Swatara is an

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

in Macville Township, Aitkin County,

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. Although unincorporated, Swatara has a

post office A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letter (message), letters and parcel (package), parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post o ...

with the ZIP code 55785.

History

The community at one time was served by the

Soo Line Railroad The Soo Line Railroad is one of the primary United States railroad subsidiaries for the CPKC Railway , one of six U.S. Class I railroads, controlled through the Soo Line Corporation. Although it is named for the Minneapolis, St. Paul and Saul ...

and had a railroad station. Swatara and neighboring townships were considered as a potential location of the Minnesota Experimental City that was proposed by scientist

Athelstan Spilhaus Athelstan Frederick Spilhaus (November 25, 1911 – March 30, 1998) was a South African-American geophysicist and oceanographer. Among other accomplishments, Spilhaus is credited with proposing the establishment of Sea Grant Colleges at a meetin ...

in the 1970s. The city was envisioned to house 250,000 people and would use experimental technologies and methodologies such as moving walkways and monorail systems for transportation and a transparent dome encapsulating the city. Despite support from state legislature, and prominent companies such as

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

, and

Honeywell Honeywell International Inc. is an American publicly traded, multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina. It primarily operates in four areas of business: aerospace, building automation, industrial automa ...

, Aitkin County residents pushed back against the proposed city, citing environmental concerns as well as concerns about changing their way of life. The newly formed

Minnesota Pollution Control Agency The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) is a Minnesota state agency that monitors environmental quality, offers technical and financial assistance, and enforces environmental regulations for the State of Minnesota. The MPCA finds and clean ...

voted to abandon the project in 1973.

Geography

Swatara is located along Aitkin County Road 7 (610th Street) near the junction with County Road 29 (Osprey Avenue). Nearby places include Hill City, Remer, and Haypoint. U.S. 169 is nearby. Swatara is located in the northwest part of Aitkin County. It is seven miles southwest of Hill City.

References

Unincorporated communities in Aitkin County, Minnesota Unincorporated communities in Minnesota {{AitkinCountyMN-geo-stub