[3] Coal mining played an important part in the early history of the Boone area.

Local blacksmiths were already mining coal from the banks of Honey Creek south of what became Boone in 1849.

It was incorporated the following year, when the Chicago and North Western Transportation Company railroad station was built there.

[8] In 1912, United Mine Workers Local 869 in Boone had 554 members, close to 10% of the population at the time.

[11] Other larger businesses that have had or still maintain facilities in Boone include Gates Rubber, Heinrich Envelope, Archway Bakery, Lowe-Berry Seeds, Coca-Cola Bottling, Quinn Iron & Wire Works (now Besser Quinn Machine & Foundry), Mid-States Steel, Sunoco Products, Specialty Leather Productions, Randy's Frozen Meats, PDM Distribution, ProLiant Biologicals, APC, Thermomass Composite Tech, CDS Global, Patterson Logistics and Stoll Bottling.

[12] According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 9.02 square miles (23.36 km2), all land.

[13] Ledges State Park is located four miles south of Boone and is a popular destination.

Boone is served by the mainline of the Union Pacific, which purchased the Chicago & North Western Railroad (C&NW) in 1995.

Boone was a division and crew change point on the railroad under the Chicago & North Western and some of that business remains today.

The locomotives no longer sound their horns in the town proper due to modifications to the various points where streets intersect with the rail line.

Boone was also the exact midpoint on the Fort Dodge, Des Moines & Southern Railroad, an electric interurban line converted to diesel in 1955 after a flood on the Des Moines River devastated the Fraser hydroelectric power plant that supplied power to the railroad.

The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad also ran a branch line into Boone from the southeast.

[22] The Des Moines Area Community College (DMACC) has a campus in the south central part of the town.

It was established when DMACC purchased the former Boone Junior College in 1969 and was the second campus added during the initial period of expansion.

[23] Pufferbilly Days, an annual event celebrating Boone's railroad heritage, is held at the end of the summer and is one of Iowa's top five community festivals with over 30,000 attendees.

[24] The IMCA Super Nationals are held at the Boone Speedway, occurring during the week of Labor Day.

[27] Vincenzo Miserendino's final and largest statue of Theodore Roosevelt, which was eight times life-size was commissioned in 1941, and was scheduled to arrive in Boone, Iowa, in 1943.

Miserendino commented that Theodore Roosevelt himself would have approved of that decision to put the service of the country first.

Later, in 1946, the Roman Bronze Corporation of Corona, New York City, produced the casting in Miserendino's original mold.

[b] Residing on three large granite blocks, the 6' 3" statue depicts Roosevelt rising out of a mountainous landscape with his hand outstretched as if addressing a crowd.