Frederick L. Mason House

The building at 585 Boston Road stands on a half acre cut from the old Daniels farm, which David L. Mason, a Boston police officer, bought from Robert Burrows in 1858 as "my Homestead farm," sixty-four acres "on the great road leading from Boston to Lowell" (see 599 Boston Rd). On November 12, 1888 Mason, described as unmarried, deeded his son Frederick L. Mason "a certain tract of land ... containing one half acre" at the north end of the farm: 111 feet on the road leading to Boston, 250 feet deep, 39 feet across the back, and bounded on the north by Edward B. Haskell. The deed names no buildings.

Seven years later, on December 10, 1895, Frederick L. Mason mortgaged the same half acre "with the buildings thereon" to Albert H. Jones for $300, promising to keep the buildings insured. The house was therefore built by Frederick L. Mason between 1888 and 1895, not about 1880 as the assessor's records estimate. When the Mason farm was registered in the Land Court in 1912 (case 3708, decree of September 16, 1912), the house lot was taken in with it.

Frederick L. Mason died about September 26, 1913, and in April 1914 the registered farm passed to his widow Mary A. Mason and their children, then to Mary A. Mason alone. That May the court's surveyor, C. B. Humphrey, divided the Boston Road front into Lots 2, 3 and 4 (plan 3708-B), with the house drawn on Lot 2, the old 1888 half acre to the foot. Jones's mortgage was discharged on July 28, 1914, and Mary A. Mason sold Lots 2 and 3 to William H. and Lulu M. Hutchins, who took a certificate of title on August 4, 1914 and borrowed $1,800 from the Lowell Co-operative Bank.

The Hutchinses kept the house for thirty years. In May 1944 the Land Court issued a certificate to their heirs, Blanche M. E. Wright of Stoneham as administratrix of William H. Hutchins and William H. Pratt of Billerica for life, and the same day the lots passed to George G. Merrill of Lowell. In March 1947 Merrill sold to James A. and Blanche M. Fallo of Dorchester, who joined the house lot with Lots 4A and 5 to the south and mortgaged the whole to the City Institution for Savings for $5,500. The Fallos sold in 1955, and in 1957 the house lot was cut off by itself as Lot 2.

After private owners in the 1950s and 1960s, the lot passed in 1975 to Brokers, Inc. of Billerica, which obtained a variance in 1978, the start of its commercial use. It was later held by The 585 Boston Road Realty Trust, leased in the 1990s to West Suburban Leasing, Inc., and sold in 2001 to D. N. McNulty, Inc. and in 2004 to the Dave-Ron Realty Trust. In 2022 Deer Run Development LLC bought the half acre for $760,000. The assessor lists an auto dealer building on the lot, home of U-Save Auto Rental, and the Land Court certificate still bounds it "by land now or formerly of Frederick L. Mason."

References

1. Billerica assessor, parcel 80-2-1 (585 Boston Rd): 0.504 acres, LC plan 3708-B Lot 2, sales 1985-2022

Title References Expand all

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.