Council Bluffs

Council Bluffs is a city in and the county seat of Pottawattamie County, Iowa, United States. It is located on the east bank of the Missouri River, across from what is now the much larger city of Omaha, Nebraska. Council Bluffs was known until 1852 as Kanesville, Iowa — the historic starting point of the Mormon Trail and eventual northernmost anchor town of the other emigrant trails.

Council Bluffs' population was 62,230 at the 2010 census. Along with neighboring Omaha to the west, Council Bluffs was part of the 60th-largest metropolitan area in the United States in 2010, which had an estimated population of 865,350 residing in the eight counties of the Omaha-Council Bluffs metropolitan area.

Council Bluffs is more than a decade older than Omaha. The latter, founded in 1854 by Council Bluffs businessmen and speculators following the Kansas-Nebraska Act, has grown to be the significantly larger city.

History

1804–1843 - Pottawatomi Reservation

The first Council Bluff name (singular) was actually on the Nebraska side of the river at Fort Atkinson (Nebraska) about 20 miles northwest of the current Council Bluffs. It was named by Lewis and Clark for a bluff where they met with the Otoe tribe on August 2, 1804.

The Iowa side became an Indian Reservation for members of the Council of Three Fires of Chippewa, Ottawa and Potawatomi who were forced to vacate the Chicago area in the Treaty of Chicago in 1833/1835 clearing the way for that city to incorporate.

The largest contingent of Native Americans moving to the area were the Pottawatomi who were led by Sauganash ("one who speaks English") whose father was a British loyalist William Caldwell who founded Canadian communities on the north side of the Detroit River and whose mother was a Native American. The band of about 1,000 to 2,000 seeking to avoid confrontation with the Sioux who were natives of the Council Bluffs area initially settled further south in Indian Territory on the east side of the Missouri River between Leavenworth, Kansas and St. Joseph, Missouri.

When this area was bought from Ioway, Sac and Fox tribes in the Platte Purchase to become part of Missouri in 1837, Sauganash and the Pottawatomi were forced to move to their official reservation in Council Bluffs. Sauganash's English name was Billy Caldwell and the village came to be called Caldwell's Camp. The group was sometimes called the Bluff Indians. The U.S. Dragoons built a small fort nearby.

In 1838–39, the missionary Pierre-Jean De Smet founded St. Joseph's Mission to minister to the Potawatomi. De Smet was appalled by the violence and brutality caused by the whiskey trade, and tried to protect the tribe from unscrupulous traders. However, he had little success in persuading tribal members to convert to Christianity and resorted to secret baptisms of Indian children.

During this time, De Smet contributed to Joseph Nicollet’s work in mapping the upper midwest. De Smet produced the first European-recorded, detailed map of the Council Bluffs area; it detailed the Missouri River valley system, from below the Platte River to the Big Sioux River.

De Smet wrote an early description of the Potawatomi settlement, which captures his bias:

"Imagine a great number of cabins and tents, made of the bark of trees, buffalo skins, coarse cloth, rushes and sods, all of a mournful and funeral aspect, of all sizes and shapes, some supported by one pole, others having six, and with the covering stretched in all the different styles imaginable, and all scattered here and there in the greatest confusion, and you will have an Indian village."

As more native Americans were pushed into the Council Bluffs area by pressure of European-American settlement to the east, inter-tribal conflict increased, fueled by the illegal whiskey trade. The US Army built Fort Croghan in 1842, to keep order and try to control liquor traffic on the Missouri River. However that fort was destroyed in a flood the same year.

By 1846 the Pottawatomi were forced to move again to a new reservation at Osawatomie, Kansas.

1844–1851 - Mormon Community of Kanesville

In 1844, the Stephens-Townsend-Murphy Party crossed the Missouri River here, on their way to blaze a new path into California across the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Beginning in 1846, there was a large influx of Latter-day Saints into the area, although in the winter of 1847–1848 most Latter-day Saints crossed to the Nebraska side of the Missouri River. Initially, the area was called "Miller's Hollow", after Henry W. Miller, who would be the first member of the Iowa State Legislature from the area. Miller also was the foreman for the construction of the Kanesville Tabernacle.

