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History · La Prairie

La Prairie’s post office opened in 1863, and 47% of its homes were built before 1940

Below: maps from 1948 on and the census since 1880.

1863first post office
0on the National Register
47%homes built before 1940
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Quick answers

How La Prairie began

When was La Prairie founded?

1863

The La Prairie post office opened in 1863, the earliest record of the town by name. Wikidata gives 1869. Another post office, Pitman (1856), opened inside today’s town and later closed.

First census: 233 in 18802020 census: 42163 years
Founding year: the first La Prairie post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Wikidata: 1869.

What stands out about La Prairie’s past

Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.

A history waiting to be writtenNo old photos of La Prairie are in the public archives yet. The rest are in attics and albums.Old housesHalf of La Prairie’s homes were built before 1942.
★ What stands out · Help out

Start La Prairie’s collection

The first neighbors to add old photos shape how La Prairie’s history is told.

Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
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The story so far

La Prairie, in brief

Wikipedia doesn’t have a history of La Prairie yet. The photos, dates and memories neighbors add here are how it gets written.

La Prairie is a village in Adams County, Illinois, United States. The population was 42 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Quincy, IL–MO Micropolitan Statistical Area.

Its first post office opened in 1863. Between the 2010 and 2020 censuses its population fell from 47 to 42 (-11%).

Intro from Wikipedia. Population: U.S. Census Bureau.

From the old history books

What they wrote about La Prairie in 1879

Passages that mention La Prairie, cut from the printed page as they were published.

The village of La Prairie is on the C, B. ct Q. K. R., thirty miles from Qnincy. laid out and platted by II. Dills, A. (J. Marsh, O. L. Skinner, II. T. J. Kicker, Hiram Rogers, I3t'njarnin Bacon and Obediah Gibbs. It has two general stores, owned by R. II. Bacon & Co. and Col. J. M. A. Drake; <«ne …
The history of Adams County, Illinois1879Read the page →
Read the text

The village of La Prairie is on the C, B. ct Q. K. R., thirty miles from Qnincy. laid out and platted by II. Dills, A. (J. Marsh, O. L. Skinner, II. T. J. Kicker, Hiram Rogers, I3t'njarnin Bacon and Obediah Gibbs. It has two general stores, owned by R. II. Bacon & Co. and Col. J. M. A. Drake; <«ne wagon shop, one shoe shop, two harness shops, two churches, one drug *ore and a graded school. In the year 1878 there were siiijjjied 176 car- -jads of stock and 32 car loads of hay.

Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.

Scans and text from the Internet Archive. Books published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.

Timeline

La Prairie, 1856 to 1948

Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.

  1. 19th century
  2. 1856Post officeThe Pitman post office opens
  3. 1863Post officeThe Pitman post office closes
  4. 1863Post officeThe La Prairie post office opens
  5. 20th century
  6. 1948On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological Survey
By decade

No old photos in the archives yet

Weddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.

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On the map

La Prairie on the map, 1948 to 1981

Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of La Prairie. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.

La Prairie on the 1948 USGS mapLa Prairie on the 1981 USGS map1948Camp Point sheet · 1:62,500

U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of La Prairie.

People over time

La Prairie, census by census

010020018801900192019401960198020002020Peak: 233

Between 42 and 233 people in every census since 1880.

15 censuses, 1880–2020.

U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on La Prairie’s Wikipedia page.

Places that used to be

Lost post offices and places now gone

La Prairie’s post office has been open since 1863. Another post office, Pitman, opened and closed inside today’s town.

Pitman
1856–1863
La Prairie
1863–today
18501940today
Gone or out of use
Pitman Post Officepost office

US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).

Questions about La Prairie’s history

What year was La Prairie founded?

The La Prairie post office opened in 1863, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records). Wikidata gives 1869.

Memory lane

What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.

Town Square →
Start a conversation
Sources

Where this page comes from

Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021). How TownRatings grades history →

From U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and old county and town histories (Internet Archive). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.