Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: maps from 1902 on and old-book passages.
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
The first neighbors to add old photos shape how Eau Pleine’s history is told.
Three other post offices opened and closed inside today’s town.
US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock, CC0). Places and cemeteries from the USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Eau Pleine. Tap a year, or press play to watch the town change.
U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (public domain), via Esri’s collection of the scans. The red ring marks the center of Eau Pleine.
From Wikipedia’s history of Eau Pleine.
The outline of the six-mile square that would become the Town of Eau Pleine was first surveyed in September 1851 by a crew working for the U.S. government. In September 1853 another crew marked its section corners, walking through the woods and wading the streams, measuring with chain and compass. When done, the deputy surveyor filed this general description:
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Passages that mention Eau Pleine, cut from the printed page as they were published.
The town of Eau Pleine was set oft' from the town of Brighton on November 14, 1884, and in the election the following spring, the town elected its first officers with Edw. Lessig as chairman. The territory of this town is township 27, range 3 east.
Text read by machine from the scan; it may contain errors.
The town of Day was created June 10, 1881, and elected Andrew Daul as its first chairman at the ensuing next spring election. There were a few settlers in a part of this territory, which moved into the same from Week's mill on the Big Eau Pleine river, which settlement was known as the "Campbell" settlement, to which reference has already been made. These first settlers made not much headway as fanners, and the country was substantially new when the Wisconsin Railroad ran its line north of Stevens Point and on the west line of Marathon county. Many of the new settlers that
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.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
What the archives can’t tell you, neighbors can.
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 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.