By 1848, the town had become known as Kanesville, named for benefactor Thomas L. Kane, who had helped negotiate in Washington, DC federal permission for the Mormons to use Indian land along the Missouri for their winter encampment of 1846–47. Built at or next to Caldwell's Camp, Kanesville became the main outfitting point for the Mormon Exodus to Utah, and it is the recognized head end of the Mormon Trail.

Edwin Carter, who would become a noted naturalist in Colorado, worked here from 1848–1859 in a dry goods store. He helped supply Mormon wagon trains.

Settlers departing west from Kanesville, into the sparsely settled, unorganized parts of the Territory of Missouri to the Oregon Country and the newly conquered California Territory, through the (eventual) Nebraska Territory, traveled by wagon trains along the much-storied Oregon, Mormon, or California Trails into the newly expanded United States western lands.

After the first large organized wagon trains left Missouri in 1841, the annual migration waves began in earnest by spring of 1843. They built up, thereafter, with the opening of the Mormon Trail (1846) until peaking in the later 1860s, when news of railroad's progress had a braking effect.

By the 1860s, virtually all migration wagon trains were passing near the renamed town. The wagon train trails became less important with the advent of the first complete transcontinental railway in 1869, but while trail use diminished after that, their use continued on at lesser rates until late in the nineteenth century.

The Mormon Battalion began their march from Kanesville to California during the Mexican–American War. This was where their practice of plural marriage was first openly practiced. Orson Hyde began publishing The Frontier Guardian newspaper, and Brigham Young was sustained as the second president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS church). The community was transformed by the California Gold Rush, and the majority of Mormons left for Utah by 1852.

1852-1900 Council Bluffs and Beginning of Railroad Era

In 1852, the town was renamed Council Bluffs. It continued as a major outfitting point on the Missouri for the Emigrant Trail and Pike's Peak Gold Rush, and entertained a lively steamboat trade.

Council Bluffs (rather than Omaha) was selected by Abraham Lincoln designated as the official starting point of the transcontinental railroad which was completed in 1869. The official "Mile 0" start is at 21st Street and 9th Avenue which is now marked by a gold spike that used for the promotion of the movie Union Pacific Council Bluffs physical connection to the Transcontinental Railroad was delayed until 1872 when the Union Pacific Missouri River Bridge opened (railroad cars had to be ferried across the Missouri River from Council Bluffs to Omaha in the early days of the Transcontinental).

The Chicago and North Western Railway arrived 1867. Other railroads operating in the city came to include the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad, Chicago Great Western Railway, Wabash Railroad, Illinois Central Railroad, Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad and the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad.

1900–present

In 1926, the portion of Council Bluffs west of the Missouri River seceded to form Carter Lake, Iowa. Carter Lake had been cut off by a change in the course of the Missouri River.

By the 1930s, Council Bluffs had grown into the country's fifth largest rail center. The railroads helped the city become a center for grain storage, and massive grain elevators continue to mark the city's skyline. Other industries in the city included Blue Star Foods, Dwarfies Cereal, Frito-Lay, Georgie Porgie Cereal, Giant Manufacturing, Kimball Elevators, Mona Motor Oil, Monarch, Reliance Batteries, Woodward's Candy, and World Radio. During the 1940s, Meyer Lansky operated a greyhound racing track in Council Bluffs.

Restructuring of the railroad industry caused the loss of many jobs after the mid-20th century, as did the restructuring of heavy industry. Many jobs moved offshore. By the late 20th century the city and region were suffering economic stagnation and a declining population, as they struggled to develop a new economy. Downtown urban renewal was undertaken to create a new future while emphasizing the strengths of heritage.

Geography

Council Bluffs is located at 41°15′13″N 95°51′45″W / 41.25361°N 95.86250°W / 41.25361; -95.86250 (41.253698, −95.862388).

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 43.62 square miles (112.98 km2), of which 40.97 square miles (106.11 km2) is land and 2.65 square miles (6.86 km2) is water.

