MINERVA

NAME: Minerva COUNTY: Marshall ROADS: 2WD GRID: 5 CLIMATE: Hot summer, cold winter BEST TIME TO VISIT: Any season, nicest weather in spring or fall

COMMENTS: Minerva is a generally easy accessible town. Take county road S-62 north off of county road E-29, about halfway between State Center and Marshalltown. There should be a sign for Minerva.Go up S-62 a few miles and the road will dip down into a valley. There is Minerva. While Minerva is not completely dead, it doesn't show up on most atlases. Has a few houses and one church. Look closely enough and you can see where the railroad tracks once ran. REMAINS: A few houses and one church.

Minerva still has a few residents. At one time it had a railroad track running through it, and from a 1928 railroad atlas, Minerva is marked as "Minerva Junction." What went wrong I am not sure about, but perhaps location played a part in this town's unlucky fate. Minerva is in a nice area, and it is too bad that it wasn't a large successful town like some of the neighboring towns. Submitted by: Lara Cady

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