Iowa anniversaries for 2024
Slaughter County is out; school centenarians are in
To kick off 2024, here are some notable Iowa-related anniversaries for this year. There’s a lot more to these stories, but a summary will do for now.
1804 (220 years ago)
The Lewis and Clark expedition traveled the Missouri River on the outbound leg.
1839 (185 years ago)
After approximately one year of existence, Slaughter County was renamed Washington County on Jan. 25.
Our county was first named in honor of Wm. B. Slaughter, a clever territorial secretary, but a merciful and esthetic Providence, perhaps stirred into action by vigorous protests, dropped that ugly name and adopted that of the Father of his Country, and we have been trying ever since to live up to it, and succeeding beautifully, as all know. … Let’s get this fact fixed in memory. The legislature of Wisconsin, January 18, 1838, named ‘us’ Slaughter. We have never liked Wisconsin since that day.
— Howard Burrell, History of Washington County, Iowa (1909)
1849 (175 years ago)
The city of Cedar Rapids was incorporated on Jan. 15. This Thursday (Jan. 11, 2024), the city is having a commemoration ceremony and time capsule dedication.
UPDATE/EDITOR’S NOTE: Cindy Hadish attended the ceremony and has a story and photos at her Homegrown Iowan blog.
The U.S. military abandoned Fort Atkinson on Feb. 14. The fort, only in existence for a decade, was intended “to provide neutral territory for interactions with the Winnebago People as they were resettled from Wisconsin into northeast Iowa,” explains the Iowa DNR’s page for the modern-day Fort Atkinson State Preserve. Original construction from the era remains available for exploration today, just outside the town of the same name. According to the July 14, 1876, Decorah Republican, the fort cost almost $100,000 to build and was sold for $3,500.
The Iowa Star, one of the newspapers the Des Moines Register counts in its lineage, started on July 1.
1854 (170 years ago)
The Locust School was built in northern Winneshiek County. Students will attend classes in the building, made of native limestone, until 1960.
1864 (160 years ago)
An “incursion” of Missouri Confederate rangers on Oct. 12 reached Davis County and three Iowans were killed. Commemorative markers were added in 2005 near the location south of Bloomfield (photos at the bottom of my U.S. 63 page). KXEL’s Jeff Stein appeared on WOI in 2021 to talk about it. It’s not quite a battle, but it’s the northernmost event of the Civil War outside of a Confederate raid in Vermont that was launched from Canada.
What’s now the “Old Stone School” was built in Lansing. Students would attend classes there until 1973. The building, on the National Register of Historic Places since 1974, is now “basically abandoned” and made Preservation Iowa’s 2017 list of most endangered buildings.
1869 (155 years ago)
An innocent block of Fort Dodge gypsum carved into the shape of a “petrified man” was “discovered” in Cardiff, New York on Oct. 16. The Cardiff Giant hoax was compounded when P.T. Barnum has an exact replica made for his show, but by the end of the year it’s over.
Coincidentally, the city of Fort Dodge was incorporated 10 days later.
1924 (100 years ago)
These active school buildings are known to have opened in 1924 and will be marking their 100th anniversary this year. There might be more, and if so, let me know! I’m compiling a list of pre-Depression buildings still in use, and the dates below come from newspaper articles. Dedications and use typically came a year after the date on the cornerstone. There are quite a few century-old schools and even a few supercentenarians out there.
Cedar Rapids’ Franklin Junior High (now Franklin Middle School) opened Jan. 7.
Le Grand’s school was dedicated Feb. 29. This school building came about in the way so many in the interwar era did: The previous one burned down. Le Grand in 1923-24 and Newell in 1911-12 both had a new facility up and running within 13 months of their fires.
Corydon High School opened shortly before the end of the school year, making the Class of 1924 the first to graduate in the building. A bond referendum to create a new complex for grades 7-12 failed in 2022.
Garfield and Hayes elementaries in Davenport opened at the beginning of the 1924-25 school year, which for most of the state is Sept. 1.
State Center’s school, now in use as part of West Marshall Elementary, opened Sept. 1.
Wapello’s school also opened Sept. 1.
Mediapolis’ school opened Nov. 4.
1924 was also very important for radio in Iowa.
KFNF, “The Friendly Farmer Station,” began radio broadcasts from Shenandoah on Feb. 22. The station owned by the Henry Field Seed Co. was a hit. Earl May, who had been doing an hour of radio once a month at an Omaha station, saw the benefits his competitor was reaping, and KMA would be up and running less than two years later. (Information from KMA Radio: The First Sixty Years.)
Bankers Life Radio opens Friday, April 11
New call letters are soon to be heard on the ether. They are WHO. The announcer will say: “WHO — who, the Bankers Life company of Iowa.”
— Des Moines Tribune, April 2, 1924
A short test of the equipment came on April 10, making that WHO’s official birthday.
1939 (85 years ago)
The Iowa Hawkeyes, led by Nile Kinnick, beat Indiana on Oct. 7 for the first home conference win since 1933. The praise Cedar Rapids Gazette sports editor Tait Cummins lavished on the team and coach Eddie Anderson sets the tone:
Despite the scorn with which he may greet their mistakes on the practice field and the lash with which he may drive them in seeking iron men for this Big Ten football warfare, when the game starts he’s their best friend, the man who appreciates that someone must lose when two evenly matched teams meet.
It was the first time the phrase “iron men” appears in the paper in relation to this team. By the end of the season, the “Ironmen” nickname became synonymous with the 1939 Hawkeyes, who finish 6-1-1, half a game short of a Big Ten title.
Nile Kinnick won the Heisman Trophy, the second Iowan to do so in five years.
1959 (65 years ago)
Iowa State’s football team became known as the “Dirty Thirty” for the number of active players on the roster. The Cyclones go 7-3 but miss out on the Orange Bowl after losing to Oklahoma.
Also in 1959, Iowa State College became Iowa State University.
1964 (60 years ago)
I-80 from Grinnell to Coralville opened Oct. 23. It’s the longest stretch of interstate in Iowa to be opened on a single date.
1974 (50 years ago)
The Iowa Legislature approved creation of the Iowa Department of Transportation, to become effective July 1, 1975.
1979 (45 years ago)
Pope John Paul II spoke to an audience of hundreds of thousands at Living History Farms.
1989 (35 years ago)
“Field of Dreams,” the most famous movie set in Iowa, was released. It’s part of what might be considered a mini-boom of baseball movies between 1988 and 1994 right before the Major League Baseball strike realigned Americans’ sporting priorities. Last week, Cheryl Tevis wrote about the school meeting scene in that movie and how it connects to what’s going on today.
1999 (25 years ago)
Terry Branstad retired from his job as Iowa governor — for the first time, anyway.
2009 (15 years ago)
The Iowa Supreme Court unanimously ruled that same-sex couples have the right to get married. A year and a half after that ruling, for the first time since the judicial retention process was established, voters would throw three justices off the court.
CORRECTION: This post has been updated to reflect the span between 1854 and 2024.
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