Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: 2 old photos and papers, maps from 1902 on, and the census since 1920.
The Bagley post office opened in 1887, the earliest record of the town by name.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Bagley’s history is told.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Bagley. 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 Bagley.
From Wikipedia’s history of Bagley.
The land for the village originally belonged to Mary Bagley when in 1884 the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad built a depot. Later that year, the Saint Paul Land Company purchased the land and platted the village.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Bagley, cut from the printed page as they were published.
ton to Glen Haven. It was first operated as a telephone line, but trouble about the patent ensuing, it was changed to a telegraph line. In 1894 Dr. G. C. Marlow bought the line and extended it to Bagley, operating it as a telephone line. In 1896 the Grant County Telephone Company was organized with L. D. Holford as president, and Marlow’s line was rapidly extended to other villages, until in 1898, when it was merged into the Union Telephone Company, it had 350 miles of wire in the county, and reached all the cities and most of
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
One decade in the archive so far: the 1970s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Bagley’s page.
Retake this view · +15Between 271 and 379 people in every census since 1920.
11 censuses, 1920–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Bagley’s Wikipedia page.
Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Bagley post office opened in 1887, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
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). How TownRatings grades history →
From Wikimedia Commons (4), 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), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
1971
2024
2017