Bluffton, Minnesota
9 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1953 and the latest in 1986. It stands in Bluffton City. It lies in ZIP code area 56518. It stands on Bluff Creek. The Survey maps it on the Wadena quadrangle. 210 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,362 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresBluffton grew from 207 to 210 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 | 207 | |
| 2020 | 210 | +3 (+1%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
6 surveys from 9 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.
- 1953 USGS Brainerd quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1957 USGS Brainerd quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Brainerd quadrangle1:250000
- 1965 USGS Brainerd quadrangle1:250000
- 1969 USGS Wadena quadrangle1:24000
- 1986 USGS Battle Lake quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
In the county-history sources
85 words on this townshipThe county-history sources names this settlement in its chapter on Bluffton City. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.
Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.
Read the whole chapter on Bluffton City - it names this place 1 more 1 time.
Fires near this place
26 since 1992Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 26 fires within 5 miles of Bluffton between 1992 and 2019, burning about 363 acres in total. None started naturally. 9 were 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 |
|---|---|
| Arson/incendiarism | 9 |
| Debris and open burning | 7 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 6 |
| Railroad operations and maintenance | 2 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1 |
| Fireworks | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 September 2013 | Arson/incendiarism | 2.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 19 June 1995 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 7 May 1992 | Arson/incendiarism | 2.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 4 May 2019 | Arson/incendiarism | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 28 May 2009 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 10 May 2013 | Equipment and vehicle use | 8.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 8 April 2010 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 8 April 2010 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
1 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 1 working within 5 miles of Bluffton: 1 producer. All of them still produce. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Weniger Pit | Sand and Gravel, Construction | Producer |
Storms near this place
26 since 1996Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Bluffton in 26 storm reports between 1996 and 2024: 10 hail, 10 thunderstorm wind, 5 tornado, 1 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 1998 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | $50,000 | In the Bluffton area, 5 miles of roads had to be reopened because of downed trees. Four barns were blown over and a tree fell on two cars. |
| June 2024 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | Tops of trees snapped in Bluffton, MN. Wind speeds estimated. |
| June 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | Several trees were down across central Bluffton Township. |
| June 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | Peak winds were measured at the Wadena Airport /KADC/. |
| June 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | Large tree branches were snapped, and several small trees were blown down. |
| July 2017 | Hail | Bluffton | - | Quarter to half dollar sized hail fell. |
| July 2016 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | Large tree branches were blown down. |
| July 2014 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | A horse shed was blown over. |
| August 2013 | Tornado (EF0) | Bluffton | - | A tornado briefly touched down 100 yards northwest of the U. S. Highway 10 and highway 75 intersection. The vortex appeared to be roughly one mile to the north-northeast parallel to highway 75. |
| July 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | The wind gust was measured at the Wadena Airport. |
| July 2010 | Tornado (EF0) | Bluffton | - | A brief tornado touchdown was viewed in the open fields about one mile west of the Wadena Airport (KADC). Maximum winds speed were estimated to 80 mph. |
| June 2010 | Tornado (EF1) | Bluffton | - | This tornado tracked briefly to the north-northeast before a wet rear-flank downdraft overtook it as viewed and recorded by multiple storm chase teams. A second and more powerful tornado eventually formed from the parent supercell thunderstorm and impacted the the community of Wadena. Very heavy rains and damaging downdraft winds obscured the overall tornado path. However large tree limbs were broken down and smaller trees were uprooted by the event suggesting peak winds to 90 mph. |
| June 2010 | Tornado (EF4) | Bluffton | - | This tornado touched down in Otter Tail County and tracked northeastward for about 2 miles before crossing into Wadena County just southwest of the Wadena city limits. The tornado developed rapidly into a multi-vortex wedge type tornado as it approached Wadena. The tornado continued in Wadena County another 8 miles and ended about 516 PM CDT. Otter Tail County received mainly extreme tree damage with peak winds estimated at 170 mph. |
| June 2006 | Hail | Bluffton | - | Garden plants were heavily damaged. |
| June 2005 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | A MNDOT RWIS sensor along U.S. Highway 10 measured the wind gust. |
| June 2005 | Tornado (F2) | Bluffton | - | A potato warehouse was completely torn apart by the tornado and debris was scattered several hundred feet downwind (east). Other nearby structures were not seriously damaged. A turkey barn roof was also partially removed. Estimated wind speeds were around 150 mph. |
| July 2000 | Flash Flood | Bluffton | - | Heavy rain washed out several roads and flooded a couple of basements. |
| June 2022 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| April 2020 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| July 2020 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| August 2015 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| August 2013 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| July 2012 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| June 2006 | Thunderstorm Wind | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| July 2000 | Hail | Bluffton | - | no account filed |
| October 1996 | Hail | Bluffton | - | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| West Wind Estates | 0.0 miles | 9 | |
| Topelius (historical) | 2.9 miles | 9 | |
| Deer Creek | 7.1 miles | 9 | |
| New York Mills | 8.3 miles | 9 | |
| Lyman | 9.0 miles | 9 | |
| Heinola | 9.3 miles | 9 | |
| Davies | 10.0 miles | 9 | |
| Leaf City (historical) | 13.1 miles | 9 |
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 Bluffton | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2023585 | 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 640313. 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.





