Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Below: 1 old photo or paper, maps from 1894 on, and the census since 1880.
The Plainfield post office opened in 1854, the earliest record of the town by name.
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 Plainfield’s history is told.
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
1894Sheet 2 of 2Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
From Wikipedia’s history of Plainfield.
When first settled in 1848, the area was called Norwich. Elijah C. Waterman laid out the village in 1849, building mills and attracting new settlers by offering free lots. Waterman later became the village's first postmaster and changed the name to honor his hometown of Plainfield, Vermont.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Woven from the archive, old maps, post office records, the National Register and the people born here.
In the archivePlainfield Wisc - 1923
On the mapFirst mapped by the U.S. Geological SurveyOne decade in the archive so far: the 1920s. Scroll each row; tap a photo for its story.
Every edition of the U.S. Geological Survey’s map of Plainfield. 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 Plainfield.
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as an old one and they appear here side by side.
Find the spot, match the angle, and add your photo. It becomes the first then-and-now pair on Plainfield’s page.
Retake this view · +15Grew from 348 people in 1880 to 924 in 2020.
15 censuses, 1880–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Plainfield’s Wikipedia page.
Nobody well known was born in Plainfield itself, so here are the best known from just nearby.
Each neighbor’s History grade, on the same three inputs.
The Plainfield post office opened in 1854, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
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 Wikimedia Commons (3), Wikipedia, 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 Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
2024
2005