Photograph of Backbone State Park — Photograph by Kevin Schuchmann, CC BY-SA 3.0. Via Wikimedia Commons.

Backbone State Park Historic District

Built in 1919. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991.

From the record

“Backbone State Park is Iowa's oldest state park, dedicated in 1920. Located in the valley of the Maquoketa River, it is approximately three miles (5 km) south of Strawberry Point in Delaware County.”
Wikipedia article Backbone State Park, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 14 National Register listings published here for Delaware County · listed in 1991 · category: District · built in 1919.

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

The listing

Address. Jct. of Co. Rds. C57 and W69, Strawberry Point, 52076
When was it listed? December 1991
Category. district
Also known as. CCC Properties in Iowa State Parks MPS
Township. Richland township
When was it built? 1919
National Register reference number. 91001842 - 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

3 since 2011

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 3 fires within 5 miles of Backbone State Park Historic District between 2011 and 2015, burning about 66 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	2
Debris and open burning	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
1 April 2015	Debris and open burning	25 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	not named
31 March 2011	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	205 CONCORD ST. LAMONT, IA 50650, IA
27 March 2011	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	40 acres	Iowa Department of Natural Resources	37383 ACORN RD., STRAWBERRY POINT, IA 52076, IA

Every fire recorded in Delaware County

Mines and quarries near this property

10 of 17 shown

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 17 workings within 5 miles of Backbone State Park Historic District: 11 past producers, 5 producers, 1 unknown. 5 still produce. 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
Hoth Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Joy Springs Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Ward Farm Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Burrack Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Forrestville Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Harold Hartman Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Producer
Joy Springs Quarry	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Delaware 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

3 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
Backbone State Park, Picnicking, Hiking & Camping Area (Area B)	0.7 miles	1990
Backbone State Park, Richmond Springs (Area C)	1.2 miles	1990
Backbone State Park, Cabin-Bathing Area (Area A)	1.4 miles	1990

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 91001842 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Delaware County	All 14 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.