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.
