This monthly column will explore the long and diverse history of literature’s Midwestern engagements. There is an established canon of American literature in which the Midwest plays heavily, as a both physical and social place.
Iowa history
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Iowa is steeped in cinema history — and historic cinemas. But keeping an indie theater ticking isn’t easy
In Tommy Haines’ and Andrew Sherburne’s 2017 documentary Saving Brinton, Iowa history teach Mike Zahs discovers a treasure trove of old film reels in a farm basement, including rare footage of Teddy Roosevelt and a never-before-seen film by Georges Méliès (A Trip to the Moon, The Impossible Voyage). Zahs then embarks on an international odyssey […]
Posted inFood & Drink
Centennial Iowa Snacks: Palmer Candy Company has focused on one product — the Bing — for 100 years
The Twin Bing is an Iowa icon, handmade in Sioux City for more than a century. What it isn’t, really, is a candy bar, even though the packaging says “candy bar” and it’s made by the Palmer Candy Company. Palmer was trying to break into America’s booming candy bar market when it introduced the first […]
Posted inFood & Drink
Centennial Iowa Snacks: Unlike a certain chip giant, Sterzing’s in Burlington has put quality over quantity since the ’30s
Barney Sterzing never meant to get into the potato chip business. In 1933, when he started the Burlington company that produces the iconic chips that bear his family name, it was the Sterzing Candy Company. But summers in Burlington are hot, and keeping a company going in the midst of the Great Depression was hard […]
Posted inFood & Drink
Centennial Iowa Snacks: The oldest popcorn company in the country is still poppin’ in Sioux City
Popcorn was already popular when Cloid Smith started selling it out of his home in Sioux City 110 years ago. It was cheap; it was tasty. And it’s been eaten in the Americas for thousands of years in a variety of ways. Archaeologists working in Peru found the remains of ears of popcorn dating back […]
Posted inCommunity/News
This 159-year-old bonsai is living its best life at the Greater Des Moines Botanical Garden
There are, of course, no bonsai seeds — only bonsai trees. Most tree species can be “trained” to become bonsai through a sophisticated, often obsessive process of cutting, potting, pruning, wiring and styling a plant into a miniature, meticulously sculpted version of itself. The art form is rooted in centuries of Japanese and Chinese tradition, […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Bison made the prairie what it was. Iowa conservationists hope they can do it again.
According to the National Park Service, the tallgrass prairie is “one of the rarest and most endangered ecosystems in the world.” It once covered 167 million acres in the middle of North America, stretching from the Red River Valley in Canada into Texas. Only about 4 percent of the tallgrass prairie that existed before the […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
At LIAL, queer history is an ever-growing hodgepodge of letters, diaries, doodles, recipes, magazines and ‘GAY ART’
My best friend Valentine will sometimes text me a picture of a page from his old journal. We’ve been friends a long time. Last fall he sent me a page, a beautiful letter — he still writes entries like the poets do, formally — in which he gushes about the sanctity of queerness, of our […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
TrekFest 39 is sure to be a Trilling experience for ‘Deep Space Nine’ fans
Update: After a long delay—perhaps caused by subspace interference, tachyon particles, or communications jamming technology—the U.S.S. Little Village has received answers to interview questions posed by Acting Ensign Rob Cline to Terry Farrell, who portrayed Jadzia Daz on Star Trek: Deep Space 9, just in time for this weekend’s TrekFest event in Riverside, Iowa. What […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Monkee Micky Dolenz plans to play the hits ‘exactly as people remember them’ — and then some — at the Surf Ballroom on Sept. 13
Editor’s note: Dolenz’s May 24, 2024 performance and meet-and-greet at the Surf was rescheduled for Friday, Sept. 13 at 7 p.m. The headline of this article has been updated with the new date. When Micky Dolenz sets foot on the stage of Clear Lake’s Surf Ballroom, the last living member of the Monkees knows that […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Photo Gallery: African American Museum of Iowa holds grand reopening
The African American Museum of Iowa (AAMI) reopened on Saturday after being closed for renovations since 2022. The $5 million renovation project included changes to the building, such as constructing a new main entrance and expanding the lobby, as well as the addition of an interactive genealogy lab, which will help people research the history […]
Posted inCommunity/News
When the Iowa women’s basketball team packed Carver — in 1985
For most of her 62 years, “nobody cared about women’s basketball,” Lisa Bluder has said, especially when compared to the phenomenon it is today. Athletic scholarships were practically nonexistent before 1972. Attendance could range from a few dozen to a few hundred. Uniforms and facilities were often less than ideal. But the sport still had […]
