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History · Watkins

Watkins’ post office opened in 1873, and 21% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: maps from 1888 on and old-book passages.

1873first post office
0on the National Register
21%homes built before 1940
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Quick answers

How Watkins began

When was Watkins founded?

1873

The Watkins post office opened in 1873, the earliest record of the town by name.

2020 census: 116153 years
Founding year: the first Watkins post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Watkins’ past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of Watkins are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.On the map since 18883 editions of the USGS map, 1888 to 1968. Watch Watkins change.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Watkins’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Watkins’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
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On the map

Watkins on the map, 1888 to 1968

Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Watkins. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.

Watkins on the 1888 USGS mapWatkins on the 1899 USGS mapWatkins on the 1968 USGS map1888Amana sheet · 1:62,500

U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Watkins.

The story

How Watkins came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Watkins.

Read it all →

The community was named for John Burton Watkins who was the Superintendent of the Iowa Divisions of the Chicago & North Western Railway from 1870 until he was killed in a tragic railroad accident near there on 30 October 1873. Nearly the entire C&NW Rwy. management team was witness to the accident. "...Albert Keep, President of the road; James Howe, General Manager; Marvin Hughitt, General Superintendent; John B. Watkins, Superintendent of the Iowa Division; M. Johnson, Chief Engineer; W. Ferry, Director, and Horace Williams, President of the Chicago, Iowa, and Nebraska Railroad Company were on a tour of inspection over the road."

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

From the old history books

What they wrote about Watkins in 1878

Passages that mention Watkins, cut from the printed page as they were published.

The amount of railway earning for the station of Watkins from the 1st day of January, 1878, up to the 1st of August, 1878, is $13,515.44. A literary society was organized last Winter, which proved to be a vastly popular organization.
The history of Benton County, Iowa, containing a history of the county, its cities, towns, &c., a biographical directory of its citizens, war record of its volunteers in the late rebellion, general and local statistics ..1878 · page 469Read the page →
Read the text

The amount of railway earning for the station of Watkins from the 1st day of January, 1878, up to the 1st of August, 1878, is $13,515.44. A literary society was organized last Winter, which proved to be a vastly popular organization.

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.

By decade

Watkins, decade by decade

Today1 recent
Youngville Cafe2016Youngville Cafe

Questions about Watkins’ history

What year was Watkins founded?

The Watkins post office opened in 1873, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

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Sources

Where this page comes from

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 the Library of Congress (1), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, 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.