Iowa may have been the scene of only one minor skirmish during the Civil War, but historians and live-action roleplayers stage battles in the state annually to highlight Iowa’s larger role in the fight to end slavery and preserve the union. The Jackson County Historical Society gathered historians, schoolkids and dozens of Civil War reenactors […]
Civil War history
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Plain Spoken: This ever-evolving American anthem recalls Iowa’s abolitionist glory days
In keeping with tradition, one dramatic beat of the presidential inauguration in January was the Naval Academy Glee Club’s performance of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.” While it was standard inaugural fare, it was also, of course, a nauseating co-optation. A song of solidarity, bravery and liberation — an alternative national anthem — was […]
Posted inCommunity/News
The history of Iowa City’s Lucas Farms neighborhood is long, colorful, sometimes ‘outlandish’ — and the subject of this weekend’s festivities
This weekend, one of Iowa City’s oldest neighborhoods is celebrating its history as the Lucas Farms Neighborhood Association holds its annual History Days. “Our neighborhood is absolutely loaded with history,” Judy Nyren, one of the organizers of History Days, told Little Village. Nyren has lived in the neighborhood for over 40 years and has extensively dug […]
Posted inCommunity/News
This Juneteenth comes at a critical moment for freedom, truth and civil rights protections in Iowa
“All Quad Citizens Come Celebrate Freedom,” the posters said, inviting people to a two-day celebration of Juneteenth in Davenport in 1989. The street-fest that year on Saturday, June 17 and the history-themed event on Sunday, June 18 made up the first community celebration in Iowa of Juneteenth to grow into an annual event. Thirty-five years […]
Posted inCommunity/News
How the Clark family of Muscatine helped desegregate schools in Iowa — and nationwide
There’s fascinating history to be found in Muscatine. Before adopting the name Mark Twain, Samuel Clemens briefly wrote for the Muscatine Journal while his brother was the paper’s editor. Long before Field of Dreams, it saw some of America’s earliest minor-league baseball teams take the field. Neither Twain nor those teams left much of a […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Four historic sites illuminate Iowa’s role in the Underground Railroad
For the enslaved people in Missouri and Kansas before the Civil War, the path to freedom often ran through Iowa. The crisis of 1820 over how far slavery should be allowed to expand in the territories of the United States acquired in the Louisiana Purchase had set the northern limit for slavery at the border […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Your Village: Why there’s a statue of a nude woman facing the Iowa State Capitol
My friend says he read somewhere that Des Moines has the most erotic statue in the world. I moved here a few months ago, and have seen zero erotic statues. Do you know what he’s talking about? —CG, Des Moines It’s probably not the most erotic statue in the world, but in his iconic memoir […]
