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Arcola, Illinois

13 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1935 and the latest in 1998. It stands in Arcola Township. It lies in ZIP code area 61910. The Survey maps it on the Arcola quadrangle. 2,927 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 677 feet above sea level.

Arcola within Douglas County

On record in Arcola

Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.

On the National Register 1 record

Population over time

2 figures

Arcola grew from 2,916 to 2,927 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
20102,916
20202,927+11 (+0%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

8 surveys from 13 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.

In the county-history sources

3,848 words on this township

History of Douglas County, Illinois, published 1876; Historical and Biographical Record of Douglas County, Illinois, published 1900 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for smaller places. Its township is covered in full.

The chapter on Arcola Township covers the township.

Read the chapter on Arcola Township - 3,848 words.

Fires near this place

1 since 2019

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Arcola in 2019, burning under an acre 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/undetermined1

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
7 January 2019Missing data/not specified/undeterminedunder an acreIllinois Division of Forestry Resources19-006

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

Every fire recorded in Douglas County

Storms near this place

19 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Arcola in 19 storm reports between 1994 and 2024: 10 thunderstorm wind, 6 hail, 1 tornado, 1 flood. The reports record 3 injuries. 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
April 1999Thunderstorm WindArcola3 hurtAs the severe thunderstorm moved across Douglas County, numerous reports of damage were received. In Arcola, several large trees were blown over, some of which caused damage to several tombstones and a storage shed in the cemetery. Several semis were blown over on I-57, injuring three people. A window was blown in on one business in Tuscola. In Villa Grove, the winds blew the roof off of an unoccupied house and destroyed the carport. Numerous trees were blown down countywide.
April 2011Thunderstorm WindArcola$60,000A power pole was blown down and a large shed was destroyed.
April 2020Thunderstorm WindArcola$40,000Numerous semis were blown over on I-57 south of Arcola.
July 2024Thunderstorm WindArcola-Corn was flattened along the Dougles-Coles county line.
June 2023Thunderstorm WindArcola-Several semis were overturned on I-57 south of Arcola.
June 2023Thunderstorm WindArcola-Numerous tree limbs were blown down.
June 2019Thunderstorm WindArcola-A tree was blown down on Main Street in Arcola.
May 2010Flash FloodArcola-Slow moving thunderstorms produced 2.50 inches of rain in one hour across a small part of southern Douglas County. Many roads were impassable, including a 1 mile stretch of I-57 for a short time, between the county line and the town of Arcola.
February 2009FloodArcola-Water flowed across County Road 1150 East just south of IL Route 133 near Arcola.
July 2005Thunderstorm WindArcola-Several trees and power lines blown down.
May 2003Thunderstorm WindArcola-Several trees were blown down.
June 2000Thunderstorm WindArcola-Several power lines and tree limbs were blown down.
April 1994Tornado (F0)Arcola-At 2027 CST, a confirmed tornado touched down 2 SW of Arcola and lifted three minutes later. Three out buildings were blown over.
February 2023HailArcola-no account filed
July 2023HailArcola-no account filed
April 2007HailArcola-no account filed
May 1998HailArcola-no account filed
August 1997HailArcola-no account filed
April 1996HailArcola-no account filed

Every storm recorded in Douglas 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
Galton3.8 miles13
Filson4.0 miles16
Fillmore (historical)4.4 miles13
Chesterville4.7 miles13
Bourbon5.7 miles13
Kemp6.5 miles16
Hillcrest7.1 miles14
Southland Acres7.3 miles14

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 ArcolaAn encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q581328The 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 403594. 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.

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.