Guest, Sign inJoin

Post to Brook Park

We’ll email a one-tap link to publish your post. No password, and nothing is public until you click it.
Already a member? Sign in
–Not graded
History · Brook Park

Brook Park’s post office opened in 1894, and 33% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1961 on, and the census since 1920.

1894first post office
0on the National Register
33%homes built before 1940
1old photo or paper
Add an old photoShare a memory
Quick answers

How Brook Park began

When was Brook Park founded?

1894

The Brook Park post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name.

First census: 167 in 19202020 census: 132132 years
Founding year: the first Brook Park post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about Brook Park’s past

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

A history waiting to be writtenOnly 1 old photo is in the public archives. The rest are in attics and albums.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start Brook Park’s collection

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

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
1 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Retake an old viewHinckey Fire Monument: stand where they stood+15Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
The story

How Brook Park came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of Brook Park.

Read it all →

Founded as a lumber camp in the 1870s, Brook Park was incorporated as a township on April 18, 1894; and as a village on October 1, 1919. On September 1, 1894, the township and surrounding area were devastated in the Great Hinckley Fire. At the time, the town of Brook Park was known as Pokegama. A monument to the Brook Park victims of the fire is located in the town cemetery just southwest of town, marking a mass grave of 23 unidentified victims.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Timeline

Brook Park, 1894 to 1961

Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.

  1. 19th century
  2. 1894Post officeThe Brook Park post office opens
  3. 20th century
  4. 1915In the archiveHinckey Fire Monument
  5. 1961On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
By decade

Brook Park, decade by decade

One decade in the archive so far: the 1910s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.

1910s1 item
Hinckey Fire Monument1915Hinckey Fire Monument
1920s–1990snothing yet
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Add from your album
On the map

Brook Park on the map, 1961 to 1983

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

Brook Park on the 1961 USGS mapBrook Park on the 1983 USGS map1961Brook Park 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 Brook Park.

Then & now

Stand where they stood

No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.

Hinckey Fire Monument
Retake this viewHinckey Fire Monument, 1915

Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Brook Park’s page.

Retake this view · +15
People over time

Brook Park, census by census

0100192019401960198020002020Peak: 167

Between 93 and 167 people in every census since 1920.

11 censuses, 1920–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Brook Park’s Wikipedia page.

Questions about Brook Park’s history

What year was Brook Park founded?

The Brook Park post office opened in 1894, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

Memory lane

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

Town Square →
Start a conversation
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, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), 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.