Editing Pleasant Prairie, Wisconsin (section)

==History==
{{More citations needed|section|date=January 2023}}
The Pleasant Prairie area was the center of Native American activity in pre-pioneer Wisconsin.<ref name="rootsweb"/> Some of the earliest traces of Native American life in Wisconsin have been found along [[Wisconsin Highway 32|State Highway 32]] and [[Wisconsin Highway 165|State Highway 165]], [[Barnes Creek (Wisconsin)|Barnes Creek]], and in the Carol Beach area.<ref>[http://www.co.kenosha.wi.us/plandev/smart_growth/documents/VPleasantPrairieNCR.pdf WI Smartgrowth] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110716094636/http://www.co.kenosha.wi.us/plandev/smart_growth/documents/VPleasantPrairieNCR.pdf |date=July 16, 2011}}</ref>

The early Native American campsites were located along what was once the shoreline of [[Lake Michigan]]. Pleasant Prairie also saw pioneers arrive in Wisconsin on the Jambeau Trail, now known as Green Bay Road. In addition, several natural historic sites such as the [[Chiwaukee Prairie]] and the Kenosha Sand Dunes lie undisturbed in Pleasant Prairie.

===Settlement===
The area's first white settler was Horace Woodbridge, who arrived on June 4, 1833; Henry Miller arrived later that same month. Pleasant Prairie had its beginnings as a political entity in April 1842 when the first town meeting was held and the first election of town officials took place. The early town officials met in the Williams Congregational Church located at 93rd Street and Green Bay Road. Later the old church became the town hall.<ref>''Racine Journal'', March 10, 1902, December 23, 1902.</ref> Pleasant Prairie originally was a town nearly {{convert|42|sqmi|km2|sigfig=2}} in size.

Over the next 150 years, the city of [[Kenosha, Wisconsin|Kenosha]] began to annex lands south of 60th Street and west from Lake Michigan. The town of Pleasant Prairie was slowly reduced in size as Kenosha grew. There were nine separate settlement areas in the town that in some cases became the starting point for significant growth. Some no longer exist.

The original unincorporated community of Pleasant Prairie was located at 104th Avenue and Bain Station Road.<ref name="PPHistory">{{cite web |url=http://www.pleasantprairieonline.com/about/history.asp |title=Village of Pleasant Prairie &#124; About &#124; History |access-date=November 13, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080509184037/http://www.pleasantprairieonline.com/about/history.asp |archive-date=May 9, 2008 |url-status=dead }}</ref><ref>{{gnis|1571621|Pleasant Prairie (community), Wisconsin}}</ref>

===Dynamite plant catastrophe===
In the early 20th century, Pleasant Prairie was the site of a 190-acre [[DuPont]] blasting powder plant. The plant, including 40 buildings, had an ongoing record of accidents. In 1909, residents of [[Kenosha County, Wisconsin|Kenosha County]] brought suit against the company on the grounds that the plant was a public menace. The suit was won by the company.

On March 9, 1911, most of the town was destroyed by the explosion of five magazines holding 300 tons of [[dynamite]], 105,000 kegs of black [[blasting powder]], and five nearby railcars holding more dynamite housed at the plant. The explosions rendered most houses within five miles of the blast center uninhabitable. Several hundred people were injured, and three plant employees, E. S. "Old Man" Thompson, Clarence Brady and Joseph Flynt, along with Alice Finch, who dropped dead of fright, were killed. The low death toll was attributed to the plant being closed at the time of the explosion. A crater 100 feet deep was blasted under the former dynamite house. Damage estimates were put at $1,500,000,<ref>{{cite news |title=Town is Destroyed: Pleasant Prairie Wiped Out By Dynamite Explosion |url=https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=SRPD19110311.2.4&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN--------1 |access-date=March 4, 2020 |volume=XXXVIII |issue=59 |publisher=Press Democrat |date=March 11, 1911}}</ref> equivalent to $37,000,000 in 2015. Almost equal damage was done in [[Bristol (town), Kenosha County, Wisconsin|Bristol]], four miles west of Pleasant Prairie.

The force of the explosion was felt more than 130 miles in every direction and was heard as far away as [[Ohio]] and [[Iowa]]. Many in the Midwest at first believed it was an earthquake. Residents in nearby [[Lake County, Illinois]], saw the fireball and remembering the [[Peshtigo fire]] fled their houses, jumping into [[Lake Michigan]]. Police in [[Chicago]] scoured the streets, looking for the site of a bombing. Windows were shattered as far away as [[Madison, Wisconsin]], a distance of some 85 miles. Concerns about looting and vandalism by curiosity seekers prompted Kenosha County Sheriff Andrew Stahl to impress a hundred deputies and clear the village.<ref>"Big Powder Explosion Wrecks a Small Town", ''The Day'' March 10, 2011, p.1.</ref>

It was believed the first explosion took place in the glaze house where more than 1,100 kegs of powder were dried in steel cylinders. One steel cylinder crashed through the roof of the general store of H. A. and E. A. King, tearing a hole five feet in diameter through the roof, the first and second floor and into the earth. H. A. King, in an adjoining room, was thrown to the floor unconscious by the shock. Phil Hess, a farmer near [[Truesdell, Wisconsin]] over two miles from the factory, lost his right ear, severed by a piece of flying glass as he was entering his home. J. H. Beland of Truesdell lost his eye from flying glass, and E. A. Fox, a farmer, bled heavily when a vein in his wrist was cut.

A DuPont spokesman was reported as being perplexed by the coverage of the blast, quoted as saying "explosions occur every day in [[steel mill]]s, [[flouring mill]]s and [[grain elevator]]s with hardly a line in the paper."<ref>[https://www.coloradohistoricnewspapers.org/cgi-bin/colorado?a=d&d=THD19110310-01.2.2&e=-------en-20--1--img-txIN%7ctxCO%7ctxTA--------0-- TONS OF DYNAMITE EXPLODE WITH DEATH AND TERROR]</ref>

The site is the location of residential homes and the Pleasant Prairie Ball Park, which is used for softball and soccer.

===Establishing independence===
Throughout much of its history, the town of Pleasant Prairie struggled to maintain its independence and identity apart from [[Kenosha]], its larger neighbor to the north.

In 1961, the village hall moved from the former Williams Congregational Church site to rented office space in a small commercial center located on 22nd Avenue and 91st Street.

In 1967,  the village government moved into a newly constructed municipal building on Springbrook Road and 39th Avenue that provided office, an auditorium, Fire Department apparatus room, and sleeping quarters.

In 1984, the town and the city of Kenosha agreed upon a plan for the orderly development and fixed boundaries for the town in exchange for an acknowledged right of property owners in various locations along the village/city border to be annexed into the city of Kenosha. A significant provision of this agreement gave Kenosha the ability to annex lands north of [[Wisconsin Highway 50|State Highway 50]] from Green Bay Road to [[Interstate 94|I-94]], where the Southport Plaza shopping center, WhiteCaps subdivision, River Crossing subdivision, and Aurora Hospital are located. In exchange, Pleasant Prairie was granted the ability to protect the rest of its area from annexations and to purchase sewer and water from Kenosha.

===Becoming a village===
In 1989, the town of Pleasant Prairie was incorporated as a [[village]] by a referendum of more than 3,000 citizens in favor and 300 against. The new boundaries were fixed and the new village, along with the WisPark Corporation, began the development of LakeView Corporate Park, a center of employment for more than 8,000 people.

In 1997, eight years after the incorporation of the town into a village, the Municipal Building was updated and increased in size to accommodate village operations.<ref name="PPHistory"/>