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Putnam, Alabama

8 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1953 and the latest in 1984. It stands in the Sweet Water census division. It lies in ZIP code area 36784. It stands on Turkey Creek. The Survey maps it on the Putnam quadrangle. 172 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 226 feet above sea level.

Putnam within Marengo County

Population over time

2 figures

Putnam fell from 193 to 172 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.

YearPeople Change
2010193
2020172-21 (-11%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

5 surveys from 8 printed sheets

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.

Fires near this place

28 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 28 fires within 5 miles of Putnam between 1994 and 2019, burning about 281 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 2 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.

Reported cause Fires
Debris and open burning10
Missing data/not specified/undetermined9
Smoking2
Arson/incendiarism2
Equipment and vehicle use2
Recreation and ceremony1
Misuse of fire by a minor1
Natural1

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

DateCause SizeReported by Name on the report
5 September 2010Debris and open burning29 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
3 September 2019Debris and open burning1.5 acresAlabama Forestry Commission20190903-4
28 September 2004Debris and open burning8.0 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
21 September 2010Debris and open burning11 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
20 September 2010Debris and open burning5.9 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
7 August 2006Natural80 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
10 August 2006Debris and open burning1.0 acresAlabama Forestry Commissionnot named
11 July 2019Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreAlabama Forestry Commission20190711-4

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Marengo County

Storms near this place

2 since 2001

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Putnam in 2 storm reports between 2001 and 2021: 1 thunderstorm wind, 1 tornado. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. 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.

WhenEvent Place namedHarm What the report says
August 2001Thunderstorm WindPutnam$2,000Several large tree limbs and one power pole were blown down from near Putnam to near Dixons Mill. Many of the limbs temporarily blocked roadways and were removed by fire department personnel.
March 2021Tornado (EF1)Putnam-National Weather Service meteorologists surveyed damage in southwest Marengo County and determined that it was consistent with an EF1 tornado, with maximum winds near 110 mph. This long track tornado began in the NWS Mobile forecast area and traveled almost 35 miles through Wayne, Choctaw, and Clarke Counties as an EF-2 tornado. It weakened to an EF-1 tornado as it crossed into Marengo County. It continued to snap and uproot numerous trees as it crossed Highway 69. The tornado dissipated in a wooded area northeast of Highway 69.

Every storm recorded in Marengo County

Nearest settlements

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

Map PlaceDistance Sheets
McNeiders (historical)2.7 miles12
Hornsboro (historical)3.0 miles8
Lasca3.9 miles10
Hotamville5.3 miles8
Nanafalia6.6 miles10
Nicholsville6.9 miles10
Barrons (historical)7.5 miles8
Coxheath7.8 miles10

Elsewhere

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.

Wikipedia article on PutnamAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q1263429The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0).

Provenance

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 153093. 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.

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.