The Prescott plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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75° on Nov. 11, 2020, the hottest reading for this week of the year since 1895. Next is 75° in 2022.
Prescott’s center stands about 800 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 760 ft to 890 ft, a difference of 130 ft: gently rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Kuhn Hill, about 1,060 ft, 14 miles west-northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Michigan Formation (shale), from the Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old.
The section below crosses 2 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 59×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Shale. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 19 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Carboniferous, 324 to 359 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Prescott reaches Lake Huron by way of Johnson Creek and the Au Gres: about 30 river miles. From there it moves on through the Great Lakes, over Niagara Falls and down the St. Lawrence to the Atlantic.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Prescott; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Prescott has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 80° in July; winter nights fall to about 14° in January. About 31 inches of rain fall in a normal year.
On November 14 Prescott normally reaches 45° and falls to 31°. The record high is 65°, in 1989; the record low 9°, in 1986. The most rain on this date, 1.12 in, fell in 1957.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1895 at Standish 4 NE, 12 miles south, 180 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
