Plum Grove was the home of Robert Lucas, the first governor of the Iowa Territory, in 1844. — Eleanor Taft/Little Village
This weekend, the Lucas Farms Neighborhood Association, one of Iowa City’s oldest neighborhoods, will celebrate its history with its annual History Day.
“Our neighborhood is really packed with history,” Judy Neilin, one of the organizers of History Days, told Little Village.
Nilin has lived in the area for more than 40 years and has thoroughly researched its history, dating back to when Robert Lucas, the first governor of the Iowa Territory, moved his family to a newly built home on 80 acres of farmland. In the early 20th century, the Lucas family began selling farmland to builders, and as the area’s name suggests, much of it is located on former Lucas family farmland.
Plum Grove, the Lucas family home, is now cared for by the Johnson County Historical Society and is open to the public on History Day with special tours.
Lucas wasn’t the only ruler of this community, bounded to the east by Downey Drive, to the west by Lower Muscatine and to the south by Highway 6. The man for whom Kirkwood Avenue, the street at the north end of the community, is named, also lived here.
Samuel Kirkwood, who served as governor of Iowa during the Civil War, lived in a two-story wooden house on the street that now bears his name. The house will be featured on Nylin’s Civil War walking tour of the Lucas Farm on Sunday morning. The tour will include stories of the period, from Kirkwood’s work in inspiring Iowa to contribute more soldiers per capita to the Union Army than any other state, to a military drummer who lived nearby, to Iowans who were captured early in the war, to relatives of John Brown’s comrades before the war began. Nylin will wear period-evocative costumes during the tour.
“When I tour, I like to wear period costumes,” she explained, “The costumes help people visualize the story of that time period.”
On Friday nights, Nilin will be dressed as Rosie the Riveter and will lead walking tours that touch on Lucas Farm’s connections to World War II, as well as walking tours that focus on specific residents from a century ago.
“We’ll be doing a constable’s walk on Keokuk Street starting at 5 p.m. on Saturday,” Nylin said. “Constable John Matthes is by far the most distinctive and eccentric person to have ever lived in Lucas Farms. The constable was an elected position and served from the 1890s until about 1930.”
Matthes was sometimes called the “unluckiest man in Iowa City” because angry people would chase him with pitchforks and axes after he executed court warrants. Always wearing a black bowler hat and smoking a cigar, Matthes was a familiar sight in Iowa City for decades.
Nylin recounted many stories about Matthes, his less-than-pure approach to law enforcement (his son was one of Iowa City’s leading moonshiners during Prohibition), his side jobs, which included milking skunks, and the few lawsuits he was personally involved in, one of which hinged on whether he ate a pigeon.
This historic home at 1027 Keokuk St. is the former home of longtime Iowa City constable John Matthes. — via Lucas Farms Neighborhood Association on Facebook
But there’s more to History Days than history. There are plenty of family-friendly activities, too. On Saturday, there’s a Tour de Farm bike ride through the neighborhood and a mini zoo for the kids. On Sunday afternoon, kids can use metal detectors to search for pieces of the past. There’s also live music, with the Old Man Band covering rock classics on Saturday night and the Iowa City Community Band performing on Sunday night.
Details of all this year’s History Days events can be found on the Lucas Farms Neighborhood Association Facebook page. All events are free and open to the public.
