RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Minnesota >> Pennington County >> Thief River Falls >> Tidbits & TriviaIndex...

Outdoor Activities ...

As we travel, we like to pursue some of our interests (such as astronomy and bird watching).

When in Thief River Falls, we use the following websites to find information relevant to Thief River Falls and the surrounding area.

  • Weather ...
  • Astronomy & Satellites ...
    • Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
    • To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above, we pass this GPS location for Thief River Falls:
    • 48.113894, -96.176174
    • Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
    • Open the Heavens-Above website centered on Thief River Falls
  • Bird Watching ...
    • We enjoy finding new spots for bird watching and we use the eBird website for local sighting reports and to help identify hotspots.
    • The eBird website is organized on a county-by-county basis. We have selected Pennington County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Pennington County
    • Since Thief River Falls is near Marshall County and also Red Lake County, we have provided a link to their eBird sighting reports:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Marshall County
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Red Lake County
  • Waymarking ...
    • Looking for somewhere out of the ordinary? Find a unique place and want to share it with others? Then it's time to visit Waymarking.com:
    • Open the Waymark.com report for Thief River Falls

Communities Also Named Thief River Falls ...

We found one communities that are also named Thief River Falls.

There is one other community in Minnesota that is also named Thief River Falls.

Beyond Minnesota.

  • Communities Located In Minnesota ...
    • Polk County
      • We found mention of this community, but have little information.<1> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Minnesota community of Thief River Falls [Polk County].

Curious and Interesting Names Near Thief River Falls ...

As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.

  • Carpenters Corner
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the west)
    • Carpenters Corner is located in Pennington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Carpenters Corner
  • Challenger Court
    (Less than 2 miles to the south)
    • Challenger Court is located in Pennington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Challenger Court
  • Dakota Junction
    (3 miles [4.8 km] to the north)
    • Dakota Junction is located in Pennington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dakota Junction
  • Dorothy
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the southwest)
    • Dorothy is located in Red Lake County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Dorothy
  • Hazel
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the southeast)
    • Hazel is located in Pennington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Hazel
  • High Landing
    (17 miles [27.4 km] to the east)
    • High Landing is located in Pennington County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for High Landing
  • Red Lake Falls
    (16 miles [25.7 km] to the south)
  • Rosewood
    (7 miles [11.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Rosewood is located in Marshall County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Rosewood
  • Viking
    (12 miles [19.3 km] to the northwest)
    • Viking is located in Marshall County
    • Jump to our Gazetteer entry for Viking
    • Population from the 2020 Census: 96 people

How Far From Thief River Falls to ...

We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers, Almanacs & Directories that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a city such as Thief River Falls to various places of note, such as the White House.

With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance<3> beginning in Thief River Falls and extending to:

  • Saint Paul, which is the State Capital of Minnesota, lies 262 miles [421.6 km]<3> to the southeast (SE). If you could drive a straight line from Thief River Falls to Saint Paul, with an average speed<4>of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, it would take four to five hours to make the trip. A comfortable walk of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour would take 15 days. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take 11 days.
  • The White House (Washington, DC) is 1,145 miles [1,842.7 km] to the east southeast (ESE). Driving would take over two days, a buggy would take 45 days and walking would take 65 days.
  • The shortest distance<5> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,148 miles [9,894.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<6>
  • The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 6,911 miles [11,122.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<7>
  • The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 4,848 miles [7,802.1 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<8>'

Footnotes ...

<1>If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer as a placeholder. As we find more information about that community, it will be added to our Gazetteer.

Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Rock Creek to see Pete ... Rock Creek is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.

Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.

Also keep in mind that Thief River Falls could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong county. Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
<2>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'point-to-point' distance. A straight line distance ignores obstructions like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line from Point A (ie- Thief River Falls) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<4>While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<5>The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Thief River Falls to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Thief River Falls. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 48.1139, Longitude: -96.1762       In this case, the coordinates for Thief River Falls have been provided by the Geographic Names Information System (GNIS).
<6>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 320.384 degrees.
<7>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 318.944 degrees.
<8>The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 311.451 degrees.