Wabash County
Illinois · County seat: Mount Carmel · Active county or equivalent
FIPS code 17185 is Wabash County, Illinois. With a population of 11,321 (2022 ACS estimate), it ranks #86 in Illinois and #2392 nationally. The state FIPS code for Illinois is 17. This code is used in Census Bureau, BLS, EPA, HUD, and USDA federal datasets to identify this county.
County FIPS
17185
Population
11,321
2022 ACS · #2392 nationally
Density
50.7/mi²
people per sq mile
Land Area
223
sq miles
Urban/Rural
Nonmetro — urban 2.5K–19.9K, not adjacent to metro
RUCC 7
How This FIPS Code Works
The 5-digit FIPS code 17185 is formed by combining the 2-digit state identifier 17 (Illinois) with the 3-digit county identifier 185. Together they uniquely identify Wabash County in every US federal dataset. No two counties share the same 5-digit FIPS code.
Census ACS Data for FIPS 17185
From the 2022 ACS 5-year estimates — the same values you'd retrieve by querying the Census API with county FIPS 17185.
Median Household Income
$54,074
ACS B19013_001E
Poverty Rate
13.3%
ACS B17001 (below poverty level)
Median Age
43.8
ACS B01002_001E
Adjacent Counties (6)
Counties that share a border with Wabash County. Useful for regional analysis — these are the geographies you'd typically include when studying labor markets, commuting zones, or environmental spillovers around FIPS 17185.
Federal Datasets Using Code 17185
FIPS code 17185 appears as the county identifier in the following federal datasets. Analysts joining data across these sources use this code as the common geographic key.
Using FIPS Code 17185 in Code
Common patterns for querying federal datasets by this county's FIPS code. The leading zeros are significant — always treat FIPS codes as strings, not integers.
import requests
url = "https://api.census.gov/data/2022/acs/acs5"
params = {
"get": "NAME,B19013_001E,B01003_001E",
"for": "county:185",
"in": "state:17",
"key": "YOUR_CENSUS_API_KEY",
}
r = requests.get(url, params=params)
data = r.json() # [[header...], [Wabash County, Illinois, income, pop, ...]-- 5-digit combined FIPS (state + county)
SELECT * FROM your_table WHERE county_fips = '17185';
-- Some datasets store state and county separately
SELECT * FROM your_table
WHERE state_fips = '17'
AND county_fips = '185';
-- ⚠ Never cast to integer — leading zeros are lost:
-- county_fips = 17185 is WRONG for this countylibrary(tidycensus)
get_acs(
geography = "county",
variables = c(income = "B19013_001E", pop = "B01003_001E"),
state = "17",
county = "185",
year = 2022
)ZIP Codes in Wabash County
ZIP codes do not align perfectly with county boundaries — a single ZIP code can span multiple counties, and a county can contain parts of many ZIP codes. The ratios below (from the Census 2020 ZCTA relationship file) show the land area share of each ZCTA that falls within Wabash County. Why FIPS ≠ ZIP →
| ZIP Code | % in county |
|---|---|
| 62811 | 100.0% |
| 62410 | 100.0% |
| 62852 | 100.0% |
| 62863 | 100.0% |
| 62818 | 49.9% |
| 62476 | 29.3% |
| 62460 | 1.8% |