Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
More historic than 72% of U.S. towns · #184 of 701 in Michigan. What drives it
4 places in town are on the National Register. Below: maps from 1961 on.
The Nottawa Township post office opened in 1855, the earliest record of the town by name. Four smaller post offices, Nottaway (1830), Oporto (1837) and Nottawa (1855), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
More historic than 72% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Nottawa Township is more historic than 72% of U.S. towns, #184 of 701 in Michigan. Its share of homes from before 1940 holds the grade up; its age pulls it down.
Few Michigan towns list much on the Register (a typical Michigan town has 0.0 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Nottawa Township’s 10.8 sits above most of its state (83% of Michigan towns have fewer) while its 4 listings outnumber those of 68% of U.S. towns.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). 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.
Four other post offices 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 first neighbors to add old photos shape how Nottawa Township’s history is told.
The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
From Wikipedia’s history of Nottawa Township.
Nottawa Township was the center of the Notawasepe Potawatamie Reservation which was the home of the ancestors of the Nottawasippi Potawatamies starting in 1821.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
BuiltNottawa Stone School is builtBuiltSt. Joseph County Courthouse is builtBuiltM-86-Prarie River Bridge is built
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Nottawa Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Nottawa Township.
Nobody well known was born in Nottawa Township itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Nottawa Township post office opened in 1855, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
Nottawa Township is more historic than 72% of U.S. towns, #184 of 701 in Michigan. 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.
4 listings: 3 buildings, among them the Nottawa Stone School (listed 1972, the first), and 1 structure.
24% of Nottawa Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±5.0 points), against a typical 12% for a Michigan town; the median home was built in 1976.
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 Wikidata (1), the National Register of Historic Places (4), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock) and the USGS Geographic Names Information System. Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
