May 13

Court clears way for Preston, East Central vote

Posted on Sunday, May 13, 2012, at 4:41 PM by Jeff

The Iowa Supreme Court ruled Friday (QC Times), months after the initial case and after East Central started a sharing agreement with Northeast.

The Preston-East Central combination, which supporters would like to call Easton Valley*, has had its viability called into question. Consultants from UNI recommended a Northeast-East Central matchup, similar to what happened while the court case worked its way through, but didn’t study Preston-East Central or a tripleheader. The tripleheader would conceivably be the best option simply because it would give all three districts control of their own destiny rather than be forced into merger or dissolution. (No matter what, of the four buildings involved, at least one would close, likely the 1882(!) elementary in Sabula.)

*I suppose that as far as artificial portmanteaus go, it could be worse. Or does it count as a form of adaptation decay, in which the sense of the original gets lost? There’s no “Easton River,” which the “Valley” implies. I’d suggest “East Iowa” since it will be the state’s easternmost district, and would work with either proposed combination or the tripleheader. (East Central is actually northeast of Northeast.)

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May 11

Border War license plate?

Posted on Friday, May 11, 2012, at 6:12 PM by Jeff

A Missouri representative has agreed to sponsor the process to get a University of Kansas specialty plate in the state of Missouri.

Missouri is already offering one for the University of Arkansas.

If the wrong bumper sticker could get your car into trouble in some places, imagine what this would do to one in Columbia and Jefferson City.

(h/t CBS Sports)

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May 11

Post offices saved, but too late for Buckingham

Posted on Friday, May 11, 2012, at 2:33 PM by Jeff

A day late and a dollar 45-cent stamp short, I know. Kyle Munson has been on it.

This is the list of reduced hours. (PDF, organized by ZIP code and state abbreviaion) It includes a lot of those places that were on The List, and more — Aplington, Dike, and Reinbeck are also going to have their time cut.

Although Lincoln lost its final appeal, the final decision was late enough that it fell under the closure moratorium. It will, however, have its hours per day reduced from six to two. It is too late for Buckingham, which now has a “For Sale” sign on its empty building. The only sign it was a post office are the naked flagpole and the town name and ZIP code written on the window.

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May 10

License plate countdown — ZIJ

Posted on Thursday, May 10, 2012, at 11:00 PM by Jeff

On April 2, I said, “It’s possible a driver with an A/B/C/E plate could renew this year and bookend the series.” I have now seen it happen — an E vehicle became a Z (with different letters than the combo in the title).

 

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May 10

The Iowa State Hawkeyes

Posted on Thursday, May 10, 2012, at 1:14 AM by Jeff

The AP’s Oklahoma City bureau needs a copy editor for this story about suspended players:

Jackson had career-highs in receptions with three and 45 yards receiving against Iowa State in the Insight Bowl.

Oklahoma played Iowa in last year’s Insight Bowl. Oklahoma also played Iowa State in the regular season.

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May 08

Complete chronology of Iowa counties

Posted on Tuesday, May 8, 2012, at 1:58 PM by Jeff


Iowa at statehood, 1846 (Flickr)

It seems like most of Iowa’s county histories are ever only organized by individual county. This provides good detail for each separately, but hurts when you are trying to think of the “big picture” of Iowa’s westward expansion.

I was going to fill in that gap, creating a timeline of when counties were created, county seats named, and so forth, only to find a pleasant surprise: It’s been done. The writer found sources and legislative acts specifying each date a county was created or changed.

There’s no need for me to duplicate that work, so I’ll have to change my focus. A timeline just of county seats will be about as informative.

Bonus: In searching for an image for this blog entry, I found a couple of maps that show one of the proposed but not approved state boundaries, the one that went into Minnesota but not to the Missouri River. More research on that later.

Posted in Geography, Iowa Miscellaneous | Comments Off on Complete chronology of Iowa counties
May 06

That would have been awkward

Posted on Sunday, May 6, 2012, at 3:14 PM by Jeff

Davis County Iowa, along the Missouri border, was named in 1843 for Garret Davis, a U.S. representative from Kentucky. But if the luck of the draw had gone another way, it would have created historical confusion for generations to come. This is from a history by a Davis County recorder:

“The name Bloomfield was pulled out of a hat. The other choices were Jefferson and Davis.”

So Iowa almost had a city of Jefferson in the county of Davis less than 20 years before the Civil War. At the time, Jefferson Davis was an officer in the U.S. Army, not yet a U.S. representative from Mississippi, secretary of war, or president of the Confederate States of America.

Whichever Davis the county was actually named after, the association surely would have been too strong for residents to bear after 1860, especially with rebels at their doorstep — Davis County was “invaded” by Confederates in 1864 (bottom of page). The name of the county seat would have had to be changed. Lincoln, perhaps?

Posted in Geography, Iowa Miscellaneous | Comments Off on That would have been awkward
May 05

Idaho president speaks his mind

Posted on Saturday, May 5, 2012, at 11:38 PM by Jeff

The University of Idaho football team moved up from I-AA with Boise State in 1996, but since then their fortunes have wildly diverged. Now Boise State is wedging its way into the BCS (just as it ceases to exist) while Idaho is in real danger of having no alternative than going back down to I-AA.

The Vandals are in the middle of a WAC-tastrophe. Idaho’s home conference has been pillaged by the Mountain West (again) and the Sun Belt, leaving it holding the bag with New Mexico State.

With just about nothing to lose, the university’s president, Duane Nellis, took a shot at the 800-pound television network in the room: “As you well know TV networks like ESPN are now running major college athletic affiliations not the NCAA.” His whole letter is at the link.

It’s not the first time someone has openly said that. Remember when Boston College’s athletics director said the ACC added Pittsburgh and Syracuse because “ESPN told us what to do” and then had to retract the statement?

I’m in the middle of reading Those Guys Have All the Fun, a history of ESPN with interviews from the people who were there. In 30 years, the network has gone from begging the NCAA to let it carry basketball games to determining structural components of college athletics. It is, to be blunt, a little scary how much power it wields.

Why am I bringing up a quote from the president of the University of Idaho on a website concerned about Iowa? It should be pretty obvious:  Iowa State has been in practically the same boat two years in a row. “The key variable for adding new teams is immediate media market,” Nellis wrote. That won’t change if and when Conferencepocalypse III rears its ugly head.

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May 04

US 34 Missouri River bridge delayed

Posted on Friday, May 4, 2012, at 12:49 PM by Jeff

The widespread flooding last year is only part of it. (Omaha World-Herald)

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May 03

Links to post office appeals

Posted on Thursday, May 3, 2012, at 8:36 AM by Jeff

This is a continuation of a post from December listing post office closing notices and appeals, filed after a moratorium was placed. A Final Determination for each had been made before mid-December, but he boilerplate text says the USPS “will proceed with the discontinuance process for any Post Office in which a Final Determination was already posted as of December 12, 2011, including all pending appeals.” The 120-day schedule for all of them has expired, but no further filings have been made.

The moratorium is scheduled to expire in two weeks. The U.S. Senate last week passed a one-year extension, but the House hasn’t voted yet. If the moratorium expires, will the USPS go ahead with closing the post offices in the towns below?

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