They said, "The Hope Boys, a company of juvenile boys was organized in 1879." C. E. Hollister built a small hand pump known as the Water Lily (pictured above). The firefighters pictured left to right are: Charles Newton, Bert Hitt, Elmer Cobb, Henry Williams, E. Newton, Dell Chapin, William Ewald, Lew Johnson, George Beck, Jr., Frank Miller, and Dan Cobb.
The Seagrave fire truck pictured below was one of the motorized vehicles that replaced the horse drawn vehicle.
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| (Des Moines Register. July 15, 1906) |
The first automobile in Des Moines landed in W.
W. Sears’ lap, almost by mistake.
Debeltrand Grocery meant to raffle it off. Then
they went broke.
Sears grabbed the car and drove it to the
fairgrounds. Bad idea—if he wanted to stay unnoticed. Every stop turned into a
crowd. People swarmed it. Stared. Asked questions. Couldn’t believe it moved
without horses.
He cruised the streets daily, drawing bigger
crowds each time.
Not long after that, J.O. Wells, W.E. Hamilton,
Webster Bishop, and a handful of others jumped in and formed the Des Moines
Automobile Club. Thirteen members. Most didn’t own a car yet—but they planned
on getting one.
The club didn’t last a year, but that didn’t
matter. The automobile wasn’t going anywhere.
(Unfortunately,
the paper didn’t give a date on when
Sears acquired the automobile. My best guess would be 1900. The paper noted
several claims against the company for unpaid debts)
Elmwood Dairy was
part of the routine in Clinton.
You didn’t think about milk. It just showed up.
The truck rolled through in the early morning before sunrise. Bottles clinked.
A crate hit the porch. By the time you opened the door, it was already
there—cold glass, cream sitting on top, paper cap waiting to be popped.
Empty bottles went out. The driver grabbed them,
dropped off full ones, and moved on. Same houses. Same route. Every day.
The milk came from farms right outside town. It
got processed, bottled, and out the door fast. What you drank that morning
hadn’t traveled far.
Chocolate milk tasted like a reward, not sugar
water. Ice cream wasn’t mass-produced mush. And if you were a kid, that
delivery box felt like a treasure chest when something extra showed up.
The milkman wasn’t a stranger. He knew which
houses had kids, which ones needed an extra quart, and which porch had a loose
step.
Eating out used to meet something
different. You didn’t rush. You sat down, grabbed a tray, or waited for a
carhop.
Some
of these places were everywhere. Others were local legends. Most are gone
now—but people still talk about them.
Bishop’s
Buffet (1930s–1990s).
If you grew up in Iowa, you ate at Bishop’s. Cafeteria line, trays, mashed
potatoes, fried chicken, pie at the end. It was cheap, and
everywhere—especially in malls.
You
could feed a family without thinking about it. And the best part was everyone
got what they wanted, no arguing about where to go.
They threw the towel in as fast
food got faster, malls declined, and buffet-style dining felt dated.
As a kid, you wanted McDonald’s. Maybe Henry’s. That felt like a
win—bright, loud, fast, and fun. Instead, you got dragged to Bishop’s.
Not that Bishop’s Buffet was bad. It just wasn’t
cool. No Happy Meals. No noise. No reason for a kid to get excited. It was
where your parents and grandparents went.
You’d walk in already annoyed.
Then the smell hit you. Roast beef, fried chicken,
rolls, gravy, something sweet in the background. That helped.
Before malls came along and pulled everything
under one roof, you went downtown. Not once in a while. All the time. And if
you were in Cedar Rapids, Killian’s was part of that trip whether or not you
planned it.
You didn’t walk in thinking, “I need to buy
something.” You walked in because it was there. Because everyone went in, and
it felt like something was happening inside.
Enormous doors. That blast of cooler air in the
summer. That department store smell—clothes, perfume, candy, all mixed together.
And if you were a kid, you weren’t thinking about
shopping. You were heading straight for the escalator.
