Fence Viewer

The Fence Viewers were among the oldest minor officers of a Massachusetts town. Under the colonial and later state fence laws each town chose fence viewers at its annual meeting to settle disputes between neighbors over partition fences: they viewed a fence on complaint, decided whether it was sufficient, assigned to each owner the part he had to build and keep in repair, and assessed the cost when one owner had to build or repair a fence that the other had neglected. Towns usually chose two or more, and in many towns, as in Billerica, the selectmen were voted fence viewers ex officio.

In Billerica the fence viewers were chosen every year at the annual Town Meeting. The town reports list them by name from the 1890s (the report for the year ending February 1895 is the first surviving list; that year's meeting voted "The Selectmen; sworn"), and from then until 1950 the printed list of fence viewers is simply the board of selectmen of the year: three members until 1932 and five from 1933. From 1951 to 1987 the annual meeting continued to appoint "the Board of Selectmen" as fence viewers each year (under Article 2 of the annual warrant, along with the keepers of the lock-up and the surveyors of wood and lumber) without printing their names, and the 1985-1987 lists of appointed officials give the fence viewers as "Board of Selectmen". From 1988 the fence viewer became a separate appointed office held by one or two residents with one-year terms, listed among the appointed town officials; the post was vacant 2008-2010.

The roster below covers the named lists 1894-1950 and the individual appointees from 1988 on. Selectmen serving 1951-1987 were also fence viewers ex officio but are not listed here (their service is under Select Board); one exception is Frederic H. Brown, whose 2002 obituary in the town report gives "Fence Viewer: 1948-1956".

Sources: Billerica annual town reports 1895-2025 (lists of town officers, annual meeting minutes, lists of appointed officials, and memorial pages).