Before the late 19th century, the area around the future site of Wheatland was a flat, arid landscape with desert-like vegetation.

In 1883 local rancher and judge Joseph M. Carey, along with Horace Plunkett, John Hoyt, Morton Post, Francis E. Warren, William Irvine, and Andrew Gilchrist, established the Wyoming Development Company.

[6] By the fall of 1883 an irrigation system was constructed on the Wheatland flats including a 2,380 foot long tunnel to divert water for irrigation into Bluegrass Creek and the first two of the system's canals.

The line was eventually sold to the Colorado and Southern Railway, controlled by the Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy Railroad, and operated at Wheatland station.

[10] According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 4.10 square miles (10.62 km2), all land.

Wheatland experiences a semi-arid climate (Köppen BSk) with cold, dry winters and hot, wetter summers.

Public education in the town of Wheatland is provided by Platte County School District #1.

[16] Wheatland is served by Phifer Airfield just east of town on State Route 316 (Gilchrist St./Antelope Gap Rd.).

The station is not open today for revenue service, though the tracks through Wheatland are currently owned and used by Berkshire Hathaway's BNSF Railway after a series of acquisitions which gave BNSF the Wheatland assets formerly operated by Union Pacific, Denver and Gulf.

[17][18] Wheatland hosts the annual Platte County Fair & Rodeo, usually held the second full week of August, at the fairgrounds on the east edge of town at Front Street and Antelope Gap Road.

[19] The horse Steamboat, the model for the bucking horse and rider motif on the Wyoming license, was stabled near Wheatland in a barn owned and maintained as a historical structure by Mike and Linda Holst.