Council Bluffs covers a unique topographic region originally composed of prairie and savanna in the Loess Hills with extensive wetlands and deciduous forest along the Missouri River. Excellent vistas can be had from KOIL Point at Fairmont Park, the Lincoln Monument, Kirn Park, and the Lewis and Clark Monument. Lake Manawa State Park is located at the southern edge of the city.

For the 1820s era United States Army outpost, see Fort Atkinson (Nebraska).

Environmental problems

In 2010, the Iowa Department of Natural Resources found that air in central Council Bluffs measured above the national air quality standard for lead, most likely due to lead emissions in this area by Griffin Pipe Products Company. In 2011, EPA found numerous violations of the Clean Water Act, because the plant's contaminated stormwater commingled with treated process wastewater and was pumped out to the storm sewer, which discharged into the Missouri River.

Arts and culture

Council Bluffs is the location of the Pottawattamie County "Squirrel Cage" Jail, in use from 1885 until 1969, which is one of three remaining examples of a Rotary Jail. Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, it was built as a rotary jail with pie-shaped cells on a turntable somewhat based on Jeremy Bentham's panopticon. To access individual cells, the jailer turned a crank to rotate the cylinder until the desired cell lined up with a fixed opening on each floor. According to the Historical Society of Pottawattamie County, the Squirrel Cage Jail is the only three-story rotary jail constructed. Although the rotary mechanism was disabled in 1960, the building remained the county jail for another nine years. Similar, smaller examples of the concept can be seen in Crawfordsville, Indiana and Gallatin, Missouri.

The city's strong ties to the railroad industry are commemorated by three local museums. The Union Pacific Museum is located in the former Council Bluffs Free Public Library (a Carnegie library), at Pearl Street and Willow Avenue; the Grenville Dodge Home is on Third Street; and the RailsWest Railroad Museum is at South Main Street and Sixteenth Avenue. RailsWest is housed in an 1899 Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad passenger depot later shared with the Milwaukee Road, which was used by the Rocky Mountain Rocket, the Arrow, and the Midwest Hiawatha. RailsWest features an outdoor display of historic train cars, including a Railway Post Office car, two steam locomotives, two cabooses, a Burlington Lounge car, and a 1953 switcher produced by the Plymouth Locomotive Works.

The Iowa West Foundation, the charitable wing of the local gambling industry, funded a public art planning process for Council Bluffs in 2004 that emphasized a 2015 goal for the city to become "a prosperous urban area known for its cultural enlightenment and public art collection."

To this end the city renovated Bayliss Park in downtown, which was re-dedicated in early 2007 with a new fountain dubbed Wellspring. Its performance pavilion, known as Oculus, was designed by sculptor Brower Hatcher. This was the first installation of the Iowa West Public Art, a foundation established during the Public Art Master Planning process. The Iowa West Foundation then established IWPA along with public art website. In 2008 a 50-foot (15 m)-tall Molecule Man sculpture by Jonathan Borofsky was installed at the Mid-America Center; nearby sculptures were designed by William King and Jun Kaneko. Albert Paley designed elements of the nearby South 24th Street bridge at Exit 1B of the combined Interstate 29 and Interstate 80 at Council Bluffs and Ed Carpenter designed Gateway for the West Broadway viaduct. Artist Dan Corson and the Big Mo by Mark di Suvero are featured at Tom Hanfan's River's Edge Park along the banks of the Missouri River.

Council Bluffs is also home to the Chanticleer Community Theater, TVI Filtration Corporation (a major supplier of discount automotive products), and Hamilton College (Iowa) which is now part of Kaplan University – Council Bluffs.

The black squirrel is the city's mascot. John James Audubon reported the squirrels in 1843, along the Missouri River at Council Bluffs.

For one week in late July/early August, the annual Pottawattamie County Fair is held at Westfair grounds. There are carnival rides, concerts, gun shows, tractor races, and a queen contest.

Transportation

The city is well served by Interstate 80, Interstate 29, U.S. Route 6, and the Loess Hills National Scenic Byway. The Union Pacific, BNSF, Iowa Interstate, and Canadian National Railroads all connect in Council Bluffs and carry important freight traffic. MidAmerican Energy has a large coal-burning power plant near the southern city limits.