The Wilkinson 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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−16° on Nov. 15, 2014, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1948. Next is −9° in 1966.
Wilkinson’s center stands about 1,600 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,310 ft to 1,700 ft, a difference of 390 ft: rolling country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Meteor Hill, about 1,830 ft, 11 miles north-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Barron Quartzite, from the Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion years old.
The section below crosses 3 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 30×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Quartzite. Age: Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion years old. About 17 mi of the line.
Sandstone. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 6 mi of the line.
Basalt, basaltic-andesite. Age: Paleoproterozoic, 1.6 to 2.5 billion years old. About 0.8 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 Wilkinson reaches the Gulf of America by way of Devils Creek, the Chippewa and the Mississippi: about 1,900 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Wissota and Holcombe Flowage.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Wilkinson; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Wilkinson has a warm-summer humid continental climate. Summer afternoons average 79° in July; winter nights fall to about 2° in January. A normal year brings about 67 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 40 inches of water.
On November 14 Wilkinson normally reaches 40° and falls to 23°. The record high is 65°, in 1953; the record low −6°, in 1996. The most rain on this date, 1.01 in, fell in 2010.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1948 at Couderay 7 W, 19 miles north, 300 ft lower. NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
