Plain, Wisconsin
11 topographic sheets cover this place, the earliest surveyed in 1905 and the latest in 1985. It stands in Franklin town. It lies in ZIP code area 53577. It lies near Sugar Grove Valley. The Survey maps it on the Plain quadrangle. 749 people lived here at the 2020 count. It stands 810 feet above sea level.
On record in Plain
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
Salem Evangelical Churchlisted 1988
Population over time
2 figuresPlain fell from 773 to 749 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 | 773 | |
| 2020 | 749 | -24 (-3%) |
Topographic sheets covering this place
8 surveys from 11 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.
- 1905 USGS Richland Center quadrangle1:125000, 2 printings
- 1958 USGS La Crosse quadrangle1:250000, 2 printings
- 1960 USGS Plain quadrangle1:62500, 2 printings
- 1961 USGS La Crosse quadrangle1:250000
- 1965 USGS La Crosse quadrangle1:250000
- 1976 USGS La Crosse quadrangle1:250000
- 1983 USGS Plain quadrangle1:24000
- 1985 USGS Richland Center quadrangle1:100000
Fires near this place
63 since 1992Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 63 fires within 5 miles of Plain between 1992 and 2019, burning about 96 acres in total. 2 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 | 38 |
| Equipment and vehicle use | 10 |
| Missing data/not specified/undetermined | 6 |
| Smoking | 4 |
| Natural | 2 |
| Power generation/transmission/distribution | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15 August 2015 | Equipment and vehicle use | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | VALLEY VIEW FIRE |
| 4 July 1992 | Smoking | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 24 July 2012 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | FEINER PASTURE |
| 28 June 2009 | Debris and open burning | 1.5 acres | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | WILSON CREEK FIRE |
| 17 June 2003 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 1 May 2018 | Equipment and vehicle use | 3.0 acres | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | MARKLEIN RD |
| 9 April 2005 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | not named |
| 7 April 1998 | Debris and open burning | under an acre | Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources | not named |
Settlements close enough to share some of these fires:
Mines and quarries near this place
2 within 5 milesRegional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 2 workings within 5 miles of Plain: 1 unknown, 1 producer. 1 still produces. What was taken out: Stone, 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Alt Quarry | Stone, Crushed/Broken | Producer | ||
| Lins Quarry | Stone | Unknown |
Storms near this place
11 since 1998Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Plain in 11 storm reports between 1998 and 2016: 5 hail, 4 thunderstorm wind, 1 flash flood, 1 tornado. 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 2004 | Flash Flood | Plain | $150,000 | no account filed |
| May 2013 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plain | $20,000 | The Sauk County 911 center received a report of damage to a building in Plain due to thunderstorm wind gusts that were estimated at 65 mph (56 knots). |
| July 1998 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plain | $2,000 | no account filed |
| July 2003 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plain | $1,000 | no account filed |
| June 2008 | Tornado (EF0) | Plain | - | This tornado lasted less than a minute and resulted in only some minor tree damage. The starting and ending locations, with respect to lat/long pairs of numbers, were 43.26431/-90.07778 and 43.26410/-90.07033, respectively. DI #27 (TH), DOD2. Maximum wind speed about 80 mph. Average path width was about 15 yards. |
| September 2016 | Hail | Plain | - | no account filed |
| June 2011 | Hail | Plain | - | no account filed |
| June 2008 | Hail | Plain | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Hail | Plain | - | no account filed |
| June 2003 | Thunderstorm Wind | Plain | - | no account filed |
| August 2002 | Hail | 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Loreta | 5.7 miles | 11 | |
| Black Hawk | 6.2 miles | 19 | |
| Leland | 6.4 miles | 19 | |
| Spring Green | 7.3 miles | 11 | |
| Oak Ridge Estates | 7.8 miles | 11 | |
| Witwen | 8.3 miles | 19 | |
| Denzer | 9.5 miles | 19 | |
| Sandusky | 9.9 miles | 11 |
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 Plain | An encyclopaedic summary. Its text is share-alike, so it is linked here rather than copied. |
| Wikidata item Q2690737 | 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 1571574. 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.







