Merced County Courthouse

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975. 11 historic topographic surveys show this location, the earliest from 1914.

From the record

“The Merced County Courthouse is the historic county courthouse in Merced County, California. Located at the intersection of W. 21st and N Streets in Merced, the building served as Merced County's courthouse from 1875 until 1975.”
Wikipedia article Merced County Courthouse, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 15 National Register listings published here for Merced County · listed in 1975 · category: Building.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Address. W. 21st and N Sts., Merced, 95340
When was it listed? October 1975
Category. building
Census division. Merced
Architectural style. Renaissance Revival architecture
National Register reference number. 75000441 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Then and now

1914 to 1983

The ground this property stands on, surveyed 69 years apart. Drag the handle to wipe between them. Both sheets are United States Geological Survey originals; neither has been altered.

Topographic sheet covering Merced County Courthouse, surveyed 1983

Topographic sheet covering Merced County Courthouse, surveyed 1914

Fires near this property

1,211 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1,211 fires within 5 miles of Merced County Courthouse between 1992 and 2020, burning about 1,533 acres in total. 5 started naturally. 93 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
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	641
Equipment and vehicle use	227
Debris and open burning	133
Arson/incendiarism	93
Smoking	48
Misuse of fire by a minor	44
Power generation/transmission/distribution	11
Natural	5
Railroad operations and maintenance	5
Recreation and ceremony	3
Other causes	1

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

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
9 September 2019	Debris and open burning	under an acre	Merced-Mariposa Unit	NORTH BEAR CREEK DR E MCK
9 September 2017	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection	PACIFIC
9 September 2017	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection	DUNN
9 September 2016	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection	BERMUDA
9 September 2005	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Grasslands Wildlife Management Area	VASSAR
9 September 1994	Equipment and vehicle use	under an acre	Merced-Mariposa Unit	ROADSIDE 262
8 September 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Merced-Mariposa Unit	STRETCH RD MCKEE
8 September 2013	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Merced-Mariposa Unit	HWY 140 E/ DELL ST

Every fire recorded in Merced County

Storms near this property

26 since 1995

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Merced, the town this property stands in, in 26 storm reports between 1995 and 2010: 6 heavy rain, 5 funnel cloud, 3 tornado, 3 lightning. 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.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
March 1998	Flash Flood	Merced	$9,600,000	Over 65 homes and 19 apartments were flooded in and around Merced City as the result of torrential/record-setting rainfall in the previous 18 hours.
February 1998	Heavy Rain	Merced	$2,000,000	no account filed
November 1996	Tornado (F1)	Merced	$45,000	no account filed
June 2003	Wildfire	Merced	$15,000	The McNamera Fire was of unknown origin and burned about 650 acres before containment. One primary structure was lost but no injuries or fatalities were reported.
March 2006	Tornado (F0)	Merced	$10,000	A trained spotter noted a funnel cloud approaching the city of Merced and tracked the northward movement of that funnel. At 1448 PST the funnel removed half of the corrugated roof of a farm maintenance shop and lifted it up and over adjacent power lines to the north. Eyewitness accounts indicated rotation and movement of the lowest level clouds toward the NE approximately 0.19 miles. Other than two ground contact points, beginning and end of the damage track, there was no evidence of any other ground contact from the funnel. Analysis by a local structural engineer aided in the assignment of the F0 rating.
April 1996	Tornado (F0)	Merced	$10,000	no account filed
April 2003	Heavy Rain	Merced	$7,500	no account filed
February 2010	Heavy Rain	Merced	-	Deep water reported on Westside Blvd at Howard due to heavy rainfall.
October 2004	Funnel Cloud	Merced	-	Spotter reports indicated a funnel cloud east to southeast of Merced during the early afternoon of the 17th.
January 1999	Funnel Cloud	Merced	-	Funnel cloud near Merced.
June 1998	Lightning	Merced	-	Lightning strike on a tree in south Merced reported by a spotter.
March 1998	Funnel Cloud	Merced	-	Spotter report of funnel almost touching the ground northwest of Merced.
March 1998	Hail	Merced	-	Spotter report of 3/4" hail.
March 1998	Lightning	Merced	-	Power outage to 700 customers of PG&E.
March 1998	Hail	Merced	-	Merced County Sheriff reports plus reports from truck drivers indicated that hail was large and deep enough to cause cars to slide off State Highway 99 just north of the Merced/Madera County line.
March 1998	Flood	Merced	-	Torrential thundershowers flooded over 25 surface streets in Merced during the afternoon of the 24th.
June 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Merced	-	Sheriff Department report of three-quarters hail in the City of Merced. Rainfall mostly within a one-hour period of time was 1.81 inches after 1325 PDT. Continued damage to valley agriculture likely but not specifically assessed to this storm (see Dos Palos Y below).
January 2006	Lightning	Merced	-	no account filed
March 2006	Funnel Cloud	Merced	-	no account filed
February 2005	Heavy Rain	Merced	-	no account filed
May 2003	Funnel Cloud	Merced	-	no account filed
April 2001	Hail	Merced	-	no account filed
November 2001	Flood	Merced	-	no account filed
April 2000	Flood	Merced	-	no account filed
May 2000	Heavy Rain	Merced	-	no account filed
May 1998	Heavy Rain	Merced	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Merced County

Maps showing this location

11 surveys

United States Geological Survey topographic sheets whose coverage includes this point. Matched by taking the middle of the area the National Park Service maps for this listing, then testing that coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet.

1914 USGS Merced quadrangle1:31680
1917 USGS Merced quadrangle1:31680
1946 USGS Merced quadrangle1:24000
1947 USGS San Jose quadrangle1:250000
1948 USGS Merced quadrangle1:24000
1956 USGS San Jose quadrangle1:250000
1961 USGS Merced quadrangle1:24000 - 3 printings
1962 USGS Merced quadrangle1:62500
1962 USGS San Jose quadrangle1:250000 - 4 printings
1966 USGS San Jose quadrangle1:250000
1983 USGS Merced quadrangle1:100000

Listed places nearby

6 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Property	Distance	Listed
Merced County High School	under 500 feet	1984
Strand Theater	0.3 miles	2021
Maj. George Beecher Cook House	0.3 miles	1983
Thomas H. Leggett House	0.3 miles	1982
Leggett House	0.3 miles	1979
Bank of Italy, Merced	0.3 miles	2004

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 75000441 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Merced County	All 15 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
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.