Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: old-book passages.
The Ashton post office opened in 1881, the earliest record of the town by name. Another post office, Saint Gilman (1873), opened inside today’s city and later closed.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Ashton’s history is told.
From Wikipedia’s history of Ashton.
Ashton was laid out in 1872 by the Sioux City & St. Paul Railroad. The city was named from a grove of white ash trees near the town site.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Ashton, cut from the printed page as they were published.
Shaw put up a store building and put in a stock of goods; the building on the same section with Huff. Mr. Shaw afterwards filed on a part of Section 14, in Gilman, and in 1872, put up a store building in the town of St. Gilman (now Ashton) and moved his stock there. Shaw's store was the first store in the county, and in it in 1871, the old settlers used to congregate, and if we had a record of all their doings, and the stories there told, our readers would be highly entertained. Every
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
The Town of Ashton was laid out by the Land Department of the Sioux City and St. Paul Railroad Company in 1S72. It was first named St. Oilman, but afterwards, in 1882, this name was changed to Ashton. The town is beautifully located, and on the east side of its business portion runs the Otter, a beautiful stream, though not a large one. It is a thrifty town, having tributary to it a scope of country that for productiveness and fertility of soil is unexcelled in the state.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.
Ashton’s post office has been open since 1881. Another post office, Saint Gilman, opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
The Ashton post office opened in 1881, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (3), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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