Up. Down. Up again. No reason. Nobody stopped you
unless you got stupid about it. Same deal with the elevators. Half the fun was
just riding them. If there was an operator in there, even better. It felt like
you were getting away with something.
There was a time when
fast food wasn’t something you just grabbed between errands.
You kind of
had to earn it.
Long bike
ride. Ball game. Wandering around all afternoon with nothing to do. Or hauling
a pile of return bottles down the street, hoping you didn’t drop one and lose
your lunch money.
Nobody
talked about “the experience.” Nobody cared. You were hungry. You had a little
money. That was enough.
Somehow it
always tasted better because of that.
These three
places stuck with me. They’re gone now. Most people wouldn’t even recognize the
names.
But if you
grew up with them, you don’t forget.
A&P — The Giant
That Felt Like Everywhere
A&P got
its start in 1859 selling tea and coffee. By the time your grandparents were
pushing a cart, A&P had turned grocery shopping into an art. Straight
aisles. Neat stacks. Labels facing forward. Everything in its place.
It felt
efficient. Maybe a little stiff. But it worked.
A&P
pushed its brands hard. Eight O’clock Coffee. Ann Page. Those names were
everywhere you looked. They were cheaper. People trusted them. And you could
fill a cart and never touch a name brand.
People
planned meals around their weekly ads. If pork chops were on sale, you ate pork
chops that week. Simple as that.
Then things changed. Stores got bigger. Flashier. More relaxed. A&P felt old while everything around it felt new.
By the 70s
it was slipping. By the 80s it was in trouble. It hung on for years, but the
spark was gone. When it finally shut down in 2015, it felt less like a shock
and more like the end of a long fade.
Still, for a
long time, A&P wasn’t just a grocery store. It was the grocery
store.
Lee County looks like the place where
nothing much happens. River towns. Brick streets. People who wave when they
pass you. Then True Crime in Lee County, Iowa by Robert Turek steps in and
says, “Look closer.”
This
book doesn’t shout. It leans in.
You
get brothers turning on each other. Bank jobs that shake whole towns. Murders
that don’t sit right, even years later. The cases that never really end—they
just go quiet for a while.
What
works here is the feeling. These aren’t distant stories. They’re close.
Familiar. You can picture the streets. The houses. The neighbors who suddenly
have something to hide.
There’s
a steady shadow running through it all—the Iowa State Penitentiary. Old, heavy,
unavoidable. You can feel its presence in the background, like it’s part of
every story, whether or not it’s mentioned.
The
writing keeps things moving. Clean. Direct. No wasted space. It gives you just
enough detail to pull you in, then lets your mind do the rest. Some stories hit
fast. Others linger, especially the ones without answers.
That’s
the hook. Not everything gets wrapped up. Some of these cases stay open. Stay
uneasy.
By
the end, you start looking at small towns a little differently.
Quiet
doesn’t mean safe.
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| Des Moines Tribune. August 29, 1925 |
Langford, age 22, had a batting average of .350 and was the leading scorer in the league. The Des Moines Tribune said he was a long-distance hitter and averaged a home run in every games as well as several doubles and triples.
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| (colorized photo from the Des Moines Register. April 15, 1928) |
Breithaupt's other passion was cooking. He worked in the kitchen at the Hotel Savery III in Des Moines, where he cooked and trained new chefs in the culinary arts. He told his students, "A meal correctly combined, scientifically prepared, and properly masticated is necessary for a healthy body."
In his spare time, he lectured at schools and clubs on food preperation, recipes, and health.
He was fifty years ahead of his time in his belief that one day, high schools would train young men to be chefs and food scientists.
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| The Davenport Democrat and Leader. February 5, 1911. |
Here's another great advertisement featuring early automobiles from 1911. Do you think every car they built was a convertible? or did they just look good in the ad?
Klemme Auto Company was located on Brady Street in Davenport, Iowa, and carried Buick and Oldsmobile vehicles.
