Florence, Minnesota
8 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1953 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Shelburne Township. It lies in ZIP code area 56170. The Survey maps it on the Ruthton quadrangle. 28 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,732 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresFlorence fell from 39 to 28 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 | 39 | |
| 2020 | 28 | -11 (-28%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
4 surveys from 8 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 Watertown quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1958 USGS Watertown quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1967 USGS Ruthton quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Brookings quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
In the county-history sources
1,535 words on this townshipHistory of Lyon County, published 1884; An Illustrated History of Lyon County, Minnesota, published 1912 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for smaller places. Its township is covered in full.
The chapter on Shelburne Township covers the township.
Read the chapter on Shelburne Township - 1,535 words.
Fires near this place
1 since 2014Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 1 fire within 5 miles of Florence in 2014, burning about 123 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 |
|---|---|
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 April 2014 | Debris and open burning | 123 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Storms near this place
17 since 1993Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Florence in 17 storm reports between 1993 and 2025: 6 hail, 6 thunderstorm wind, 3 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.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| March 2019 | Flood | Florence | $510,000 | U.S. Highway 14 between 300th Avenue and County Road 54 was covered by water. Other flooding resulted in damage to public infrastructure including county and township roads and culverts. The property damage costs include estimates for public property losses. |
| July 2011 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | $10,000 | Thunderstorm winds blew down trees and power lines, and blew over a truck. |
| August 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | - | Thunderstorm wind gusts were measured by a Road Weather Information System sensor near Florence. |
| June 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | - | Occasional thunderstorm wind gusts as high as 65 mph were measured at Minnesota Road Weather Information System site MN160 near Florence. |
| August 2023 | Hail | Florence | - | Pea size hail transitioned into quarter size after initial contact. |
| May 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | - | A thunderstorm wind gust of 80 mph was measured by Minnesota Road Weather Information System site at Florence. |
| May 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | - | A thunderstorm wind gust of 59 mph was measured by the Minnesota Road Weather Information System site near Florence. |
| June 2020 | Hail | Florence | - | Considerable dime size hail fell near Florence. Crop damage is an estimate from insured losses. Information provided by the United States Department of Agriculture. |
| June 2019 | Flood | Florence | - | During crop planting season, prolonged flooding led to the loss of or inability to plant crops across the area. Crop loss estimates provided by the United States Department of Agriculture. |
| July 2019 | Flash Flood | Florence | - | Creeks flooding with water standing in some fields along U.S. Highway 14. |
| September 2019 | Flood | Florence | - | Flooding resulted in crop losses across the area. Crop loss estimates provided by the United States Department of Agriculture. |
| June 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Florence | - | Thunderstorm winds caused tree damage and tossed a farm wagon. |
| July 2002 | Hail | Florence | - | Large hail caused damage to vehicles, windows, and crops, The amount of damage was not known. |
| May 1993 | Tornado (F1) | Florence | - | A tornado tore through the town of Florence and traveled northeast before dissipating. The tornado damaged a local bar, several mobile homes and downed several trees and powerlines. |
| April 2005 | Hail | Florence | - | no account filed |
| June 2005 | Hail | Florence | - | no account filed |
| June 1996 | Hail | Florence | - | 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.
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 Florence | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q1924404 | 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 643753. 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.



