The Richardton 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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75° on Nov. 15, 1963, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1916. Next is 72° in 1999.
Richardton’s center stands about 2,470 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 2,190 ft to 2,500 ft, a difference of 310 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Young Mans Butte, about 2,710 ft, 3 miles east-southeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Sentinel Butte Formation (siltstone, claystone, sandstone), from the Paleocene, 56 to 66 million years old.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 36×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Siltstone, claystone, sandstone. Age: Paleocene, 56 to 66 million years old. About 24 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 Richardton reaches the Gulf of America by way of Government Creek, the Heart, the Missouri and the Mississippi: about 2,650 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Oahe, Lake Sharpe, Lake Francis Case and Lewis and Clark Lake.
1,170 miles of the trip are on the Mississippi.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Richardton; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Richardton has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 83° in July; winter nights fall to about 7° in January. A normal year brings about 33 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 16 inches of water.
On November 14 Richardton normally reaches 40° and falls to 22°. The record high is 68°, in 1975; the record low −20°, in 1940. The most rain on this date, 1.43 in, fell in 1944.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1916 at Richardton Abbey, here. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
