Williams, Minnesota
8 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1918 and the latest in 1976. It stands in Williams City. It lies in ZIP code area 56686. The Survey maps it on the Williams quadrangle. 157 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,152 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresWilliams fell from 191 to 157 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 | 191 | |
| 2020 | 157 | -34 (-18%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
6 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.
- 1918 USGS Williams quadrangle1:62500
- 1954 USGS Roseau quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1957 USGS Roseau quadrangle1:250000
- 1958 USGS Roseau quadrangle1:250000
- 1967 USGS Williams quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
- 1976 USGS Baudette quadrangle1:100000
Fires near this place
92 since 1993Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 92 fires within 5 miles of Williams between 1993 and 2020, burning about 2,184 acres in total. None started naturally. 28 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 |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 34 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 28 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 11 |
| Railroad operations and maintenance | 10 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 6 |
| Smoking | 1 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 1 |
| Misuse of fire by a minor | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 September 2018 | Debris and open burning | 2.4 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 8 August 2003 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 4 August 2010 | Railroad operations and maintenance | 1.7 acres | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 30 August 2008 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 30 August 2006 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 22 August 2006 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 21 August 2006 | Railroad operations and maintenance | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 23 July 2006 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Minnesota Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
32 since 1998Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Williams in 32 storm reports between 1998 and 2023: 21 hail, 5 thunderstorm wind, 2 tornado, 2 funnel cloud. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2001 | Flash Flood | Williams | $10,000 | Basement flooding was reported along with water pooling in yards. |
| September 2002 | Thunderstorm Wind | Williams | $5,000 | Many large trees were snapped off or uprooted near Norris Camp. |
| July 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Williams | $5,000 | Trees were blown down, some falling on cars and power lines. |
| March 2009 | Flood | Williams | $5,000 | no account filed |
| May 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Williams | - | Delayed report. Several trees with 6 to 8-inch diameter branches down and small piles of hail were still present in the morning after. Time estimated off radar. |
| July 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Williams | - | Peak wind was measured by an NDAWN station at the 10 meter height. |
| July 2019 | Funnel Cloud | Williams | - | A thunderstorm with a wall cloud and intermittent funnel tracked east-northeast across Zippel Bay. Due to the high cloud base, the funnel was visible over a wide area. |
| September 2018 | Hail | Williams | - | The hail was mostly dime to nickel size. |
| August 2015 | Thunderstorm Wind | Williams | - | A pine tree was blown down onto a house. |
| September 2013 | Hail | Williams | - | A wall cloud was also reported. |
| September 2013 | Hail | Williams | - | Ping pong ball sized hail fell, knocking branches off some trees. |
| September 2013 | Tornado (EF0) | Williams | - | This tornado tracked intermittently with damage mainly to occasional broken tree branches. Peak winds estimated to 70 mph. |
| June 2008 | Funnel Cloud | Williams | - | A persistent wall cloud produced a brief funnel over the open waters of the lake of the woods to the northeast of zippel bay. |
| August 2006 | Tornado (F0) | Williams | - | This tornado originated 1 mile north of Swift in Roseau County at 1822 CST. Peak winds were estimated at 65 mph. |
| July 2022 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| May 2011 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| June 2008 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| August 2006 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| June 2005 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| June 2004 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2004 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2003 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| September 2003 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2002 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2001 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2000 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2000 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 2000 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| June 1999 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| September 1999 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| July 1998 | Hail | Williams | - | no account filed |
| June 1998 | Hail | Williams | - | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Graceton | 6.6 miles | 8 | |
| Faunce | 12.1 miles | 8 | |
| Pitt | 12.1 miles | 8 | |
| Birch Beach | 12.8 miles | 7 | |
| Hackett | 13.0 miles | 7 | |
| Arnesén | 14.3 miles | 9 | |
| Long Point | 14.4 miles | 7 | |
| Wheelers Point | 14.5 miles | 7 |
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 Williams | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q963315 | 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 654165. 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.





