Wells County Courthouse

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.

From the record

“Wells County Courthouse in Fessenden, North Dakota, United States, is a two-story Queen Anne style courthouse built in 1895. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.”
Wikipedia article Wells County Courthouse (North Dakota), CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 8 National Register listings published here for Wells County · listed in 1977 · category: Building.

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. Railway St., N., Fessenden, 58438
When was it listed? September 1977
Category. building
Also known as. North Dakota County Courthouses TR (AD); North Dakota County Courthouses TR
City. Fessenden city
Architectural style. Queen Anne style architecture in the United States
Architect. John W. Ross
National Register reference number. 77001037 - 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

2 since 1999

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 2 fires within 5 miles of Wells County Courthouse between 1999 and 2016, burning about 144 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
Arson/incendiarism	1
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
28 April 2016	Arson/incendiarism	133 acres	Chase Lake National Wildlife Refuge	HOORNAERT WPA
9 December 1999	Debris and open burning	11 acres	Chase Lake Prairie Project Wetland Management District	SCHLINDLER

Every fire recorded in Wells County

Storms near this property

23 since 1997

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Fessenden, the town this property stands in, in 23 storm reports between 1997 and 2025: 15 hail, 6 thunderstorm wind, 1 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
August 2021	Hail	Fessenden	$300,000	Multiple vehicles and roofs were damaged.
June 2025	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	$75,000	Numerous trees near the house and in a nearby shelter belt uprooted or snapped. Small shed demolished. Roof partially torn off of a small horse shed.
June 2010	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	$50,000	Severe thunderstorm wind gusts resulted in extensive tree damage in and around the city of Fessenden. No structural damage was reported.
August 2007	Flash Flood	Fessenden	$40,000	Rainfall of 6.5 inches in a 2 1/2 hour period caused flooding with water rushing over roads.
July 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	-	Storm traveled southeast along Highway 52. Numerous large trees down along its path.
July 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	-	Numerous tree branches and limbs down. A grain bin flatten by the wind. Visibility reduced to several yards in heavy rain driven rain.
July 2000	Tornado (F0)	Fessenden	-	Damage to trees and grain bins.
July 1999	Hail	Fessenden	-	Significant agricultural damage.
September 1997	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	-	numerous large tree branches with isolated trees knocked down.
September 2025	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
July 2023	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
August 2021	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
August 2019	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
August 2019	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
June 2011	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
June 2011	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
August 2007	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
August 2002	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
July 2001	Thunderstorm Wind	Fessenden	-	no account filed
May 2000	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
July 2000	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
July 2000	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed
May 1999	Hail	Fessenden	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Wells 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

4 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.

Property	Distance	Listed
Beiseker Mansion	0.2 miles	1977
Wells County Fairgrounds	0.4 miles	1991
Manfred Historic District	6.6 miles	2017
Vang Evangelical Lutheran Church	6.7 miles	2001

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 77001037 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Wells County	All 8 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.