Octagon Barn, Richland Township

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.

From the record

“The Octagon Barn, Richland Township is a historic building located near Jamaica in Guthrie County, Iowa, United States. Built in 1881, this is the oldest known octagon-shaped barn extant in Iowa.”
Wikipedia article Octagon Barn, Richland Township, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 8 National Register listings published here for Guthrie County · listed in 1986 · category: Building.

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

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. Off IA 141, Jamaica, 50128
When was it listed? June 1986
Category. building
Also known as. Iowa Round Barns: The Sixty Year Experiment TR
Township. Richland township
National Register reference number. 86001433 - 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

8 since 2006

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 8 fires within 5 miles of Octagon Barn, Richland Township between 2006 and 2012, burning about 15 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	7
Equipment and vehicle use	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
20 September 2012	Equipment and vehicle use	2.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
27 June 2011	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	424 NORTH ST., IA
20 May 2007	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
26 March 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	2.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
15 March 2009	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	1.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
23 February 2009	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	3.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
26 November 2010	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	HWY 4 AND HWY 141, IOWA
14 October 2006	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	6.0 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named

Every fire recorded in Guthrie County

Mines and quarries near this property

1 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Octagon Barn, Richland Township: 1 past producer. None of them still produces. What was taken out: 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.

Where	Site	Commodity	Status	Recorded
	Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Guthrie County

Storms near this property

39 since 1999

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Jamaica, the town this property stands in, in 39 storm reports between 1999 and 2025: 13 hail, 12 thunderstorm wind, 10 heavy rain, 4 flash flood. 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	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$150,000	Significant tree damage in town with 50 percent of the trees damaged. Thirty trees were down, two sheds had roof damage and the county mobile EOC was tossed 150 feet into the field.
July 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$75,000	Three to four foot diameter trees were down with roads impassable. A travel trailer was blown approximately 150 feet.
May 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$50,000	no account filed
May 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$20,000	Grain bin and shed damaged by straight line winds with estimated gusts near 70 MPH along Wood Road.
June 2008	Flash Flood	Jamaica	$20,000	Water was over 140th St just east of Wood Road.
July 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$10,000	The emergency manager reported a large 2 foot diameter tree down in Yale and several large branches down in Jamaica. One large branch fell on a truck with minor damage.
June 2015	Flash Flood	Jamaica	$10,000	Emergency Manager reported flooding within the town of Jamaica.
April 2009	Flash Flood	Jamaica	$10,000	Water was reported over the roads.
July 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$10,000	A 4 inch flag pole was bent by the wind. Power was reported out as well.
August 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$10,000	A power pole was partially blown over.
May 2004	Hail	Jamaica	$5,000	no account filed
May 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$5,000	no account filed
July 1999	Hail	Jamaica	$5,000	no account filed
May 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$3,000	A large tree was snapped.
June 2008	Hail	Jamaica	$3,000	Nickel to quarter size hail occurring.
May 2004	Hail	Jamaica	$3,000	no account filed
June 2008	Hail	Jamaica	$2,000	no account filed
June 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	$2,000	no account filed
June 2000	Hail	Jamaica	$1,000	no account filed
April 1999	Hail	Jamaica	$1,000	no account filed
September 2025	Hail	Jamaica	-	Quarter sized hail reported by former NWS employee.
July 2024	Hail	Jamaica	-	Quarter sized hail and winds estimated 30 to 40 mph.
May 2023	Hail	Jamaica	-	Dime to nickel sized hail.
April 2022	Flash Flood	Jamaica	-	Several streets closed in Jamaica and Bagley due to surface flooding. Relayed by the Emergency Manager.
August 2019	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	NWS employee recorded heavy rainfall of 2.29 inches over the last 24 hours.
May 2018	Hail	Jamaica	-	NWS employee reported up to penny size hail lasting about 15 to 30 seconds.
June 2018	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	CoCoRaHS observer recorded heavy rainfall of 2.58 inches over the last 24 hours.
August 2018	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	CoCoRaHS observer recorded heavy rainfall of 2.01 inches over the last 24 hours.
August 2018	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	Coop observer recorded heavy rainfall of 2.01 inches over the last 24 hours.
May 2017	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	Public reported heavy rainfall of 2.00 inches via social media.
October 2017	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	Trained spotter reported heavy rainfall of 3.50 inches.
June 2015	Hail	Jamaica	-	Trained spotter reported quarter sized hail at his home.
June 2015	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	NWS employee reported 6.08 inches of rain since 7am Wednesday.
December 2015	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	NWS Employee reported heavy rainfall of 3.78 inches over the last 48 hours/storm total so far.
October 2014	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	Rainfall of 2.04 inches in the past 24 hours.
August 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	-	Short lived miso-vortex produced crop damage south of Jamaica. Damage was found and documented using high resolution satellite imagery.
April 2009	Heavy Rain	Jamaica	-	Rainfall of 4.66 inches in past 25 hours.
May 2008	Hail	Jamaica	-	Hail was also accompanied by strong winds.
May 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Jamaica	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Guthrie 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

2 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.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Yale High School Gymnasium	3.5 miles	2018
	Springbrook State Park, Civilian Conservation Corps Area	7.3 miles	1990

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 86001433 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Guthrie County	All 8 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.