Pierceton, Indiana

12 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1950 and the latest in 1994. It stands in Washington Township. It lies in ZIP code area 46562. The Survey maps it on the Pierceton quadrangle. 928 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 922 feet above sea level.

Pierceton within Kosciusko County

On record in Pierceton

Buildings and businesses the archive holds for this place. Each opens its own page, with the source record it came from.

On the National Register 1 record

Pierceton Historic Districtlisted 1992

Population over time

2 figures

Pierceton fell from 1,015 to 928 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	1,015
2020	928	-87 (-9%)

Topographic sheets covering this place

6 surveys from 12 printed sheets

Matched 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.

1950 USGS Pierceton quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
1953 USGS Fort Wayne quadrangle1:250000, 4 printings
1956 USGS Fort Wayne quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
1962 USGS Pierceton quadrangle1:24000, 2 printings
1984 USGS Fort Wayne quadrangle1:100000
1994 USGS Fort Wayne quadrangle1:100000

In the county-history sources

2,539 words on this township

Biographical and Historical Reocrd of Kosciusko County, published 1887 names this settlement in its chapter on Washington Township. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.

The first public house was built upon the Ryerson homestead in 1839, and was for many years in charge of G. W. llyerson. He planted the first orchard in the township in 1841, having raised tlie young trees from seed obtained in Fort Wayne. The first postofhce was also established at his house in 1837, George Kyerson, postmaster; his son Ira, deputy postmaster. The Fort Wayne & Chicago Koad was surveyed in 1837, and passed the house of Mr. llyerson. The mail was carried on horseback between the points named, and the postman's arrival was a great event at that early day. Lewis Keith, one of the founders of Pierceton, was one of the most prominent men of that time, being miller, blacksmith, justice of the peace and general adviser in a legal, social and theological way. In 1853 he erected the first hewed-log house in the township, which was afterward used as a tavern, and stood on lot 1, block 15, in the original town pilat of Pierceton.

Passage source: Biographical and Historical Reocrd of Kosciusko County, published 1887.

The first church society organized was the Methodist, at the house of Robert McNeal in 1838, and for five years religious services were held at his house. In 1851 Mr. McNeal donated a lot, and a frame church was erected by the Methodist society, and until the organization of the Methidist Episcopal church at Pierceton the society was in a prosperous condition. The church was sold in 1872, and the congregation concenti'ated at Pierceton.

Passage source: Biographical and Historical Reocrd of Kosciusko County, published 1887.

The Dunkard church, known as the Washington Congregation, was organized December, 1860, by elders Metzgar, LTllery and Brumbaugh, at the residence of Samuel S. Leedy, with twenty-one members. Services were held at private residences and in school houses until the purchase of the Baptist church in 1866. That society was practically disbanded. The Dunkard members numbered seventy. The church is located two and onehalf miles north of Pierceton. Levi Workman was the first minister chosen from their congregation. This church has a membership of 150, and a fine brick church has recently been erected three and one-half miles northeast of Warsaw. Jesse Calvert, A. H. Puterbaugh, H. II. Brallier and Levi Stone are present pastors.

Passage source: Biographical and Historical Reocrd of Kosciusko County, published 1887.

Machine-read from a century-old scan, so expect the errors a machine makes: misspelled names, dropped words, stray characters.

Read the whole chapter on Washington Township - it names this place 11 more 11 times.

Storms near this place

15 since 1998

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Pierceton in 15 storm reports between 1998 and 2022: 7 thunderstorm wind, 6 hail, 1 tornado, 1 lightning. 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 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	$200,000	A HOUSE WAS FLATTENED BY A LARGE OAK TREE. NO ONE WAS HOME AT THE TIME FORTUNATELY.
July 1998	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	$10,000	TREE FELL ON HOME AND DAMAGED ROOF AND PORCH.
May 2022	Lightning	Pierceton	$5,000	A lightning strike caused a small house fire.
May 2003	Tornado (F1)	Pierceton	$5,000	A mini van driving southbound on a county road, about 6.5 miles south of Pierceton, was picked up by the tornado and deposited 10 to 15 feet west of the road in a field. The driver reported not being able to see out of the van, was pressing the accelerator but not going anywhere. The driver and her granddaughter were unharmed and there was no visible damage to the van. Just north of this location, 2 large trees, each roughly 2 to 3 feet in diameter and 8 to 10 feet of their top trunks removed by the tornado. An RV in the yard received extensive damage from the tornado, with debris striking a car in the yard, breaking out both the front and rear windows. .
July 2014	Hail	Pierceton	-	Amateur radio operators reported quarter size hail west of Pierceton.
July 2014	Hail	Pierceton	-	A trained spotter reported nickel size hail.
May 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	-	A trained spotter reported a six to eight inch diameter, 20 foot long tree branch down across County Road 350 South, near State Route 13.
November 2013	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	-	A state official reported a tree down south of Pierceton.
July 2011	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	-	Law enforcement officials reported a few trees blown in the area of State Route 13 and East County Road 500 South.
May 2003	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	-	Several trees were uprooted 6 miles south of Pierceton, along county roads 550 E and 750 S. One tree fell onto the porch of a home, destroying the porch, but leaving the remainder of the house undamaged. The owners, who were in their basement at the time of the damage, were not injured. The roof was torn off a over 100 year old barn at one residence. Large trees were also uprooted in the general area of the barn damage. A unsecured, unoccupied mobile home was blown approximately 50 yards and destroyed in the area as well.
May 2003	Hail	Pierceton	-	Local residents reported hail up to the size of tennis balls falling with the storm.
July 2002	Thunderstorm Wind	Pierceton	-	Local utility reported trees and power lines down north of Pierceton.
June 2001	Hail	Pierceton	-	no account filed
June 2001	Hail	Pierceton	-	no account filed
May 2000	Hail	Pierceton	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Kosciusko County

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.

Place	Distance	Sheets
Wooster	2.1 miles	12
Bayfield	5.1 miles	14
Lakeview Spring	6.0 miles	14
Barbee	6.3 miles	14
Winona Lake	6.4 miles	12
Highlands Park	6.6 miles	13
Sidney	6.8 miles	10
Stoneburner Landing	7.0 miles	13

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 Pierceton	An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied.
Wikidata item Q2391291	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 441110. 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.