Foster, Nebraska
9 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1955 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Foster precinct. It lies in ZIP code area 68765. The Survey maps it on the Foster quadrangle. 42 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 1,640 feet above sea level.
On record in Foster
Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.
On the National Register 1 record
Willow Creek Bridgelisted 1992
Population over time
2 figuresFoster fell from 51 to 42 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 | 51 | |
| 2020 | 42 | -9 (-18%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
5 surveys from 9 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.
- 1955 USGS Sioux City quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
- 1958 USGS Sioux City quadrangle1:250000
- 1959 USGS Sioux City quadrangle1:250000
- 1963 USGS Foster quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Norfolk quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
12 since 2008Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 12 fires within 5 miles of Foster between 2008 and 2020, burning about 226 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 | 6 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 2 |
| Smoking | 1 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 September 2020 | Smoking | 1.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 3 May 2013 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 7 April 2014 | Equipment and vehicle use | 2.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 23 April 2014 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | 10 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 23 April 2008 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 21 April 2014 | Debris and open burning | 4.0 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 9 March 2015 | Power generation/transmission/distribution | under an acre | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
| 20 December 2017 | Debris and open burning | 50 acres | Nebraska Forest Service | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Storms near this place
14 since 2004Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Foster in 14 storm reports between 2004 and 2025: 9 hail, 4 thunderstorm wind, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2025 | Hail | Foster | - | Trained spotter report of hail measured up to 1 inch in diameter. |
| June 2024 | Hail | Foster | - | The office received a report from a trained sporter of hail ranging from penny to quarter sized. |
| July 2023 | Hail | Foster | - | Public reported 1-inch hail. |
| April 2023 | Hail | Foster | - | Public reported 1-inch hail. |
| July 2021 | Thunderstorm Wind | Foster | - | Personal weather station measured a peak wind gust of 58 mph. |
| June 2017 | Tornado (EF0) | Foster | - | Brief Touchdown. |
| June 2014 | Thunderstorm Wind | Foster | - | Out buildings were destroyed due to the strong wind gusts. |
| August 2011 | Thunderstorm Wind | Foster | - | A spotter estimated thunderstorm winds reached around 60 mph. |
| August 2010 | Thunderstorm Wind | Foster | - | The public estimated a thunderstorm wind gust of around 60 mph. |
| July 2015 | Hail | Foster | - | no account filed |
| May 2011 | Hail | Foster | - | no account filed |
| August 2009 | Hail | Foster | - | no account filed |
| July 2007 | Hail | Foster | - | no account filed |
| September 2004 | Hail | Foster | - | 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 Foster | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2672745 | 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 829362. 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.




