Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
The Solon Springs post office opened in 1896, the earliest record of the town by name. Another post office, White Birch (1885), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
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 Solon Springs’s history is told.
From Wikipedia’s history of Solon Springs.
Solon Springs was first called White Birch, from a grove of white birch trees near the original town site. The present name of Solon Springs honors Thomas F. Solon, who discovered mineral springs here. A post office was established as White Birch in 1885, and the name of the post office was changed to Solon Springs in 1896.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
Weddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Nobody well known was born in Solon Springs itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Solon Springs’s post office has been open since 1896. Another post office, White Birch, opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
The Solon Springs post office opened in 1896, 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 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.
