More historic than 6% of U.S. towns · #268 of 273 in Minnesota. What drives it
Most of Sartell was built recently: 1% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 2001. Below: 2 old photos and papers, maps from 1950 on, and the census since 1910.
Founding year: the first Sartell post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Wikidata: 1907.The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Sartell’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Sartell is more historic than 6% of U.S. towns, #268 of 273 in Minnesota. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
D
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Sartell’s overall grade.
Minnesota towns list about as much on the Register as the country (a typical Minnesota town has 2.1 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Sartell’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (23% of Minnesota towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would still be D. The pre-1940 share (±0.9 points) is firm at this size. The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date; Wikidata’s 1907 falls in the same era, so the grade doesn’t depend on which one is used.
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 →
What stands out about Sartell’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first known Native American tribe in the area now known as Sartell were the Dakota. Greysolon du Luht ("Duluth") visited the large Mdewakantonwan village Izatys on Mille Lacs Lake in 1679. As the Anishinaabe people moved westward around Lake Superior and into the interior away from the Europeans in the 18th century, they pushed the neighboring Sioux/Dakota people to their west—in present-day Minnesota—farther south and west away from them. By 1820 the Chippewa/Anishinaabe controlled all of northern Minnesota, but raids between them and the Dakota to the south continued. The area later named Sartell was an intertribal no man's land when French fur traders and British geographers first descended the Mississippi River from the Anishinaabe north (Jean-Baptiste Perrault 1789, David Thompson 1798), and American explorers ascended the river from the Sioux south (Zebulon Pike 1805, Lewis Ca…
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.
The Sartell post office opened in 1906, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records). Wikidata gives 1907.
How does Sartell rank for history?
Sartell is more historic than 6% of U.S. towns, #268 of 273 in Minnesota. 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.
How old are the homes in Sartell?
1% of Sartell’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate), against a typical 8.1% for a Minnesota town; the median home was built in 2001.
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 (6), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, 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.
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