Rock Falls, Illinois

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 within a mile 3 records

The National Register names another town for these. They stand within one mile of this settlement's coordinate.

• Col. Edward N. Kirk Houselisted 1980 · 0.4 miles away
• First Congregational Church of Sterlinglisted 1995 · 0.7 miles away
• Sterling Masonic Templelisted 1996 · 0.7 miles away

Rock Falls fell from 9,266 to 8,789 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.

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.

• 1930 USGS Woodsung quadrangle1:48000
• 1946 USGS Sterling quadrangle1:62500
• 1948 USGS Sterling quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
• 1958 USGS Aurora quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
• 1961 USGS Aurora quadrangle1:250000
• 1983 USGS Sterling quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
• 1985 USGS Dixon quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings

An account from the chapter on Coloma township. The inset identifies its exact source book and publication year.

Portrait and Biographical Album of Whiteside County, Illinois : Containing Full-page Portraits and Biographies of All the Governors of Illinois, and of the Presidents of the United States, published 1885 names this settlement in its chapter on Coloma Township. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 5 fires within 5 miles of Rock Falls between 2018 and 2019, burning about 4 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.

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:

• Yeoward Addition
• Como
• Douglas Park
• Sterling
• Galt
• Grimes Addition

Every fire recorded in Whiteside County

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 9 workings within 5 miles of Rock Falls: 6 past producers, 2 plants, 1 producer. 3 still produce. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, 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.

Every working recorded in Whiteside County

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Rock Falls in 29 storm reports between 1995 and 2024: 15 thunderstorm wind, 10 hail, 2 flash flood, 1 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.

Every storm recorded in Whiteside County

The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.

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.

This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 416812. 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.