Polo, Missouri
14 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1924 and the latest in 1986. It stands in Grant Township. It lies in ZIP code area 64671. The Survey maps it on the Polo quadrangle. 509 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,014 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresPolo fell from 575 to 509 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 | 575 | |
| 2020 | 509 | -66 (-11%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
7 surveys from 14 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.
- 1924 USGS Polo quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1950 USGS Kansas City quadrangle1:250000
- 1954 USGS Kansas City quadrangle1:250000
- 1956 USGS Kansas City quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
- 1960 USGS Kansas City quadrangle1:250000, 3 printings
- 1984 USGS Polo quadrangle1:24000
- 1986 USGS Saint Joseph quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
8 since 1995Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 8 fires within 5 miles of Polo between 1995 and 2018, burning about 55 acres in total. None 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 |
|---|---|
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 5 |
| Debris and open burning | 2 |
| 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 September 1999 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 1.0 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 8 April 1995 | Debris and open burning | 3.0 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 3 March 2018 | Debris and open burning | 20 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | 177335-08922-03032018-1214 |
| 17 March 1995 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 3.0 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 12 March 1995 | Arson/incendiarism | 1.0 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 26 November 1999 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 10 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 2 November 1999 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2.0 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
| 16 November 1999 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 15 acres | Missouri Department of Conservation | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
2 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Polo: 1 past producer, 1 producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Campbell Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Everett Qsy # 6 | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer |
Storms near this place
32 since 1995Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Polo in 32 storm reports between 1995 and 2025: 14 thunderstorm wind, 11 hail, 4 flash flood, 2 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 1998 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | $70,000 | A storm survey team from the National Weather Service Office in Pleasant Hill, MO reported straight line wind damage in Polo and Braymer. Several sheds were damaged in Polo. On County Road KK along the southeast side of Braymer, a doublewide mobile home was destroyed. Diagonally across the street from the destroyed mobile home, a barn, a chicken house and a grain bin were destroyed on a farmsted. A horse on this property was killed by flying debris. |
| May 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | $2,000 | Power lines were downed with power outages reported across the county. |
| November 2005 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | $1,000 | Plate glass window blown out of business. |
| May 2004 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | $1,000 | Minor damage to a building and trees down. |
| May 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | Downed wires and power outages near Route 116 west of Polo. |
| March 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | Downed tree and wires near Holstein Road. |
| June 2023 | Hail | Polo | - | Quarter sized hail was reported in Polo. |
| June 2021 | Flood | Polo | - | Several roads in and around Polo were flooded, and a few vehicles stalled under the railroad viaduct in Polo. |
| June 2021 | Flash Flood | Polo | - | The sewage treatment plant in Polo was flooded. |
| July 2020 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | A large tree was down in the city of Polo with several other large limbs down across the town. |
| October 2018 | Tornado (EF0) | Polo | - | This is a continuation of a tornado that formed in northern Ray County and crossed Price Road into Caldwell County. The tornado did some minor tree damage along its path. |
| May 2015 | Tornado (EF0) | Polo | - | This is a continuation of the tornado that formed in Ray County and moved into Caldwell County. A supercell that produced a tornado near Sibley formed a second tornado in northern Ray County, and did some EF-1 damage to some outbuildings before crossing into Caldwell County. The tornado dissipated just north of the county line about a couple miles east of Polo. |
| May 2010 | Flash Flood | Polo | - | Flash flooding was observed around the railroad bridge. |
| August 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | A thunderstorm wind gust was estimated up to 65 mph. |
| June 2009 | Flash Flood | Polo | - | Water was reported to be 2 feet deep on Highway 13. |
| June 2009 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | Thunderstorm winds gusts were reported up to 60 mph. Six to eight inch tree limbs were blown down. |
| May 2009 | Flash Flood | Polo | - | Highway 13 was closed south of Polo, due to 5 to 6 feet of water over railroad underpass. |
| June 2001 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | Law enforcement reported power lines down. |
| July 1995 | Hail | Polo | - | A severe thunderstorm produced hail an inch and a half in diameter nine miles west of Polo. |
| June 2018 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| July 2018 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| June 2010 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| June 2009 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| May 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | no account filed |
| May 2003 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| July 2001 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | no account filed |
| June 2001 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| May 2000 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | no account filed |
| May 2000 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| October 2000 | Hail | Polo | - | no account filed |
| July 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Polo | - | no account filed |
| July 1999 | Hail | Polo | - | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prairie Ridge | 4.9 miles | 14 | |
| Cowgill | 6.1 miles | 11 | |
| Kingston | 6.3 miles | 14 | |
| Mirabile | 6.9 miles | 14 | |
| Bonanza | 7.3 miles | 11 | |
| Shoal | 9.0 miles | 11 | |
| Easterville | 9.1 miles | 11 | |
| Far West | 9.5 miles | 14 |
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 Polo | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q954056 | 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 724721. 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.






