Jamestown, Wisconsin
17 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1900 and the latest in 1984. It stands in Jamestown town. It lies in ZIP code area 53807. The Survey maps it on the Kieler quadrangle. 2,181 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 909 feet above sea level.
Population over time
2 figuresJamestown grew from 2,076 to 2,181 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 | 2,076 | |
| 2020 | 2,181 | +105 (+5%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
9 surveys from 17 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.
- 1900 USGS Lancaster quadrangle1:125000
- 1904 USGS Lancaster quadrangle1:125000
- 1908 USGS Lancaster quadrangle1:125000, 5 printings
- 1959 USGS Dubuque quadrangle1:250000
- 1961 USGS Dubuque quadrangle1:250000
- 1961 USGS Kieler quadrangle1:24000, 3 printings
- 1962 USGS Dubuque quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1976 USGS Dubuque quadrangle1:250000
- 1984 USGS Dubuque North quadrangle1:100000, 2 printings
What happened here
An account from the chapter on Jamestown town. The inset identifies its exact source book and publication year.
The Harney Murder
One of the most terrible crimes in the annals of the county was committed at Fairplay September 25,1865. Dr. Harney, an old resi¬ dent of the place, and a man of good character (except that he was subject to fits of almost insane anger), killed his step-daughter and seriously injured his wife. The daughter of Mrs.
In the county-history sources
3,188 words on this townshipHistory of Grant County Wisconsin, published 1900 names this settlement in its chapter on Jamestown Town. These are the passages that mention it, exactly as the scans read.
A number of miners from Hardscrabble came into the vicinity of Jamestown in 1827. In that year James Boyce discovered mineral near the present village and James Gilmore with his family came and opened a farm in the same neighborhood. Boyce is said to have dis¬ covered the lode by noticing a large growth of mineral weed or Ma¬ sonic weed as he sat down to rest, and digging down five or six feet, he came to a fine body of mineral, which eventually yielded 1,150,000 pounds.
Passage source: History of Grant County Wisconsin, published 1900.
The mines about the future village continued to produce large quantities of mineral. They were called the Menomonee Diggings. An account of the yield of these mines will be found in Part III. In 1837 a post-office called Menomonee was established at the mines of that name. The name was afterward changed to Jamestown, after James Gilmore, the first postmaster. When the county was organized this part was made the precinct of Menomonee. In 1843 it was divided into Jamestown and Fairplay precincts (see map on page 135). In 1839 it had filling the humble office of constable quite an eminent man -
Passage source: History of Grant County Wisconsin, published 1900.
The town of Jamestown was organized in 1849. It is Town 1, Range 2, and contains about thirty-two square miles in the south¬ western corner of the county. As the land is generally quite hilly, little of the town is first-class farming land ; consequently since agriculture has superseded mining as the leading industry of the county Jamestown and its included villages have declined. Its population was in 1850, 666; in 1855, 1,141; in 1860, 1,403; in 1865, 1,362; in 1870, 1,114; in 1875, 1,194; in 1880, 1,215; in 1885, 1,149; in 1890, 961 ; in 1895, 1,002.
Passage source: History of Grant County Wisconsin, published 1900.
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 Jamestown Town - it names this place 11 more 11 times.
Fires near this place
3 since 2019Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 3 fires within 5 miles of Jamestown between 2019 and 2020, burning about 1 acre in total. None started naturally. 1 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 |
|---|---|
| Smoking | 1 |
| Arson/incendiarism | 1 |
| Debris and open burning | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9 May 2020 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 20052 |
| 31 May 2019 | Smoking | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 191476 |
| 16 March 2019 | Arson/incendiarism | 1.0 acres | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | 31938 |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
9 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 9 workings within 5 miles of Jamestown: 4 past producers, 3 producers, 2 unknowns. 3 still produce. What was taken out: Zinc, Stone, Crushed/Broken, Lead. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fairplay Level | Lead, Zinc | Unknown | Galena | |
| Fairplay Level | Lead, Zinc | Unknown | Galena | |
| Fairplay Level Mine | Zinc, Lead | Past Producer | ||
| George Wendtlandt Inc Deiter Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Johns Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Past Producer | ||
| Klar Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Kowalski-Kieler Inc Kieler Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Travis Farm Prospects | Lead, Zinc | Past Producer | ||
| Dugdale Mine | Zinc | Past Producer |
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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Louisburg | 0.7 miles | 17 | |
| Kieler | 2.9 miles | 17 | |
| Dickeyville | 3.6 miles | 17 | |
| Fair Play | 3.7 miles | 17 | |
| Prairie Corners | 3.7 miles | 17 | |
| Georgetown | 4.2 miles | 14 | |
| Sinsinawa | 4.5 miles | 17 | |
| Sandy Hook | 4.5 miles | 17 |
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 Jamestown | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2218008 | 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 1567095. 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.








