Des Moines, Iowa

Des Moines is the capital and most populous city in the state of Iowa. Once a tiny fort established on American Indian–owned lands, Des Moines has grown into a thriving Midwestern hub with a strong economy primarily based on the insurance industry, a growing arts and culture scene, and a nationally renowned state fair that draws more than one million visitors annually. Des Moines is also the host of the country's first presidential caucuses during each election year—a time when a national spotlight is always trained on this otherwise modest city.

Landscape

The city of Des Moines is located in the south-central part of Iowa and occupies approximately eighty square miles of gently hilly terrain. The city has seventy-six municipal parks that cover more than 3,000 acres; most of this green space is situated along the banks of the two rivers that run through the city.

The climate of Des Moines is continental, meaning that temperatures range widely throughout the year, with bitterly cold winters marked by significant snowfall, and summers that are hot and humid. Des Moines residents occasionally find themselves subject to the effects of severe weather: thunderstorms, tornadoes, snowstorms, and floods are not uncommon phenomena throughout Iowa. In 2008, for instance, flood waters spread through downtown Des Moines when it experienced more than ten inches of total rainfall during the first two weeks of June alone.

Two rivers—the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers—meet and become one in the center of the city, and the busy downtown area of sprawls to the north, east, and west sides of the rivers' confluence. The largest and fastest growing suburb of Des Moines is West Des Moines, a bustling suburban area located about seven miles away from the city center.

People

The earliest immigrants to settle in Des Moines included large numbers of Germans, Norwegians, and Swedes; later in the nineteenth century, they were joined by an influx of Russians, Greeks, Mexicans, and Jews from Eastern Europe, many drawn by the city's mining and meat packing industries. In the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, more and more immigrants from Southeast Asian countries, including Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, have made Des Moines their home. However, the city's population remains predominantly white.

According to the United States Census Bureau estimate, the number of people living in Des Moines in 2022 was 211,034. White residents make up 63.4 percent of the population, approximately 11.8 percent are African Americans, and 6.6 percent are of Asian descent. Of that population, 14.3 percent self-identify as Hispanic or Latino. Although the lands around Fort Des Moines were once owned by the Saux and Fox Native American peoples, less than 1 percent of the city's current population identifies as American Indian (alone or in combination with any other race).

Des Moines has long held a reputation for being a sleepy, unremarkable Midwestern city. In the 2000s, however, the city's thriving economy and growing cultural scene helped it to shake off this characterization somewhat. Nevertheless, the image remains a powerful one. One of Des Moines's famous residents—nonfiction writer Bill Bryson—invoked it with gentle humor in the opening line of his book The Lost Continent: Travels in Small-Town America. "I come from Des Moines," wrote Bryson. "Somebody had to."

Other Des Moines residents who have gone on to achieve national fame include actresses Harriet Nelson and Cloris Leachman. Nelson, together with her husband Ozzie, developed a radio and television comedy that was popular from the 1940s to the 1960s; it was entitled The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet. Leachman was best known for her long running role as Phyllis Lindstrom on the 1970s sitcom The Mary Tyler Moore Show. Shawn Johnson, a 2008 Olympic gold medalist in gymnastics who captured the nation's attention when she competed as part of the American team in Beijing, is a West Des Moines resident.

Economy

The Des Moines economy is largely driven by the success of its insurance and financial services sectors. The city has been a hub for the insurance industry for more than 150 years. Des Moines resident Frederick Marion Hubbell (a prominent Iowan businessman of his time, who moved to the Fort Des Moines area from Connecticut) founded the Equitable Life Insurance Company of Iowa in 1867, and dozens of other life, health, and casualty insurance companies emerged in the years that followed.

Today, the headquarters of dozens of major insurance firms (including Allied Insurance, EMC Insurance, and FBL Financial) are situated in Des Moines, making it one of the largest centers for the insurance industry in the world. In addition, about one hundred other insurance companies have smaller offices here. As a whole, the insurance industry employs thousands of Des Moines residents.

Major employers in the financial services sector in Des Moines include Wells Fargo, Principal Financial Group, and Athene USA Corporation. Although Des Moines—like cities throughout the United States—was subject to the effects of the global economic crisis of 2008–10, the financial and insurance industries recovered from the crisis better than many others. As a result, the city's overall economic outlook remains generally positive.

In addition to the role played by its other industries, the Des Moines economy also receives an extra boost every four years from an unusual source: traditionally, the city is the host of the nation's first presidential caucuses. This status brings it both media attention and a significant number of tourist revenue for hotel rooms, restaurants, and conference venues, as candidates, staffers, and journalists flock to the city to attend the caucuses and the campaign-related events that surround them.

