A CENTURY DRAWS TO A CLOSE

At the beginning of the new year 1898, an article appeared in the Steamboat Rock Echo entitled “An Historic & Business Town.”

In the Friday , January 7 issue Mr. A.S. Root was interviewed and he gave his description of where Steamboat Rock had come from and where it was going. Part of the article has been quoted earlier. It is an appropriate way to close out the 19th century portion of the Steamboat Rock story since it was written so near the end of that century. For that reason it is included in it’s entirety here. 

“One of the most interesting towns in the county, or even the state, is Steamboat Rock, a little town of 650 inhabitants, located on the Iowa Central Railroad, where it crosses the Iowa River four miles above the county capital.” 

“I don’t know where the Steamboat comes in?” Question is often raised.” 

“A.S. Root who located there in January 1857 and built and managed for 28 years the hotel gives the explanation as follows: There is south of the main part of town and just, I believe, inside the corporate limits, a point where a creek flows into the river. At this place in the river bank twenty-five feet high, and there is a sharp turn, making the current of the stream strikes the bank almost square. With the creek washing along there , the water had wore that bank so for a distance of 300 feet, that it looked like the side of a steamboat. As a result Mr. Lesh, so he told me, suggested Steamboat Rock as a name for the town. There was a projection like a wheel house and a pine tree stood on top. Since then lightning struck the tree and the Wheel house projection dropped off so that the place does not retain so distinct an appearance like a steamboat… 

“In 1856 a temporary dam was built and a sawmill put in operation. In March of the following year S.F. Lathrop who died a year ago, bought the water power and went to work on a grist mill. This made Steamboat Rock the business point for farmers within a large radius. And the mill as it is today, entirely remodeled, highly equipped as a modern roller mill and run under the management of Benson and Gearhart, is one of the leading factors of business life at Steamboat Rock. It runs night and day and creates a demand for the produce of farmers bringing them to town and consequently coming there to trade.” 

“If ever Steamboat Rock was a boom it was in 1868 when the railroad, now the Iowa Central was run from Ackley to Eldora and the town was put in touch with the outside business world. The road was built because of coal mining prospects between Steamboat Rock and Eldora. Since then the line has been extended to the south and the town has excellent railroad facilities, the station is one at which the railroad does a large amount of business.” 

“The town has a picturesque location. The mill, depot, and elevators are located in the river valley on the south side of the stream, while the first business house is not reached until the bridge is crossed and the bluff on the north side of the stream is ascended. On this running north and south and parallel to the railroad track is the main street and school and church buildings beyond the business houses.” 

“The business men are conservative but they know a good thing when they see it and conduct their business on lines which meet in a very satisfactory manor the demands of the farmers tributary to them. H.H. Turner, cashier of the Farmers Exchange bank estimates that there is invested in Steamboat Rock business men at the present time about $65,000. The names of the business leaders of the town are conspicuous in the advertising columns of the Steamboat Rock Echo, a feature of the Herald which they say has proven satisfactory to them and to the people of the vicinity.” 

“D.W. Turner has the largest business interests in town, being proprietor of the bank, which although a private institution, has a responsibility of $50,000 and does a large banking business. He also runs the lumber yard and sells coal and buys grain for which he has an elevator, and buys livestock.” 

“Because of its proximity to other towns in the county, Steamboat Rock has a limited farming territory directly dependent for business suppliers. On the north and east the farmers are Germans and on the west and south Americans. Nearly all are prosperous and most of them wealthy. They bring a great amount of grain to Steamboat Rock for shipment.” 

“The school building is one of the most substantial in the county. It is a commodious, two-story building with a basement. It was erected nearly thirty years ago, and was at that time in advance of the buildings of the vicinity and in it’s present condition it is ahead of newer towns. The building has four school rooms, in which 125 pupils are in attendance. One of these rooms is a high school department in which the pupils are instructed in an excellent course which embraces as its highest study geometry. The teachers are: Principal- Miss Hatti Garrison, Grammar department- Miss Edna L. Watson, 1st Primary departmentMiss Lucy Otis, 2nd Primary departmentMrs. V. M. Warrington (note that the latter was married). These teachers are energetic and thorough. “We have a first class school,” says a proud citizen.” 

“There are three churches which are well attended in which there are active members. The Methodist Episcopal has a resident pastor, Rev. C.B. Wright, who is serving his second year on that charge. The meetings of this organization are held in the church just recently built.” 

“The German Baptists have a membership of about ninety and have as pastor in charge Rev. J. DeWeerdt.” 

“The Congregationalists have a church building and hold meetings regularly though the pastor is a nonresident.” 

“An unused church building is owned by the Universalist’s.” 

”The people of the town are respectable, intelligent, law-abiding, churchgoing people, Americans and Germans, being divided about equally, in the 650 who reside there. Population reached that figure many years ago. And since then Steamboat Rock has furnished whole colonies of first class settlers for places further west. There are among the residents of the town quite a number of retired merchants, shop men, and farmers.”