Brocton, Illinois
15 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1946 and the latest in 1998. It stands in Embarrass Township. It lies in ZIP code area 61917. The Survey maps it on the Brocton quadrangle. 273 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 663 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresBrocton fell from 322 to 273 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 | 322 | |
| 2020 | 273 | -49 (-15%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
9 surveys from 15 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.
- 1946 USGS Kansas quadrangle1:62500
- 1949 USGS Kansas quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1953 USGS Indianapolis quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
- 1956 USGS Indianapolis quadrangle1:250000
- 1957 USGS Indianapolis quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1962 USGS Indianapolis quadrangle1:250000
- 1982 USGS Brocton quadrangle1:24000
- 1986 USGS Paris quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
- 1998 USGS Brocton quadrangle1:24000
In the county-history sources
8,140 words on this townshipThe History of Edgar County, Illinois, Containing a History of the County--its Cities, Towns, &c. : Directory of Its Tax-payers; War Records of Its Volunteers in the Late Rebellion Portraits of Early Settlers and Prominent Men; General and Local Statistics; Map of Edgar County; History of Illinois, Illustrated; History of the Northwest, Illustrated; Constitution of the United States, Miscellaneous Matters, &c., &c. Illustrated, published 1879 has no passage naming this settlement, which was common for smaller places. Its township is covered in full.
The chapter on Embarrass Township covers the township.
Read the chapter on Embarrass Township - 8,140 words.
Storms near this place
16 since 1996Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Brocton in 16 storm reports between 1996 and 2025: 9 thunderstorm wind, 5 hail, 1 tornado, 1 flash 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| July 2008 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | $30,000 | Several trees were blown down. Falling tree limbs cuased damage to a few vehicles in Brocton. |
| July 2016 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | $20,000 | A TV antenna tower was blown down. Roof shingles were stripped off a building and several tree branches were blown down. |
| March 2025 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | A tree was blown down. |
| March 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | Powerlines were blown onto a motor home and pickup truck along Route 49 south of US-36. |
| June 2023 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | Trees were blown down. |
| March 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | An anchored swing set was blown about 50ft. |
| August 2022 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | Numerous tree branches were blown down. |
| May 2016 | Hail | Brocton | - | The hailstones were oblong shaped and jagged. |
| June 2010 | Flash Flood | Brocton | - | Nearly 2.00 of rain in one hour produced flash flooding in parts of east central Edgar County from the late afternoon into early evening. Numerous streets were impassable in the city of Paris, as were rural roads west of the city. |
| June 1999 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | As storms moved across Edgar County, numerous tree limbs were blown down. One tree was blown down 5 miles south of Paris on Route 1 and another one was blown down on US Route 150 just east of Paris. No injuries were reported. |
| April 1998 | Tornado (F0) | Brocton | - | A tornado briefly touched down 4 miles north of Brocton. A shed was destroyed and 7 utility poles were either bent or snapped off completely. No injuries were reported and no damage estimate was available. |
| August 2014 | Hail | Brocton | - | no account filed |
| August 2014 | Hail | Brocton | - | no account filed |
| May 2014 | Hail | Brocton | - | no account filed |
| May 2005 | Hail | Brocton | - | no account filed |
| April 1996 | Thunderstorm Wind | Brocton | - | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Catfish (historical) | 3.0 miles | 15 | |
| Borton | 4.1 miles | 15 | |
| Isabel | 4.3 miles | 15 | |
| Hughes | 4.6 miles | 14 | |
| New Athens (historical) | 4.8 miles | 15 | |
| Melwood | 4.8 miles | 14 | |
| McCown | 5.8 miles | 14 | |
| Redmon | 6.1 miles | 15 |
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 Brocton | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2077348 | 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 404897. 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.
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.








