Le Roy Township is a

township A township is a form of human settlement or administrative subdivision. Its exact definition varies among countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, this tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Canad ...

Mower County Mower County () is a county in the U.S. state of Minnesota. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,029. The county seat is Austin. Mower County comprises the Austin Micropolitan Statistical Area and is included in the Rochester-Austin ...

Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...

, United States. The population was 396 at the 2000 census. The

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

in the township with the largest

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

is Le Roy with 925 people. The township is also home to

Lake Louise State Park Lake Louise State Park is a Minnesota state park just north of the Iowa border near the small town of Le Roy in Mower County, Minnesota, directly south of Rochester. It has a 25 acre man-made lake and of mixed prairie and deciduous forest. ...

, the only

Minnesota State Park There are 64 state parks, nine state recreation areas, nine state waysides, and 23 state trails in the Minnesota state park system, totaling approximately . A Minnesota state park is an area of land in the U.S. state of Minnesota preserved ...

in Mower County and the southernmost in the state. The Old Village of Le Roy was the first area in the township to be

settled A settler or a colonist is a person who establishes or joins a permanent presence that is separate to existing communities. The entity that a settler establishes is a settlement. A settler is called a pioneer if they are among the first settli ...

History

Le Roy Township was organized on May 11, 1858 at a meeting held at the house of Daniel Caswell. The township was named after Caswell's native home in

Le Roy, New York Le Roy, or more commonly LeRoy, is a town in Genesee County, New York, United States. The population was 7,662 at the time of the 2020 census. The town is named after one of the original land owners, Herman Le Roy. The town lies in eastern Gen ...

/ Le Roy was a small village on the banks of the Little Iowa River, one of the small

stream A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a strea ...

s that eventually become the

Upper Iowa River The Upper Iowa River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map, accessed May 13, 2011 tributary of the Mississippi River in the upper Midwest of the United States. Its headwaters rise ...

.History of Le Roy
It was located in section 28 of Le Roy Township. Henry Edmonds, the first citizen of "Old Town," erected a

mill Mill may refer to: Science and technology * Factory * Mill (grinding) * Milling (machining) * Millwork * Paper mill * Steel mill, a factory for the manufacture of steel * Sugarcane mill * Textile mill * List of types of mill * Mill, the arithmetic ...

on the river in 1855. The small village was

platted In the United States, a plat ( or ) (plan) is a cadastral map, drawn to scale, showing the divisions of a piece of land. United States General Land Office surveyors drafted township plats of Public Lands Surveys to show the distance and bear ...

on April 24, 1857. When the

railroad Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport using wheeled vehicles running in railway track, tracks, which usually consist of two parallel steel railway track, rails. Rail transport is one of the two primary means of ...

was being built about one mile to the southeast in the area that is the modern-day town of Le Roy, some of the settlers starting making plans. When the first

train A train (from Old French , from Latin">-4; we might wonder whether there's a point at which it's appropriate to talk of the beginnings of French, that is, when it wa ... , from Latin , "to pull, to draw") is a series of connected vehicles th ...

rolled into "Le Roy Station" in August 1867, it dropped off building supplies for the new town. The new town was platted in September 1867 and some of the businesses and houses of Old Le Roy were moved intact to the new town.

Geography

According to the

United States Census Bureau The United States Census Bureau, officially the Bureau of the Census, is a principal agency of the Federal statistical system, U.S. federal statistical system, responsible for producing data about the American people and American economy, econ ...

, the township has a total area of , of which is land and (0.08%) is water. The small streams of the southeastern part of the township are tributaries of the

, which eventually winds its way to the

Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the main stem, primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States. It is the second-longest river in the United States, behind only the Missouri River, Missouri. From its traditional source of Lake Ita ...

Demographics

As of the

census A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given Statistical population, population, usually displayed in the form of stati ...

of 2000, there were 396 people, 142 households, and 111 families residing in the township. The population density was . There were 149 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the township was 99.49%

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

, and 0.51% from two or more races. There were 142 households, out of which 39.4% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 73.9% were

married couples Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

living together, 0.7% had a female householder with no husband present, and 21.8% were non-families. 19.0% of all households were made up of individuals, and 7.0% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.79 and the average family size was 3.22. In the township the population was spread out, with 29.8% under the age of 18, 6.1% from 18 to 24, 28.3% from 25 to 44, 23.7% from 45 to 64, and 12.1% who were 65 years of age or older. The median age was 38 years. For every 100 females, there were 118.8 males. For every 100 females age 18 and over, there were 109.0 males. The median income for a household in the township was $37,857, and the median income for a family was $42,292. Males had a median income of $29,028 versus $21,875 for females. The

per capita income Per capita income (PCI) or average income measures the average income earned per person in a given area (city, region, country, etc.) in a specified year. In many countries, per capita income is determined using regular population surveys, such ...

for the township was $24,077. About 1.9% of families and 3.2% of the population were below the

poverty line The poverty threshold, poverty limit, poverty line, or breadline is the minimum level of income deemed adequate in a particular country. The poverty line is usually calculated by estimating the total cost of one year's worth of necessities for ...

, including none of those under age 18 and 11.0% of those age 65 or over.

Cemeteries

*Bethany Lutheran Cemetery is located in the southeast corner of the southwest quadrant of section 11 of the township. Its oldest known

burial Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...

dates to 1879. *Le Roy Lutheran Cemetery is located in section 28 of the township. *St. Patrick Catholic Cemetery is adjoined to Le Roy Lutheran Cemetery.

History

Geography

Demographics

Cemeteries

References

Further reading