More historic than 14% of U.S. towns · #694 of 768 in Illinois. What drives it
Most of Wheatland Township was built recently: 0.5% of its homes predate 1940 and the median home dates from 2000. Below: maps from 1892 on and old-book passages.
The Wheatland Township post office opened in 1854, the earliest record of the town by name. Four smaller post offices, Wheatland (1854), East Wheatland (1855) and Tamarack (1858), opened inside today’s town and later closed.
2020 census: 88,894172 years
How historic is Wheatland Township?
D
More historic than 14% of U.S. towns, on its age, its old homes and the National Register.
Founding year: the first Wheatland Township post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Wheatland Township’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Wheatland Township is more historic than 14% of U.S. towns, #694 of 768 in Illinois. Its age holds the grade up; its share of homes from before 1940 pulls it down.
D
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Wheatland Township’s overall grade.
Few Illinois towns list much on the Register (a typical Illinois town has 0.5 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Wheatland Township’s 0.0 sits below most of its state (28% of Illinois towns have fewer) while its 0 listings outnumber those of 23% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from D to C−. The pre-1940 share (±0.3 points) is firm at this size. The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Wheatland Township’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
Lost post offices, old corners, places now gone and burying grounds
Four other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
Wheatland
1854–1866
East Wheatland
1855–1899
Tamarack
1858–1901
Normantown
1893–1903
18501940today
Hamlets and corners on the map
Breckenridge EstatesBrook Crossings EstatesGraver Country EstatesNormantownTamarackTamarack FairwaysWheatland PlainsWheatland ViewWolf Creek EstatesWolf Creek Island
Gone or out of use
East Wheatland Post Officepost officeGerman Lutheran SchoolschoolLombard SchoolschoolSpaulding Schoolschool
4cemeteries and burying grounds inside Wheatland Township
VermontWheatlandWheatland Presbyterian ChurchZion Lutheran Church
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Help out
Start Wheatland Township’s collection
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Wheatland Township’s history is told.
Decades since 1900 with photos
00s10s20s30s40s50s60s70s80s90s
0 of 10 decades. The empty ones are waiting for someone’s album.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Wheatland Township. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
1892Joliet 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 Wheatland Township.
Most of Wheatland Township was still owned by the Potawatomi, a Native American tribe, until 1833. The 1833 Treaty of Chicago obtained this land and officially made it available for settlement. Growth was slow during the 1830s, due to a lack of significant wooded lands. Farmers depended on wood for building and a source of fuel. They also believed if the land could not grow trees then it would not be beneficial for farming.
Passages that mention Wheatland Township, cut from the printed page as they were published.
The history of Will County, Illinois, containing a history of the county ... a directory of its real estate owners1878 · page 540Read the page →
Read the text
The recent settlements of Wheatland Township, and the absence of anything like towns or villages, leaves but little here to write about, or to make history. It is now pretty thickly settled, and that by an intelligent and energetic class of people, with excellent schools and churches. It has good roads and a number of substantial wooden bridges, but these are of such modern date as to be hardly considered an interesting matter of history. Then, with these brief pages, we will leave it for some future historian to do it more ample justice.
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
Wheatland Township, 1854 to 1901
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
The Wheatland Township post office opened in 1854, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Wheatland Township rank for history?
Wheatland Township is more historic than 14% of U.S. towns, #694 of 768 in Illinois. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
How old are the homes in Wheatland Township?
0.5% of Wheatland Township’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate), against a typical 11% for an Illinois town; the median home was built in 2000.
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).
From Wikimedia Commons (2), Wikipedia, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, 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.
2026
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