The Ashley plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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4° on Nov. 12, 2019, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1931. Next is 6° in 1986.
Ashley’s center stands about 740 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 630 ft to 810 ft, a difference of 180 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Buffalo Knob, about 1,030 ft, 9 miles east-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Osagean Series (limestone), from the Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old.
The section below crosses 5 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 56×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Limestone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 16 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone, siltstone. Age: Carboniferous, 299 to 324 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Limestone, siltstone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Middle Ordovician to Late Ordovician, 445 to 471 million years old. About 0.5 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Ashley reaches the Gulf of America by way of the North Fork Cuivre, the Cuivre and the Mississippi: about 1,280 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Ashley; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Ashley has a hot-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 86° in July; winter nights fall to about 18° in January. A normal year brings about 16 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 41 inches of water.
On November 14 Ashley normally reaches 53° and falls to 34°. The record high is 79°, in 1989; the record low 9°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 2.06 in, fell in 1985.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1931 at Bowling Green 1 E, 7 miles north-northeast, 160 ft higher. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
