Since the onset of Americanization during the early 1800s, Iowa’s environment has changed more than any state in the union. Over 98 percent of Iowa’s lands were altered in service of agriculture. Forever spreading fields of corn and soybeans line highway shoulders, stretching out east to west, north to south.
The state ranks second to last in public state land and last in federal lands open to the public per capita. But in those remaining public lands, the natural and historic beauty of the Hawkeye state survives.
During the 19th century, eager pioneers plowed the prairies and cleared ancient oak savannahs to open the lands for the age of Manifest Destiny. As expansion accelerated and the best lands went into production, settlers began planting on marginal lands, like the steep stretches of the Iowa Driftless region around Yellow River State Forest.
In the early 20th century, public attitudes shifted toward preservation and conservation of natural resources. In 1917, Iowa created the Iowa Conservation Commission with the purpose of establishing a series of parks and preserves throughout the state. The commissioners quickly set about identifying potential park sites and rallying local communities to provide funding and lands for park creation.
Jumping from rock to rock high above the Maquoketa River, Backbone State Park’s breathtaking beauty lets your imagination wander back in time. Backbone is Iowa’s first state park, located near Strawberry Point in eastern Iowa. It first welcomed visitors in 1920 and is known for the distinctive quarter mile long “Devils’ Backbone,” a stretch of Silurian-age Dolomitic limestone towering above the river. The state purchased 1,200 acres at the site from 44 individual property owners. After extensive development over the ’20s and ’30s, it quickly grew into a beloved destination for generations of Iowans who enjoy the outdoors. Backbone, with its distinctive castle-like boathouse, rare natural springs, mysterious caves and other natural wonders, still draws thousands of visitors each year.
As the Maquoketa River winds southeast, its water has carved out one of Iowa’s most distinctive state parks: Maquoketa Caves. The park has at least 13 distinct cave structures ranging from 30 to over 1,000 feet deep, and evidence of human inhabitation there stretches back at least 6,000 years.
American settlers first happened upon the vast underground labyrinth when two local hunters followed a herd of deer into the entrance of one of the caves during a snowstorm. The location rapidly gained popularity soon after. Young visitors would dance in a small pavilion constructed under the rockface, at the entrance to “Dance Hall Cave.”
With contrasting darkness and light, paired with rough stone and vibrant plant life, Maquoketa Caves makes many visitors believe they’ve stepped out of Iowa and into an alternative reality.
Just down the road from Maquoketa Caves in Anamosa is Wapsipinicon State Park. Visitors started flocking to the park during the early 1920s. Blasting crews uncovered at least nine human skeletons at Horse Thief Cave within the park’s bounds in 1923. The blasting also uncovered pottery and other artifacts tying the location to the distant past, but the park itself dates back to the Archaic period roughly 4,000 years ago.
Wapsipinicon stands as a distinctive early entrant into the state park system, with unique amenities like a nine-hole golf course and a peeled log-style lodge, representative of park development in the 1920s. Much of the park’s development resulted from work agreements with the Anamosa State Penitentiary. Inmates toiled to develop the amenities familiar to visitors today.
Pilot Knob State Park towers above the Algona end moraine in far north-central Iowa. The park is capped by a stone tower constructed to offer a commanding view of the bottomless sphagnum bog known as Dead Man’s Lake. The park is a love story of sorts: 162 locals each chipped in $70 to purchase the land, and gifted the site to the state during the early 1920s, hoping to secure a state park. Similar stories abound in state parks throughout Iowa. Local communities have often taken initiative to preserve lands too precious to surrender to the plow.
Today, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources officially administers 72 parks throughout the state, and many other sites now under county or federal control have once been a part of the state park system.
Pammel State Park, managed by Madison County Conservation, is tucked among the famous covered bridges southwest of Des Moines. It has Iowa’s only automotive tunnel and a “Devil’s Backbone” of its own. State officials determined Madison County could better maintain the park and officially transferred duties in 1989.
A similar story played out for Echo Valley State Park in Fayette County. The state owns the park, but the Fayette County Conservation Board manages it, after disrepair and other issues plagued the park’s enticing escarpments.
Echo Valley visitors can drive 30 minutes south to Brush Creek Canyon State Preserve and inadvertently land in the distant past. The state refused to transfer the park to local control, in favor of creating a biological preserve. Hikers might feel like prehistoric explorers as they bushwhack through this largely unmaintained park and see the sharp canyon that descends to a meandering trout stream. Or as they encounter the decaying Civilian Conservation Corps picnic shelter in the depths of the forest.
For those more interested in a well-maintained and informative journey into Iowa’s history, the partially reconstructed military fort at Fort Atkinson State Preserve hosts interpretive panels, yearly programming and other features friendly to the faint of heart.
Further to the east on the Mississippi River is Pikes Peak State Park, which showcases the past, present and future of Iowa’s public lands. The park was originally part of a federal plan to create a national park in the early 20th century, but it was eventually adopted into the state system. The nearby McGregor Heights State Park, however, only temporarily stayed in state control before federal officials reclaimed the land to create Effigy Mounds National Monument.
Both sites feature mounds tied to Iowa’s Woodland Era Indigenous inhabitants. Pike’s Peak also holds other treasures: the gentle water of Bridal Veil Falls, prominent views at Point Ann and Pike’s Peak, and an active hummingbird population drawn by the sweet sugar of feeders near the Civilian Conservation Corps lodge building.
From the northeastern Pikes Peak, to the southwestern Waubonsie State Park, and from the northwestern Gitchie Manitou State Preserve to the southeastern Shimek State Forest, there are still beautiful lands for Iowans to explore.
No matter where you are in the state, you aren’t far from the public lands that provide glimpses into Iowa’s natural and historic past.
Explore the state parks mentioned in this story:
Backbone State Park
1347 129th St, Dundee
563-924-2527, backbone@dnr.iowa.govMaquoketa Caves State Park
9688 Caves Rd, Maquoketa
563-652-5833, maquoketa@dnr.iowa.govWapsipinicon State Park
21301 County Rd E34, Anamosa
319-462-2761, wapsipinicon@dnr.iowa.govPilot Knob State Park
2148 340th St, Forest City
641-581-4835, pilot_knob@dnr.iowa.govPammel State Park
1900 Pammel Park Rd, Winterset
515-462-3536,
awarnke@madisoncounty.iowa.govEcho Valley State Park
9672 Echo Valley Rd, West Union
563-422-5146, fayetteccb@hawkeyetel.comBrush Creek Canyon State Preserve
E Avenue near Arlington
563-425-4161, state_preserves@dnr.iowa.govFort Atkinson State Preserve
303 2nd St NW, Ft Atkinson
563-425-4161, volga_River@dnr.iowa.govPikes Peak State Park
32264 Pikes Peak Rd, McGregor
563-873-2341, pikes_peak@dnr.iowa.govEffigy Mounds National Monument
151 IA-76, Harpers Ferry
563-873-3491, efmo_interpretation@nps.govWaubonsie State Park
2585 Waubonsie Park Rd, Hamburg
712-382-2786, waubonsie@dnr.iowa.govGitchie Manitou State Preserve
52141 Adams Ave, Larchwood
515-725-8200, state_preserves@dnr.iowa.govShimek State Forest
33653 Route J56, Farmington
319-878-3811, shimek_forest@dnr.iowa.gov
Kevin T. Mason, Ph.D., serves as an Assistant Professor of History at Waldorf University in Forest City, and created ‘Notes on Iowa,’ a publicly oriented history project currently exploring the history of Iowa’s public in videos and short-essays available at notesoniowa.com.
This article was originally published in Little Village’s June 2023 issue, Rec’d.
