What do Mormon pioneers and Caitlyn Jenner have in common? Besides a tendency towards backwards beliefs and manslaughter, they share a deep connection to the southwestern Iowa city of Lamoni (pop. 1,974). Though she grew up in Sandy Hook, Connecticut, Jenner was recruited to Lamoni’s Graceland University, a small, private religious school, in 1969 — […]
Recreation
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Yearlong legal battle over Des Moines’ historic Greenwood Pond art installation ends with $900,000 settlement for artist
On Tuesday, the Des Moines Art Center and artist Mary Miss announced a settlement in their legal dispute over the fate of Greenwood Pond: Double Site, a land art installation Miss created for the center. It’s considered a major and pioneering work of American land art, and has been part of Des Moines’ Greenwood Park […]
Posted inEastern Iowa Arts & Entertainment
Artists deck out dozens of skateboards for a rad exhibition at Dubuque’s Smokestack
A live and local example of the creative partnership between art and skate culture is realized in “The Skate Deck Art Show,” a collaborative exhibit brought to life by the Dubuque Area Arts Collective and Olliewood Action Sports. Over 100 artists, skaters and non-skaters alike, across all ages, channeled their energy into creating original works of art on skate decks.
Posted inCommunity/News
Peak Iowa: Earth’s first apex predator — and a beloved UI museum exhibit — was much chonkier than we thought
For the homecoming parade in October, the student advisory board for the University of Iowa’s 160-year-old Museum of Natural History (UIMNH) made a paper mache model of a nearly 400-million-year-old fish species. Held above the heads of two people by three wooden poles, the prop was about six feet long with a flat head and […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Bumper Crops: Pinball bans and the Des Moines mafia
There was never an amendment to the Constitution prohibiting pinball, but that didn’t stop some major cities from banning the game from the 1930s through the mid-’70s. In fact, Oakland, California still had a ban on pinball machines as recently as 2014. I first learned about pinball’s checkered history after trying to cajole my mom […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Caitlin Clark’s rookie year drove a ‘staggering’ amount of profit, with 99% of her income earned off-court
Time announced on Tuesday that its selection for the 2024 Athlete of the Year is Caitlin Clark. It’s just the latest in a long line of honors Clark has won over the past few years. Among those honors are the titles of AP Player of the Year and Naismith College Player of the Year for […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Peak Iowa: Inside Squirrel Cage Jail, Council Bluffs’ spinning panopticon of misery
A rotating steel drum of pie-shaped prison cells inside a cylindrical cage. On each of three floors, there’s only one way in, one way out. Is this a pitch for a Saw trap? Nah, this is the Squirrel Cage Jail in Council Bluffs. The Squirrel Cage Jail operated as the Pottawattamie County jail from 1885 […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Peak Iowa: Astride her hobby horse, a Dubuque teen wins a new national championship
For those who love the idea of sports played with an extraneous stick-like object between their legs but find Quidditch too ideologically freighted, hobby horsing is the new trend sweeping through a very specific subset of the nation. This year marked the inaugural U.S. Hobby Horse Championships in Almont, Michigan, where Dubuque teen Gwen Maiers […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Peak Iowa: Behold the most mesmerizing, ‘violently Midwest’ vibes on TikTok
Who will you really miss if TikTok is banned? Not the Hawk Tuah girl, surely. Not watching oversized Stanley cups fill with colorful liquids. Certainly not the clipped content from Jubilee, Logan Paul and Andrew Tate. No, you’ll miss those moments of magic captured by everyday people: A Boston cop plunging down on a metal […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Gaming panel hears public comments on Cedar Rapids casino proposal
Members of the Iowa Racing and Gaming Commission heard mostly favorable comments Wednesday about a proposed new casino in Cedar Rapids, as well as some concerns from people affiliated with a group, Iowans for Common Sense, launched to oppose casino expansion in the state. The IRGC meeting was held at the Kirkwood Center in Cedar […]
Posted inCommunity/News
After a record-breaking year, Mount Trashmore is canned for the winter
After a record-breaking season that saw almost 30,000 people visit the former landfill turned greenspace, Mount Trashmore is closing for the winter. Trashmore’s trails and the overlook pavilion at its peak will close at 4 p.m. on Tuesday. They will reopen in the spring “when the weather allows,” according to the Cedar Rapids/Linn County Solid […]
Posted inCommunity/News
A creative can-struction fundraiser in Coralville helps CommUnity fight food insecurity
There have been shelves of canned foods in grocery stores as long as there have been grocery stores. But as useful as they are in preserving food and inspiring Andy Warhol prints, cans are seldom seen as material for art. On Saturday at the Coral Ridge Mall, architects will unlock some of canned food’s artistic potential, […]
