Billerica, Massachusetts, United States

🇺🇸 Billerica is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It takes its name from the town of 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 Billericay in Essex, England.

History In the early 1630s, a Praying Indian village named Shawshin was at the current site of Billerica, commonly spelled Shawsheen today, as in the Shawsheen River. In 1638, Massachusetts Bay Governor John Winthrop and Lt. Governor Thomas Dudley were granted land along the Concord River in the area, and roughly a dozen families from Cambridge and Charlestown Village had begun to occupy Shawshin by 1652. The settlers chose the name Billerica because some of the families originally came from the town of Billericay in Essex, England. The town was incorporated as Billerica in 1655, on the same day as neighboring Chelmsford and nearby Groton. The original plantation of Billerica was divided during the colonial period into the towns of Billerica, Bedford, Wilmington, and Tewksbury.

The oldest remaining homestead in the town is the Manning Manse built in 1696, which was also the residence of William Manning (1747–1814), the author of The Key of Liberty, a critique of Federalist policies. Other notable Revolutionary War era residents included Asa Pollard, the first soldier killed at the Battle of Bunker Hill, and Thomas Ditson, who was tarred and feathered in 1775 while on a visit to Boston after attempting to illegally purchase a musket from a British soldier. The song "Yankee Doodle" supposedly became a term of national pride instead of an insult because of this event. The town now celebrates "Yankee Doodle Weekend" every September.

Geography According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 26.4 square miles (68 km²), of which 25.9 square miles (67 km²) are land and 0.5 square miles (1.3 km²) (1.90%) is water.

Billerica is located 20 miles (32 km) north-northwest of Boston along the Northwest Expressway (Massachusetts) portion of U.S. Route 3, positioning it as the border between Boston’s inner suburbs to the south and the Merrimack Valley region to the north. The town is also situated less than 3 miles (5 km) from the Massachusetts Route 128/Interstate 95 High-Technology belt to the south and less than 2 miles (3 km) from the Interstate 495 (Massachusetts) outer belt highway to the north.

Billerica has several small neighborhoods that form villages (or sections) of town. Those villages are Billerica Center, East Billerica, North Billerica, Nutting Lake, Pinehurst, West Billerica, River Pines, Riverdale, and South Billerica.

Billerica borders the following towns: Chelmsford, Lowell, Tewksbury, Wilmington, Burlington, Bedford, and Carlisle. The border with Lowell is at a point in the middle of the Concord River where Billerica, Chelmsford, Lowell and Tewksbury all meet.

Economy • E Ink Corporation, a privately held manufacturer of electrophoretic displays (EPDs) that powers tablets such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook. • Raytheon Company, a major American defense contractor and industrial corporation with core manufacturing concentrations in weapons and military and commercial electronics, has two large offices in Billerica. • EMD Serono, Inc, the US biopharmaceutical division of Merck Group, Darmstadt, Germany, a global pharmaceutical and chemical group, is undergoing a $75-million expansion of their Billerica facility, naming it the EMD Serono Research & Development Institute. • GE Measurement & Control, a $5 billion energy technology unit of General Electric, recently moved its headquarters to Billerica. • Cabot Corporation, a $3.3 billion specialty chemicals and performance materials company, has its primary Research and Development facility in Billerica. • Avaya Inc, a privately held $8 billion global provider of business communications and collaboration systems, has its New England headquarters in Billerica. • L3 Technologies, is a $15 billion American company that supplies command and control, communications, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (C3ISR) systems and products, avionics, ocean products, training devices and services, instrumentation, space, and navigation products. They have a Billerica office on Concord Road. • Pan Am Railways, New England's largest railroad, is headquartered in North Billerica, Massachusetts. • Merck Millipore is the life sciences subsidiary of Merck and is headquartered in Billerica. • Pharmalucence, a biotech company which makes drugs for disease diagnosis has its corporate headquarters in Billerica. • American Science & Engineering, based in Billerica, "said it received a $6.7 million order for its X-ray detection technology that will be used by the US government for counterterrorism missions". • Lantheus Medical Imaging Inc., the Billerica-based medical imaging company, "sealed a new purchasing deal with Ottawa-based MDS Nordion for a rare imaging isotope, molybdenum-99". • Seahorse Bioscience, a labware products manufacturer, is also headquartered in North Billerica. • Entegris, a provider of semiconductor handling solutions. • Bruker, a manufacturer of scientific instruments for molecular and materials research. • FLIR Systems has a large facility in Billerica.

Transport MBTA Commuter Rail provides service from Boston's North Station with the North Billerica station on its Lowell Line. The southern portions of the town are also geographically close to the Wilmington (MBTA station) and the Anderson Regional Transportation Center in Woburn. The Lowell Regional Transit Authority provides bus service in parts of Billerica. Route #3 (South Lowell) services the North Billerica MBTA station and the North Billerica Business Center. Route #13 (Billerica via Edson) services Boston Road (Massachusetts Route 3A) from North Billerica to Pinehurst. Stops along the way include the North Billerica MBTA Station, Pollard Street, High Street, Billerica Center and Town Hall, the Billerica Mall, and Towne Plaza, and a shopping centre located in Riverdale. Route #14 (Burlington Mall/Lahey Hospital & Medical Center) services Route 3A until Billerica Center, where it continues onto Concord Road and the Middlesex Turnpike.

The Middlesex Canal, which flowed through Billerica between 1795 and 1852, was used to transport goods between Lowell and Boston.

In the 1840s, the Boston and Lowell Railroad's main line was built and passed through the town's villages of North Billerica and East Billerica. Stations were built in both locations and North Billerica station is still an active station on the MBTA Commuter Rail. Trains stopped taking passengers at East Billerica in 1965 and the station was remodeled and is now a private home.