According to the 2021 census gazetteer files, Piper City has a total area of 0.56 square miles (1.45 km2), all land.

It was a station on the Toledo Peoria and Western Railroad, which had been completed ten years earlier.

An earlier railroad siding and grain station known as Brenton had been established two miles to the east of the eventual location of the town.

John Allen and W. C. Jones opened the first store in Piper City the summer of 1867.

[6] The first Post Office was in the home of John R. Lewis, who had been a land agent for the Illinois Central Railroad.

In 1924, when the people of Piper City learned that a new highway, soon to be known as U.S. 24, would pass a quarter mile south of the town, a delegation was sent to the governor to protest.

[8] The town has been an important grain shipping point for the rich agricultural land of the pan handle of Ford County.