Dows Street Historic District

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

From the record

“The Dows Street Historic District is located in Ely, Iowa, United States. The area exemplifies the importance the railroad and transportation in general played in the development of the town's central business district.”
Wikipedia article Dows Street Historic District, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 121 National Register listings published here for Linn County · listed in 2003 · category: District.

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

The listing

Address. Dows St. bet. State and Main Sts., Ely, 52333
When was it listed? November 2003
Category. district
Also known as. Ely, Iowa MPS
National Register reference number. 02001026 - 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.

Fires near this property

56 since 2006

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 56 fires within 5 miles of Dows Street Historic District between 2006 and 2020, burning about 170 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
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	32
Debris and open burning	18
Equipment and vehicle use	3
Smoking	2
Recreation and ceremony	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
30 September 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	2.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
30 September 2007	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
4 August 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
25 August 2013	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
9 July 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
6 July 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
19 July 2012	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
15 July 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named

Every fire recorded in Linn County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 10 workings within 5 miles of Dows Street Historic District: 10 past producers. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken, Sand and Gravel, Construction. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status
Meyer Quarry	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Schultz Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Stahle Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Vanourney Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
W.J. Turecek Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Wray Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Linn County

Storms near this property

17 since 2000

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Ely, the town this property stands in, in 17 storm reports between 2000 and 2024: 8 thunderstorm wind, 5 hail, 2 flash flood, 2 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.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
July 2008	Flash Flood	Ely	$15,000	Heavy rains caused flash flooding in Springville, IA, and Ely, IA during the evening of July 2. In addition, Hart Road, which is about 5 miles south southeast of Prairieburg, was washed out as a result of the flooding rains.
June 2024	Tornado (EF0)	Ely	-	A non-supercell, or landspout tornado touched down in a field about 2 miles north of Ely in Linn County Iowa Tuesday evening. The tornado caused crop damage and moved very slowly to the southeast. The tornado then snapped large tree limbs along Ivanhoe Road, and damaged a power pole cross member. The tornado also lifted some loose asphalt and tossed it a short distance away. The tornado then moved through a grove of trees before lifting in a field. The tornado was rated EF0, with maximum winds estimated around 85 mph. The path width was estimated around 50 yards and the tornado was on the ground for 10 to 15 minutes.
January 2023	Tornado (EFU)	Ely	-	A storm chaser reported a brief tornado. There was no observable damage to assign a rating on the EF scale.
March 2022	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	A trained spotter measured a 52 knot wind gust.
May 2019	Flash Flood	Ely	-	Significant water running over Vista Road in Ely.
April 2017	Hail	Ely	-	A trained spotter reported quarter size hail that lasted for 3 to 4 minutes.
May 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	Local broadcast media reported a swath of trees was blown down in Paris.
July 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	A public report was received of large tree limbs down over a car via KCRG Facebook page.
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	Measured wind gust from an Iowa Mesonet site southeast of Cedar Rapids.
April 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	Trees were reported down near Ely by the Linn county emergency manager.
August 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	A public report estimated thunderstorm wind gusts between 60 and 70 mph. Heavy rain was helping to reduce visibility.
August 2007	Hail	Ely	-	Hail the size of a penny fell near Ely, IA.
July 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	Trees down.
July 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Ely	-	Power lines blown down.
June 2015	Hail	Ely	-	no account filed
May 2011	Hail	Ely	-	no account filed
May 2000	Hail	Ely	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Linn County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

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
Podhajsky-Jansa Farmstead District	2.5 miles	2000
Ely School House	2.9 miles	2006
Jan F. and Antonie Janko Farmstead District	3.2 miles	2000
Joseph and Clara Amanda H. Moorhead House	3.7 miles	2000
Klinsky Farmstead Historic District	5.4 miles	2025
Josias L. and Elizabeth A. Minor Farmstead District	5.5 miles	2000

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 02001026 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Linn County	All 121 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.
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.