Beaver Bay, Minnesota
11 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1954 and the latest in 1982. It stands in Beaver Bay City. It lies in ZIP code area 55601. It stands on Beaver River. The Survey maps it on the Silver Bay quadrangle. 120 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 702 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresBeaver Bay fell from 181 to 120 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.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 181 | |
| 2020 | 120 | -61 (-34%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
7 surveys from 11 printed sheetsMatched 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.
- 1954 USGS Silver Bay quadrangle1:62500, 3 printings
- 1954 USGS Two Harbors quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1957 USGS Two Harbors quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Two Harbors quadrangle1:250000
- 1964 USGS Two Harbors quadrangle1:250000
- 1976 USGS Two Harbors quadrangle1:100000
- 1982 USGS Silver Bay quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
22 since 1992Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 22 fires within 5 miles of Beaver Bay between 1992 and 2018, burning about 60 acres in total. 1 started naturally. 1 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 |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 8 |
| Railroad operations and maintenance | 6 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 2 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 2 |
| Natural | 1 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2 August 2012 | Natural | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 13 August 2007 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 12 August 2007 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 6 May 2000 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 6 May 1997 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 1.5 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 6 May 1993 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 8.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 6 May 1992 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 28 May 2013 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 9.6 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
5 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 5 workings within 5 miles of Beaver Bay: 3 producers, 2 plants. All of them still produce. What was taken out: Iron, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Thompson Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer | ||
| E.W. Davis Works | Iron | Producer | ||
| Northshore I Pellet Plant | Iron | Plant | ||
| Northshore Mining Ii Pellet Plant | Iron | Plant | ||
| Silver Bay Plant | Iron | Producer |
Storms near this place
5 since 1998Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Beaver Bay in 5 storm reports between 1998 and 2025: 3 hail, 1 flash flood, 1 thunderstorm wind. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | East Beaver Bay | - | Trees were reported down along and across Highway 61 between Ionas Beach and East Beaver Bay along with trees down in Silver Bay. |
| August 2016 | Flash Flood | East Beaver Bay | - | Thunderstorms brought heavy rain to parts of the North Shore. There was flooding over Highway 61 between mile markers 53 and 54. |
| July 2012 | Hail | Beaver Bay | - | Lots of dime-size hail fell, with a few golf ball size hailstones mixed in. Heavy rain amounted to 0.80 inches. |
| July 2003 | Hail | Beaver Bay | - | no account filed |
| August 1998 | Hail | Beaver Bay | - | no account filed |
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 | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| East Beaver Bay | 1.2 miles | 11 | |
| Silver Bay | 3.4 miles | 11 | |
| Lax Lake | 6.0 miles | 11 | |
| Illgen City | 8.5 miles | 11 | |
| Finland | 11.2 miles | 11 | |
| Kennedy Landing | 11.6 miles | 11 | |
| Beaver Crossing | 11.9 miles | 11 | |
| Bell Harbor | 12.5 miles | 11 |
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 Beaver Bay | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q813475 | The 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 655294. 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.






