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History · New Melle

New Melle’s post office opened in 1850, and 11% of its homes were built before 1940

Its Register listings are the St. Paul's Church and the Meier General Store. Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1948 on, and the census since 1880.

1850first post office
2on the National Register
11%homes built before 1940
1old photo or paper
Add an old photoShare a memory
From New Melle’s archive · credits on each photo
Quick answers

How New Melle began

When was New Melle founded?

1850

The New Melle post office opened in 1850, the earliest record of the town by name.

First census: 264 in 18802020 census: 541176 years
Founding year: the first New Melle post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓

What stands out about New Melle’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.Shrank, then grewLost two-thirds of its people between 1990 and 2000, then grew 4-fold.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start New Melle’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how New Melle’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Date a photo1 archive item has no date. Guess the decade.+2Retake an old viewNewmellewatertower: stand where they stood+15Share a family photoSign in to add one+10
People over time

New Melle, census by census

010020030040050060018801900192019401960198020002020486 in 1990Low: 124

Lost two-thirds of its people between 1990 and 2000, then grew 4-fold.

6 censuses, 1880–2020.

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

The story

How New Melle came to be

From Wikipedia’s history of New Melle.

Read it all →

New Melle was platted ca. 1850. The community was named after Melle, Germany, the former home of a share of the first settlers, who came in 1839. The city's first Lutheran church, St. Paul Lutheran Church, was established in 1844. A post office called New Melle has been in operation since 1850. New Melle incorporated as a city in 1978.

The Meier General Store and St. Paul's Church are listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Timeline

New Melle, 1850 to 2020

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

  1. 19th century
  2. 1850Post officeThe New Melle post office opens
  3. 20th century
  4. 1948On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
  5. 21st century
  6. 2020CensusPopulation peaks at 541
By decade

New Melle, decade by decade

Date unknown1 to date
NewmellewatertowerDate?Newmellewatertower
Today3 recent
New Melle, Missouri2026New Melle, MissouriNew Melle memorialstone2015New Melle memorialstoneMOMap-doton-New Melle2004MOMap-doton-New Melle
On the map

New Melle on the map, 1948 to 1972

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

New Melle on the 1948 USGS mapNew Melle on the 1972 USGS map1948Augusta 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 New Melle.

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.

Newmellewatertower
Retake this viewNewmellewatertower

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

Retake this view · +15
On the National Register

2 historic places in New Melle

The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.

places listed
2
National Historic Landmarks
0
none yet
historic buildings protected
3
each building in a district counts
first listed
1982
St. Paul's Church
St. Paul's ChurchMeier General Store
Buildings

Architectural styles listings

Vernacular1
Gable-Front Store1
St. Paul's ChurchVernacular
Meier General StoreGable-Front Store

National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.

Famous people

Famous people close to New Melle

Nobody well known was born in New Melle itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.

See all →
Reinhold NiebuhrAmerican Protestant theologian · b. 1892
Josh SargentAmerican soccer player · b. 2000
Jack WagnerAmerican actor and singer · b. 1959
C
Carl O. SauerAmerican geographer · b. 1889
C
Clayton KellerAmerican ice hockey player · b. 1998
H
H. Richard NiebuhrAmerican theologian · b. 1894

Questions about New Melle’s history

What year was New Melle founded?

The New Melle post office opened in 1850, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).

What is on the National Register in New Melle?

Two places: the St. Paul's Church (listed 1982) and the Meier General Store (2002).

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 (4), the National Register of Historic Places (2), 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.