Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
More historic than 56% of U.S. towns. What drives it
Below: 1 old photo or paper and old-book passages.
More historic than 56% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Madison Township is more historic than 56% of U.S. towns. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its National Register listings pull it down.
Indiana towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Indiana town has 7.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Madison Township’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (22% of Indiana towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
Founding year: our sources. Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
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 Madison Township’s history is told.
Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of Madison Township yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.
Madison Township is one of twenty townships in Allen County, Indiana, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population was 1,659.
Between the 2010 and 2020 censuses its population fell from 1,771 to 1,659 (-6%).
Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.
Passages that mention Madison Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
We will supplement the list of township officers with a list of Madison Township citizens who have held county, state and other honorary positions. In October of 1827 John Swisher succeeded James Kilbourne as county assessor, and served until 1835.
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.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Madison Township’s page.
Retake this view · +15Nobody well known was born in Madison Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Another post office, Massilon, 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).
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
Madison Township is more historic than 56% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
29% of Madison Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±7.8 points), against a typical 14% for an Indiana town; the median home was built in 1968.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (1), 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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