The sign on the door of the State Historical Society of Iowa’s Centennial Building, where the society’s Iowa City research facility has been located since 1956, let visitors on Wednesday know there were only a few days left to access its remarkable archival collections or even the building itself.
The Centennial Building has been open Wednesdays through Fridays, by appointment only, since July 9. The facility is scheduled to close, perhaps permanently, and lay off the one full-time staff member still working there on Dec. 31.
The restricted hours and the plan to shutter the Centennial Building, resulting in the dismantling of its collections, was announced by the SHSI on June 17. The Iowa City archives had been underfunded for decades, despite its national reputation as an important center for historical research and its active role collaborating with communities throughout eastern Iowa. Still, the announcement was a surprise. The main reason given for the decision was that it would save DAS money, as the department was experiencing a budget shortfall.
The announcement did not address the fact that Iowa Code mandates SHSI, which was founded in Iowa City in 1857, “shall… Maintain research centers in Des Moines and Iowa City.”
There were about two dozen people in the reading area on the first floor of the Centennial Building on Wednesday afternoon. Most were union members and part of group organized by the Iowa Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, to give members a chance to see the building’s extensive collection of material on Iowa workers and unions, before Dec. 31.
The labor history collection in Iowa City occupies 8,000 feet in the Centennial Building and includes an oral history project started during the Bicentennial celebration in 1976. It contains interviews with workers, from those still early in their careers to someone born in 1876.
“The project resulted in 1,200 oral history interviews with the rank-and-file workers and union members in Iowa, from 75 different occupational groups,” Mary Bennett, who was at the Centennial Building on Wednesday afternoon to help guide people through the collection, told Little Village. “Steelworkers, meatpackers, John Deere and International Harvester workers, all kinds of stories are documented here — richly documented with photographs, meeting records like minute books, union constitutions and bylaws, proceedings of meetings from the Iowa Federation of Labor. It’s a very inclusive collection. It’s a hallmark collection at the national level.”
“You’d have to go to the Walter Reuther Archive in Michigan or to New York City to find such a comprehensive collection as we have here in Iowa. We’re very lucky to have it.”
Bennett is a former special collections coordinator who worked at the Iowa City facility for 49 years before retiring in 2023. She has been a leader in the fight to reverse the decision to close the Centennial Building, and is one of 17 who sued the state in September to prevent the dismantling of the Iowa City archive and reverse the decision to close the building.
On Oct. 6, before the first hearing in the lawsuit, workers from Iowa Prison Industries started removing material from the Centennial Building. One of the concerns immediately expressed after the SHSI announcement in June — not only in Iowa, but also by national organizations representing historians and archivists — was if there had been sufficient preparations made to handle the 34,700 cubic feet of material inside. Moving or restructuring a collection requires careful planning. As the extremely compressed schedule for closing the facility and the use of imprisoned workers with no special training suggest, there was no careful planning.
State Archivist Tony Jahn, who supports closing the Iowa City facility, has said that 40 percent of the Centennial Building’s material will be transferred to the archives in Des Moines. What will happen to the rest is unclear.
On Oct. 24, Johnson County District Court Judge Kevin McKeever issued a temporary injunction prohibiting further removal of materials from the Centennial Building until the lawsuit over the Iowa City facility is resolved.
The labor history archives weren’t touched by the IPI workers. They removed books and the research center’s extensive collection of historical journals from other states. In the early 20th century, Benjamin Shambaugh, the leading Iowa historian of his day and the first superintendent of the SHSI, set up an exchange program with archives in other states in which the SHSI sent its history journal and received state journals from the other archives.
Because SHSI was archiving those journals, “the University of Iowa never collected paper copies of the journals,” Bennett explained. “We had the collection that the professors would come and look at.”
But, as Bennett pointed out, Jahn considered the journals unnecessary because they weren’t specifically about Iowa. Current SHSI Administrator Valerie Van Kooten dismissively described them as “travel books from other states.”
“They’re gone now,” Bennett said about the more than a century’s worth of journals. “Where did they go?”
While the temporary injunction won’t prevent SHSI and DAS from closing the Centennial Building on Dec. 31, leaving no staff member to supervise the handling of fragile materials, it does give local legislators time to take action to preserve the Iowa City facility.
Rep. Adam Zabner and Rep. Dave Jacoby, both Johnson County Democrats, started working this summer on a bill to reverse the decision by DAS, and will introduce it at the beginning of next legislative session on Jan. 12. Zabner and Jacoby were at the Centennial Building on Wednesday, along with Senate Minority Leader Janice Weiner.
Jacoby told Little Village that on Tuesday, he and union leader Bill Gerhard drove to Wilton to meet with Rep. Bobby Kaufmann. Gerhard is the president of the Iowa State Building and Construction Trades Council, as well as the vice president of Iowa Labor History Society. Kaufmann, a Republican from Wilton, is the majority leader in the Iowa House.
“It was a great conversation,” Jacoby said. “We have an agreement that the Zabner-Jacoby bill will be the Zabner, Jacoby and Kaufmann bill. He not only agreed to sign on to the bill, but said that he’ll join us in doing what we can to prevent the closure.”
“Promises sometimes don’t mean a lot in the world of politics, but I trust him,” he added.
Jacoby said that just before he came to the Centennial Building he had been on the phone with the House staffer, discussing the particulars of the bill.
“As soon as the copy is ready, I will go to Des Moines, pick up the draft sheet, drive it to Wilton and have a meeting with Bobby,” he said. After Kaufmann signs, Jacoby plans to drive the draft bill around the state and collect signatures from other House members.
“I don’t want to wait till Jan. 12,” he said. “The injunction gives us a chance. I’m excited by that.”
The Zabner-Jacoby-Kaufmann bill won’t be the only bill about the closure of the Centennial Building. Reportedly, DAS has drafted a bill that would change Iowa Code to eliminate the requirement that SHSI maintain a research center in Iowa City.
Sen. Janice Weiner said her staff is continuing to question SHSI and DAS about the Centennial Building.
“A couple things have been very clear to me since the beginning,” the Iowa City Democrat said. “One, this is not an Iowa City issue. This belongs to all Iowans. And so many communities — not just labor, religious communities, ethnic communities, cities, companies and businesses — have records here. This is an essential part of our history and patrimony as Iowans.”
“The other piece is that this sort of happened by stealth with no legislative oversight,” she continued. “It’s the result of a budget cut that occurred at the last minute behind closed doors, done by our Republican colleagues in the Senate just before the end of session. There was never any mention in the budget subcommittees or the budget committee that this could be a result. It never came up.”
“I fully believe this should get legislative oversight. It shouldn’t be the decision of one head of DAS, who is no longer there, to dissolve and really make our history inaccessible.”
The DAS director who made the decision was Adam Steen. He resigned in August to launch a campaign for governor.
“I’m a Jesus guy. I’m a Make America Great Again guy,” Steen, a Republican, said at his campaign kickoff rally at a Des Moines-area church.
The Save Iowa History coalition that Bennett helped organize now has a website. It debunks misinformation that DAS has advanced in support of closing the Centennial Building, has updates on the lawsuit and suggestions for action supporters can take. It is also counting down the dwindling number of days the Centennial Building will be open.
“Only Six More Days for Research,” the site said on Thursday.
