History of Iowa

Although Native Americans have occupied what is now Iowa for 13,000 years, the written history of Iowa begins with the protohistoric accounts of Native Americans by explorers such as Marquette and Joliet in the 1680s. Until the early 19th century Iowa was occupied exclusively by Indians and a few European traders, with loose political control by France and Spain. Iowa became part of the United States of America after the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, but uncontested U.S. control over what is now Iowa occurred only after the War of 1812 and after a series of treaties eliminated Indians claims on the state. Beginning in the 1830s American settlements appeared in the Iowa Territory, U.S. statehood was acquired in 1846, and by 1860 almost the entire state was settled and farmed. Subsistence frontier farming was replaced by commodity farming after the construction of railroad networks in the 1850s and 1860s. Iowa contributed a disproportionate amount of young men to fight in the American Civil War, afterwards they returned to help transform Iowa into an agricultural powerhouse, supplying food to the rest of the nation. The industrialization of agriculture and the emergence of centralized commodities markets in the late 19th century and 20th centuries led to a shift towards larger farms and the decline of the small family farm, this was exacerbated during the Great Depression. Industrial production became a larger part of the economy during World War II and the postwar economic boom. In the 1970s and 1980s a series of economic shocks, including the oil crisis, the 1980s farm crisis, and the Early 1980s recession led to the collapse of commodities prices, a decline in rural and state population, and rural flight. Iowa’s economy rebounded in the 1990s, emerging as a modern mixed economy dominated by industry, commerce, finance and in which agriculture is a comparatively small component. Iowa’s population is now predominately urban and has been increasing since the 1990s at a faster rate than the U.S. as a whole, although rural flight continues to be a problem.