Mahnomen County Courthouse

Built in 1909 (Neoclassical architecture). Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.

From the record

“The Mahnomen County Courthouse is a Classical Revival brick building at 311 North Main Street in Mahnomen, Minnesota, United States. It was completed in 1909 at a cost of $10,000.”
Wikipedia article Mahnomen County Courthouse, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 3 National Register listings published here for Mahnomen County · listed in 1984 · category: Building · built in 1909, Neoclassical architecture.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

What is counted as historic. The nomination lists 1 building as contributing to the listing.
Address. 311 N. Main St., Mahnomen, 56557
When was it listed? February 1984
Category. building
City. Mahnomen city
When was it built? 1909
Architectural style. Neoclassical architecture
National Register reference number. 84001488 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

27 since 2003

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 27 fires within 5 miles of Mahnomen County Courthouse between 2003 and 2020, burning about 2,420 acres in total. None started naturally. 12 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	12
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	6
Debris and open burning	5
Equipment and vehicle use	3
Recreation and ceremony	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
29 September 2012	Equipment and vehicle use	215 acres	Detroit Lakes Wetland Management District	WOLBECK 2
5 July 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Minnesota Agency	VETERANS 1
5 July 2020	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	under an acre	Minnesota Agency	VETERANS 2
5 May 2019	Missing data/not specified/undetermined	100 acres	Minnesota Department of Natural Resources	not named
5 May 2017	Debris and open burning	1.0 acres	Detroit Lakes Wetland Management District	TURKEY
20 May 2010	Arson/incendiarism	704 acres	Minnesota Department of Natural Resources	not named
15 May 2018	Arson/incendiarism	104 acres	Minnesota Department of Natural Resources	not named
9 April 2015	Recreation and ceremony	2.0 acres	Minnesota Agency	RIVERSIDE

Every fire recorded in Mahnomen County

Storms near this property

59 since 1994

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Mahnomen, the town this property stands in, in 59 storm reports between 1994 and 2025: 32 thunderstorm wind, 17 hail, 5 flash flood, 4 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
July 2013	Tornado (EF2)	Mahnomen	$1,000,000	This tornado continued into Clearwater County, where it lifted at about 0130 am CST, west-northwest of Zerkel. The tornado damaged structures at three locations along the route with long tracks of tree and crop damage evident. Peak winds were estimated at 115 mph.
May 1996	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$100,000	no account filed
June 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$50,000	One airplane hanger was destroyed as well as the airplane inside. Another hanger was severely damaged.
July 1998	Tornado (F0)	Mahnomen	$30,000	A retired farmer was looking out his back door and saw a swirling cloud come down. He headed for the basement and was not hurt. His home lost power and his house and outbuildings were damaged. Witnesses said the tornado was a high-based rope tornado.
June 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$10,000	Windows were broken and a shed door was torn off.
August 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$2,000	Large trees were blown down.
May 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$2,000	A machine shed was blown down in the wind.
August 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$1,000	Trees and powerlines were blown down.
July 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$500	Tree branches were blown down.
July 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	$500	Large tree limbs were blown down.
August 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Wind gust measured by MN dot station MN044.
June 2023	Hail	Mahnomen	-	Valley News Broadcaster reports quarter-sized hail in Mahnomen.
June 2022	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Peak wind was measured at the Minnesota DOT RWIS on Hwy 59.
May 2022	Hail	Mahnomen	-	Received a report of dime to nickel sized hail.
October 2020	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Mahnomen Airport (K3N8) AWOS reported 51 knot or 58.7 mph wind gust.
May 2019	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The Mahnomen AWOS reported the wind gust, associated with a passing thunderstorm. A nearby MNDOT RWIS mesonet sensor also registered a peak wind of 73 mph.
June 2019	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	A gustnado developed on two convergent thunderstorm outflow boundaries and slowly moved across a field. A persistent rotating dust plume was evident.
June 2017	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	A couple of trees were split and broken down across power lines, resulting in local power outages.
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Several large branches were blown down by the strong wind.
July 2016	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The wind gust was measured by a MNDOT RWIS sensor along highway 59.
July 2015	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Trees and power lines were blown down.
July 2015	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Several large trees were blown down.
June 2015	Tornado (EF1)	Mahnomen	-	A tornado tracked across southern portions of the city of Mahnomen, where it ripped roofing off of a maintenance shed, lifted and tipped a parked semi trailer, slid parked vehicles, and destroyed a small wooden shed. Flying debris impacted and damaged additional vehicles and structures near the casino. Peak wind speeds were estimated at 95 mph.
September 2014	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Strong winds broke off a large piece of a tree in Mahnomen, where it fell into a street.
May 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The wind gust was measured by an MNDOT RWIS sensor.
September 2008	Funnel Cloud	Mahnomen	-	A brief cold core funnel was viewed south of Mahnomen. No touchdown was observed.
June 2008	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The wind gust was measured at the MNDOT RWIS site near Highway 59.
July 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The wind gust was measured by a MNDOT RWIS sensor.
June 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The wind gust was measured by a MNDOT RWIS wind sensor on U.S. Highway 59.
June 2006	Hail	Mahnomen	-	The hail covered the ground.
August 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	The MNDOT RWIS site southeast of Mahnomen reported a 58 mph wind gust. A barn nearby was damaged.
September 2005	Flash Flood	Mahnomen	-	Flash flooding occurred along Marsh Creek. Water briefly overtopped county road 130 near Marsh Creek.
June 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Large branches were blown down and power outages were reported.
June 2002	Flash Flood	Mahnomen	-	Highway 200 was flooded by water. Travel in Mahnomen county was not advised, as many other county roads were washed out. Many basements flooded and farm fields were submerged.
June 2002	Flash Flood	Mahnomen	-	Citywide flooding was reported and no travel was advised throughout the county.
June 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	A MN DOT RWIS site measured a 67 mph wind gust.
August 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	A 63 mph wind gust was measured by a Minnesota DOT RWIS site.
August 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	A 60 mph wind gust was measured by a Minnesota DOT RWIS site.
June 1998	Flash Flood	Mahnomen	-	Water was reported to be covering a portion of highway 200 near Mahnomen.
July 1998	Tornado (F0)	Mahnomen	-	A tornado was picked up on video near the Shooting Star Casino in Mahnomen by a parking lot security camera.
May 1994	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	Strong thunderstorm winds downed several large trees and power lines and tore shingles from many roofs of buildings in the Mahnomen area.
May 2022	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
June 2018	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2010	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2007	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2007	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
August 2006	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2006	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
September 2005	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
June 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2004	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 2002	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
August 2001	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
June 2000	Flash Flood	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
August 2000	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
July 1999	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
August 1997	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed
August 1997	Hail	Mahnomen	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Mahnomen County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

2 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Mahnomen City Hall	0.2 miles	1988
	Mahnomen County Fairgrounds Historic District	0.6 miles	1989

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 84001488 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Mahnomen County	All 3 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
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.