Pleasant Plain, Iowa
7 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1958 and the latest in 1984. It stands in Penn Township. It lies in ZIP code area 52540. The Survey maps it on the Brighton quadrangle. 84 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 751 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresPleasant Plain fell from 93 to 84 between 2010 and 2020. These are the recorded population figures Wikidata holds for this place, reached through the Geographic Names Information System number this page is keyed on rather than by name, so they belong to this place and not to another of the same name. Most are census counts, but not all are: an early figure may be a founding or settlement estimate, and an estimate published within five years of a census is left out. The change column is computed, and is left blank where more than 20 years separate a figure from the one before it, because a gap that long is not a change between two counts.
| Year | People | Change |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 93 | |
| 2020 | 84 | -9 (-10%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
5 surveys from 7 printed sheetsMatched by testing this settlement's coordinate against the published boundary of every sheet in the United States Geological Survey's historical collection. Each opens the scanned sheet at the Survey.
- 1958 USGS Davenport quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1961 USGS Davenport quadrangle1:250000
- 1962 USGS Davenport quadrangle1:250000
- 1980 USGS Brighton quadrangle1:24000
- 1984 USGS Muscatine quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
Fires near this place
47 since 2008Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 47 fires within 5 miles of Pleasant Plain between 2008 and 2020, burning about 433 acres in total. None started naturally. None was recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Reported cause | Fires |
|---|---|
| Debris and open burning | 29 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 13 |
| Smoking | 2 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 2 |
| Recreation and ceremony | 1 |
The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.
| Date | Cause | Size | Reported by | Name on the report |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4 July 2008 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 29 June 2017 | Smoking | under an acre | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 15 June 2017 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 6 May 2010 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | under an acre | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | 1384 HWY 1 & HWY 78, BRIGHTON, IOWA, IOWA |
| 29 May 2009 | Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 2.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 11 May 2018 | Debris and open burning | 1.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 10 May 2018 | Debris and open burning | 25 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 7 April 2014 | Debris and open burning | 6.0 acres | Iowa Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
4 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 4 workings within 5 miles of Pleasant Plain: 4 past producers. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
| Where | Site | Commodity | Status | Recorded |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anderson Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Germanville Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Old Brighton Quarries | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Slater Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer |
Storms near this place
8 since 1999Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Pleasant Plain in 8 storm reports between 1999 and 2017: 3 hail, 2 tornado, 2 thunderstorm wind, 1 flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.
| When | Event | Place named | Harm | What the report says |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| August 2010 | Flood | Pleasant Plain | $250,000 | no account filed |
| May 2017 | Tornado (EF1) | Pleasant Plain | - | Tornado rated an EF-1 tornado with peak winds 110 mph, a path length of 1.27 miles, and a max width of 25 yards. This rapidly moving tornado moved almost due north damaging farm outbuildings and trees. It moved from Jefferson County into Washington County. This tornado was spotted and reported by local fire department spotters. |
| April 2014 | Hail | Pleasant Plain | - | A trained spotter reported dime sized hail. |
| May 2013 | Thunderstorm Wind | Pleasant Plain | - | A trained spotter reported a carport lifted and tree branches blown down. |
| May 2013 | Thunderstorm Wind | Pleasant Plain | - | A trained spotter reported siding blown off of a house, along with a 4 inch diameter limb blown down. Several other smaller branches blown down, and a barn damaged by a fallen limb. |
| April 2013 | Hail | Pleasant Plain | - | Quarter sized hail fell in Pleasant Plain, IA at 1044 am CDT April 17. |
| April 2001 | Hail | Pleasant Plain | - | Nickel sized hail reported by law enforcement. |
| April 1999 | Tornado (F0) | Pleasant Plain | - | no account filed |
Nearest settlements
The eight closest, with where each one stands in the county. Distances are straight-line, computed from the Geographic Names Information System coordinates.
| Map | Place | Distance | Sheets |
|---|---|---|---|
| East Pleasant Plain | 0.9 miles | 7 | |
| Veo | 2.6 miles | 7 | |
| Perlee | 5.0 miles | 7 | |
| Germanville | 5.6 miles | 7 | |
| Salina | 7.1 miles | 7 | |
| Merrimac | 8.5 miles | 7 | |
| Beckwith | 9.5 miles | 7 | |
| Maharishi Vedic City | 9.7 miles | 7 |
Elsewhere
Matched on this settlement's Geographic Names Information System number rather than its name, so it cannot be a different place of the same name in another state.
| Wikipedia article on Pleasant Plain | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q1926202 | The structured record the population and elevation above come from. Public domain (CC0). |
Provenance
This settlement is recorded in the Geographic Names Information System as feature 460275. The sheet list is computed by point-in-boundary test against the United States Geological Survey's historical topographic inventory. Both are works of the United States government and carry no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.




