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History · St. Charles Township

20% of St. Charles Township’s homes were built before 1940

Below: 2 old photos and papers, maps from 1954 on, and the census since 1870.

0on the National Register
20%homes built before 1940
2old photos & papers
Add an old photoShare a memory
From St. Charles Township’s archive · credits on each photo

What stands out about St. Charles Township’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 2 old photos are in the public archives. The rest are in attics and albums.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start St. Charles Township’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how St. Charles Township’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 view1910postcardHighSchoolStCharlesMN: stand where they stood+15Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
The story

How St. Charles Township came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of St. Charles Township.

Read it all →

St. Charles was laid out in 1854, and named for Saint Charles Borromeo (1538–1584), an Italian saint and cardinal. A post office has been in operation at St. Charles since 1855. St. Charles was incorporated in 1870.

The city was evacuated on April 17, 2009, when a large fire at North Star Foods, a poultry processing plant, threatened anhydrous ammonia tanks. Residents were allowed to return the next day.

Three properties in St. Charles are listed on the National Register of Historic Places: the 1874 Trinity Episcopal Church, the 1876 St. Charles City Bakery, and the 1890s Whitewater Avenue Commercial Historic District.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

By decade

St. Charles Township, decade by decade

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

1910s2 items
1910postcardHighSchoolStCharlesMN19101910postcardHighSchoolStCharlesMNPostcardIngersollpostcardStCharlesMN1910IngersollpostcardStCharlesMNPostcard
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
Today4 recent
St. Charles MN downtown2016St. Charles MN downtownNorthStarFoodsAfterFire2009NorthStarFoodsAfterFire501WhitewaterAve559722008501WhitewaterAve55972StCharlesMN2006StCharlesMN
On the map

St. Charles Township on the map, 1954 to 1974

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

St. Charles Township on the 1954 USGS mapSt. Charles Township on the 1974 USGS map1954Chatfield 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 St. Charles Township.

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.

1910postcardHighSchoolStCharlesMN
Retake this view1910postcardHighSchoolStCharlesMN, 1910

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

Retake this view · +15
People over time

St. Charles Township, census by census

05001,0001,5002,0002,5003,0003,5004,000188019001920194019601980200020203,990

Grew from 1,151 people in 1870 to 3,990 in 2020, 3 times over.

16 censuses, 1870–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on St. Charles Township’s Wikipedia page.

Places that used to be

Old burying grounds

3cemeteries and burying grounds inside St. Charles Township
CarpenterSinclairSmith

Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).

Stories next door

History across the town line

Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.

St. Charles3 historic placesB+Saratoga TownshipIts storynot graded: under 1,000 residents or part of its townUtica TownshipIts storynot graded: under 1,000 residents or part of its townElba Township2 historic placesnot graded: under 1,000 residents or part of its townDover Township1 historic placenot graded: under 1,000 residents or part of its town

Questions about St. Charles Township’s history

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 Wikimedia Commons (6), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia) 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.