Helena, Alabama

• Open map evidence
• Research guide
• Shelby County

Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.

On the National Register 1 record

• Helena Historic Districtlisted 2006

Surveyed buildings and structures 3 records

• Billy Gould Coal Mine and Coke Ovens, Confluence of Cahaba River & Buck Creek, Helenafederal building survey, 5 photographs
• Louisville & Nashville Railway, Cahaba River Bridge, Spanning Cahaba River, Helenafederal building survey, 2 photographs
• Mule Cotton Press, Dunham Plantation, County Road 17, Helenafederal building survey, 3 photographs

Helena grew from 16,793 to 20,914 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.

Matched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.

• 1890 USGS Bessemer quadrangle1:125000
• 1892 USGS Bessemer quadrangle1:125000, 2 printings
• 1905 USGS Bessemer Iron District quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
• 1905 USGS Bessemer Special quadrangle1:48000
• 1907 USGS Bessemer Iron District quadrangle1:62500, 3 printings
• 1907 USGS Bessemer Special quadrangle1:62500
• 1953 USGS Birmingham quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
• 1956 USGS Birmingham quadrangle1:250000
• 1957 USGS Birmingham quadrangle1:250000
• 1959 USGS Helena quadrangle1:24000, 7 printings
• 1975 USGS Helena quadrangle1:24000
• 1984 USGS Birmingham South quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
• 1997 USGS Helena quadrangle1:24000

Taken for the Office of War Information and the Farm Security Administration, who photographed the country between 1935 and 1944. Works of United States government photographers, with no known restriction on use. Each opens its catalogue record.

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 94 fires within 5 miles of Helena between 1994 and 2019, burning about 750 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 26 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

• Tacoa
• Calliston
• Dearing Downs
• Chandalar South
• Falliston
• Paramount

Every fire recorded in Shelby County

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 13 workings within 5 miles of Helena: 6 producers, 3 past producers, 3 unknowns, 1 prospect. 6 still produce. What was taken out: Iron, Stone, Crushed/Broken, Calcium, Clay. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Every working recorded in Shelby County

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Helena in 31 storm reports between 1995 and 2025: 15 thunderstorm wind, 10 hail, 3 lightning, 2 flash flood. The reports record 1 injury. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

Every storm recorded in Shelby County

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 157982. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.

Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.

Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.