at the centre, "that the necessary steps be taken towards better quarters for the apparatus," and that the town raise $1,500 for the department for the coming year.

King stayed on the lot and kept his business there. By 1912 he was listed as a contractor and builder dealing also in hardware, paints and glass on Boston Road near the Common. The better quarters the engineers asked for came fifteen years later, on the same land: in October 1917 King sold the town the south 8,260 square feet of his lot as the "Fire Station Lot, Billerica Center," and the Center Fire Station was built there, close against the south side of his block. King died in 1920; his widow sold the block in 1927 to Valentine O. and Isabella M. Martin, whose name it bore until it was taken down in 1987.

People

• Edward A. King: Carpenter and builder who owned both the Dickenson Block and King's Block; in 1917 he sold the town the south part of the same lot for the Center Fire Station.
• Warren Holden: Fire engineer who signed the 1902-03 report recording the fire and asking for better quarters for the apparatus at the Centre.
• Charles A. Wright: Fire engineer and clerk of the board that recorded the fire and recommended a new building for the fire department at the Centre.
• Lawrence W. Buckley: Fire engineer (signing as L. W. Buckley) who signed the 1902-03 report recording the fire.

References

1. Billerica Annual Report, year ending Feb. 28, 1903, p. 84: list of fires; Jan. 21 alarm 9.55 a.m., Dickenson Block of E. A. King, spark from stove, building $1,500, contents $500; King's Block damage $42.50.
2. Same report, p. 85: engineers L. W. Buckley, Warren Holden, Charles A. Wright on the poor state of the department at the centre; recommend better quarters for the apparatus and $1,500.
3. Same report, fire department report and inventory (pp. 81-83): Hose Company No. 2, hose wagon, hook and ladder truck, Hero No. 2.