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Castalia, Iowa

11 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1906 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Bloomfield Township. It lies in ZIP code area 52133. The Survey maps it on the Castalia quadrangle. 145 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,247 feet above sea level.

Castalia within Winneshiek County

Population over time

2 figures

Castalia fell from 173 to 145 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
2010173
2020145-28 (-16%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

7 surveys from 11 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

4 since 2013

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 4 fires within 5 miles of Castalia between 2013 and 2018, burning about 18 acres in total. None started naturally. None was 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 burning3
Equipment and vehicle use1

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
24 April 2018Debris and open burning5.0 acresIowa Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
14 April 2015Debris and open burning2.0 acresIowa Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
14 November 2013Equipment and vehicle use1.5 acresIowa Department of Natural Resourcesnot named
8 October 2014Debris and open burning10 acresIowa Department of Natural Resourcesnot named

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Winneshiek County

Mines and quarries near this place

5 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of Castalia: 3 past producers, 2 producers. 2 still produce. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Where SiteCommodity StatusRecorded
Castalia QuarryStone, Crushed/BrokenProducer
Livingood QuarryStone, Crushed/BrokenProducer
Schweinefus QuarryStone, Crushed/BrokenPast Producer
UnknownStone, Crushed/BrokenPast Producer
UnknownStone, Crushed/BrokenPast Producer

Every working recorded in Winneshiek County

Storms near this place

15 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Castalia in 15 storm reports between 1994 and 2022: 7 hail, 6 thunderstorm wind, 1 flash flood, 1 heavy rain. 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
July 2009HailCastalia$964,000Large hail occurred along Highway W42 going into Fayette County.
June 2013Flash FloodCastalia$900,000Heavy rain caused flash flooding to occur across Winneshiek County, especially the northern sections. Rapidly rising waters along the Upper Iowa River caused a campground in Bluffton to be evacuated and covered numerous roads in Burr Oak Township stranding residences.
May 2012Thunderstorm WindCastalia$60,000Two barns were blown down between Castalia and Ossian. One of these barns was a 114 foot by 283 foot freestall barn under construction. On the same farm, another calf barn was partially destroyed and three cattle sheds were completely destroyed. One cow was killed, 55 acres of corn was sheared off by the wind and 50 acres of alfalfa was destroyed.
July 2009HailCastalia$50,000This was the second round of large hail to fall in five hours, damaging many of the same fields and properties.
October 2006HailCastalia$50,000no account filed
July 1994Thunderstorm WindCastalia$50,000no account filed
May 1998Thunderstorm WindCastalia$23,000no account filed
July 2009HailCastalia$10,000Golf ball size hail was reported on a family farm along the county line.
May 2017Thunderstorm WindCastalia$3,000Several large trees were blown down south of Ossian.
August 2022Thunderstorm WindCastalia$2,000Trees were blown down in Castalia.
May 2017Thunderstorm WindCastalia$2,000Trees were blown down in Castalia.
May 2004HailCastalia$750no account filed
June 2014Heavy RainCastalia-East of Ossian, 4.90 inches of rain fell.
July 2009HailCastalia-Penny sized hail fell but there were no winds with the storm.
May 2004HailCastalia-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Winneshiek 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
Junction (historical)3.1 miles11
Moneek4.3 miles11
Ossian5.3 miles12
Frankville6.2 miles11
Twin Springs9.7 miles12
Nordness9.9 miles12
Festina10.1 miles11
Calmar11.1 miles12

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 CastaliaAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q1000163The 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 455206. 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.