Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
More historic than 72% of U.S. towns · #115 of 362 in Wisconsin. What drives it
10 places in town are on the National Register, among them two historic districts with 66 buildings between them. Below: 21 old photos and papers, maps from 1885 on, and the census since 1880.
The Sturgeon Bay post office opened in 1855, the earliest record of the town by name. Another post office, Sawyer (1874), opened inside today’s city and later closed.
More historic than 72% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Sturgeon Bay is more historic than 72% of U.S. towns, #115 of 362 in Wisconsin. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
Wisconsin towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Wisconsin town has 3.0 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Sturgeon Bay’s 72.4 sits above most of its state (91% of Wisconsin towns have fewer) while its 71 historic buildings outnumber those of 87% of U.S. towns.
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 →
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
5 decades in the archive, from the 1860s to the 1920s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
18671867 Plan of Lake Michigan and Sturgeon Bay Canal Doo…Map
1881Sturgeon Bay 1881
1890Equisetum x ferrissii Door County Wisconsin
1899Sturgeon Bay Canal
1910Ahnapee and Western Sawyer Wisconsin
1911Sherwin-Williams brand Lime Sulphur and Arsenate of L…
1912Lincoln Beachey flying west down State Street in Sawy…
1917Bashful
1917Flashes 1917 Playground 1
1917Flashes 1917 Playground 2
1917Flashes 1917 Playground 3
1917Hail hail the gangs all here
1917Just lunching Sturgeon Bay High School
1917Mr. Soukup all in a days work
1917Skating rink at the lower campus
1917Skating rink at the lower campus 2
1919Justice of the Peace
1919Mutt and Jeff a Fast OneFire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
1885Sheet 1 of 4Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
The country’s official list of buildings and places worth saving.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
From Wikipedia’s history of Sturgeon Bay.
The area was originally inhabited by the Ho-Chunk and Menominee. The town is known in the Menominee language as Namāēw-Wīhkit, or "bay of the sturgeon". The Menominee ceded this territory to the United States in the 1831 Treaty of Washington. After that, the area was available for white settlement.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Sturgeon Bay, cut from the printed page as they were published.
but for their services received a large salary. To-day the true American principle is adopted, and the county officials occupy a magnificent building, but their pay is humble, compared with the salary paid in by-gone years. Sturgeon Bay has grown from a settlement of a hand ful of inhabitants to a thriving place with a population of an even 1,200 the 1st day of June, 1880. The branches of business carried on in Sturgeon Bay, will be found in the county directory, which appears
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
are carried to the post offices by stage lines, and parties desiring to reach any part of the county, can secure passage in the mail coaches at reasonably low prices. In the summer time, there are passenger steamers that stop at Sturgeon Bay, going to Green Bay, Menominee, and other Bay ports. The Goodrich Transportation Company, of Chicago, run two large steamers on this route, thus affording direct, comfortable, and cheap transportation to and from Chicago, as well as other
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.
In the archive1867 Plan of Lake Michigan and Sturgeon Bay Canal Door County WisconsinBuiltLarson, L. A., & Co. Store is built
Born hereEddie Cochems is born hereIn the archiveSturgeon Bay 1881In the archiveEquisetum x ferrissii Door County WisconsinIn the archiveAhnapee and Western Sawyer WisconsinBuiltCarnegie Free Library is built
In the archiveHighest AttainmentBuiltSturgeon Bay Bridge is builtBuiltSturgeon Bay Post Office is built
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
Born hereCasey Rabach is born hereEvery edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Sturgeon Bay. 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 Sturgeon Bay.
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 Sturgeon Bay’s page.
Retake this view · +15Grew from 1,199 people in 1880 to 9,646 in 2020, 8 times over.
15 censuses, 1880–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Sturgeon Bay’s Wikipedia page.
Writers, athletes, leaders and more, ranked by how widely they’re known.
Sturgeon Bay’s post office has been open since 1855. Another post office, Sawyer, 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).
Most archives stop around 1920. The photos from after that are in family albums, not libraries.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Sturgeon Bay post office opened in 1855, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
Sturgeon Bay is more historic than 72% of U.S. towns, #115 of 362 in Wisconsin. 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.
10 listings: 5 buildings, 2 historic districts, the Louisiana Street/Seventh Avenue Historic District and the Third Avenue Historic District, with 66 contributing buildings, 2 sites, and 1 structure. 71 historic buildings in all.
17% of Sturgeon Bay’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±4.0 points), against a typical 12% for a Wisconsin town; the median home was built in 1979.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (21), Wikidata (3), the National Register of Historic Places (10), 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, Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress) 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.
1922
1923