Landmarks

The State Capitol building, with its massive brick and steel dome covered with twenty-three-karat gold leaf and topped with a golden lantern, is one of Des Moines's most recognizable architectural landmarks. Construction on the capitol began in 1871 and was completed in 1886; the original cost of its construction reached nearly $3 million. The building is as impressive inside as it is outside: the interior chambers feature brass and crystal chandeliers, elaborate stone and wood carvings, two dozen fireplaces, and twenty-nine different types of marble inlay.

The grand mansion known as Terrace Hill, built in 1869 by millionaire Benjamin Franklin Allen, is another noted historical structure. At the time of its construction, Terrace Hill was situated on what was the western edge of the city, but urban expansion has surrounded the mansion, which is now used as a residence for the governor of Iowa, into the central downtown area. The ninety-foot tall tower offers a sweeping view of the city.

Other historic sites in Des Moines include the forty-two room Salisbury House, a 1920s mansion built by entrepreneur Carl Weeks and modeled after a Tudor mansion in Salisbury, England, and the Fort Des Moines Museum, the site of the first training center for African American officers and the first Women's Auxiliary Corps. (Fort Des Moines was built in 1901 as a military base and is not to be confused with the small outpost around which the city was originally founded.)

One of the city's most popular attractions is the annual Iowa State Fair, a huge agricultural and industrial exposition that has taken place in Des Moines since 1879 (prior to that, it was held in Fairfield, Iowa), and whose hundreds of livestock shows, contests, events, food stalls, and vendor displays sprawl over an area of four hundred acres. The fair has garnered more than one million visitors each year since 2002, many of whom camp out on the fair's grounds for the duration.

History

The city of Des Moines traces its origins back to 1843, when a military outpost known as Fort Des Moines was set up at the point where the Raccoon River and the Des Moines River (the latter is a major tributary of the Mississippi) meet and become one. The fort's original purpose was to protect the land rights of the tribes living in the area, but after the Native American title to the lands surrounding Fort Des Moines expired, it was not long before white settlers began to move in.

There is some debate over the precise background of the name "Des Moines." One theory holds that it came from an Indian word meaning "river of the mounds," since the banks of the Des Moines River were used as burial grounds by the local tribes. Another explanation is that it comes from a term used by French explorers to refer to the Trappist monks who made their homes near the river's mouth.

After the fort area was opened to settlers in 1845, the settlement grew rapidly. Street planning began in 1847, and a few years later, the town was officially incorporated as Fort Des Moines (the name was shortened to Des Moines in the same year it was declared the state capital). Government and public service buildings, private residences, and new roads sprang up around the city as its population continued to expand at a steady pace.

As the United States entered World War I, the town's growth ground to a halt. Instead, Des Moines acquired a new military camp, Camp Dodge, where many of its young male residents prepared for service overseas. After the war, throngs of returning veterans faced unemployment in Des Moines—but the city's mayor tackled the problem head-on by spearheading a spate of construction projects, including many new schools. The Des Moines economy remained resilient in spite of the onset of the Great Depression of the 1930s, and the city's infrastructure benefited from federal projects designed to put Americans back to work.

Though World War II saw Des Moines hit by food shortages and the loss of many of its young men, the city once again weathered the storm. In the decades following World War II, the city blossomed into its current role as a hub for insurance companies, and the city's economy as a whole grew by leaps and bounds.

Present-day Des Moines is a bustling city perhaps most famous (after its insurance companies and presidential caucuses) for having an extensive system of climate-controlled enclosed skywalks that conveniently link dozens of downtown buildings. The Des Moines Skywalk system spans a total of four miles of walkway and was opened in 1982. In the late 2000s and early 2010s, Microsoft, Facebook, and other tech companies opened data centers in and around Des Moines, and in 2013, Forbes magazine placed Des Moines at the top of its list of the best places for business and careers in the United States. In the magazine’s 2019 rankings, the city was placed at number ten.

Bibliography

“About Des Moines.” City of Des Moines, 2024, www.dsm.city/departments/city‗manager‗s‗office/about‗des‗moines.php. Accessed 23 Feb. 2024.

“Des Moines (City), Iowa.” United States Census Bureau, www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/desmoinescityiowa/. Accessed 23 Feb. 2024.

“Historical Highlights of the Iowa State Fair.” Iowa State Fair. Iowa State Fair, 2015. Web. 16 Sept. 2015.

Ossian, Lisa L. The Depression Dilemmas of Rural Iowa, 1929–1933. Columbia: U of Missouri P, 2011. Print.

Weatherford, Doris. “Des Moines, Fort.” American Women during World War II: An Encyclopedia. 127–29. New York: Routledge, 2010. Print.

Whitaker, William E., ed. Forts of Iowa: Indians, Traders, and Soldiers, 1682–1862. Iowa City: U of Iowa P, 2009. Print.