Iowa Has a Cancer Problem—and Nobody Can Explain Why

 

Iowa has a cancer problem.

The state has the second-highest cancer rate in the country. From 2018 through 2022, it averaged 499 new cases for every 100,000 people. The national average was 449.

If you packed 100,000 people into a football stadium, 50 more Iowans would get cancer than the average American crowd.

Only Kentucky has a higher rate.

Here’s what should really bother Iowans. Cancer rates have been dropping across much of the country, but Iowa is going the other way.

The 2026 Cancer in Iowa report estimates 21,700 Iowans will be diagnosed with invasive cancer this year—6,400 will die from it. Five years ago, the state estimated 18,900 new cases.

Iowa is getting older, and cancer is more common as people age. Researchers know that. That’s why cancer rates are adjusted for age, making it possible to compare Iowa fairly with younger states.

Even after that adjustment, Iowa is still near the bottom of the pack.

Researchers know which cancers are driving the numbers. Figuring out why is proving much harder.

Melanoma is one of the biggest problems.

Davenport Man Witnesses Wilbur Wright Flying At Le Mans France

 

The Daily Times. February 1, 1909.

In February 1909, the Davenport Daily Times talked with Dr. A. L. Hageboeck, who’d seen something few Americans could imagine—an airplane in flight.

 

Hageboeck had spent three days in Le Mans, France, watching Wilbur Wright fly, and what he saw left him shaken.

 

He said the real secret of the Wright brothers’ success was simple, almost too simple. The canvas wings of the machine could be tilted up or down at either end, allowing the pilot to adjust to the wind—just like a bird shifting its wings in flight.

 

That one idea changed everything.

 

He said Wilbur Wright wasn’t polished or impressive in the usual sense. He was thirty-five years old, tall, awkward, and quiet. There was nothing graceful about him. He barely spoke.