History of Davenport, Iowa

In August, Major Zachary Taylor, later the 12th President, fought a battle east of what is now Credit Island Park in Davenport.

Davenport was declared to be Iowa's first military headquarters just before the Civil War by Governor Samuel J. Kirkwood.

Davenport was on hard times once again with the farm crisis of the 1980s, when the Caterpillar Plant closed, costing 35,000 jobs.

In 1832, Chief Keokuk and General Winfield Scott signed a treaty to end the Black Hawk War.

[3] Keokuk stipulated that Antoine build their home on the exact spot where the treaty was signed or forfeit the land.

Fort Armstrong was located on the northwestern tip of Arsenal Island with the purpose of monitoring fur trade traffic in the area and keeping the peace between local Native American tribes.

Fort Armstrong was located on the northwestern tip of Arsenal Island with the purpose of monitoring fur trade traffic in the area and keeping the peace between local Native American tribes.

On July 4, 1845, Colonel Davenport was assaulted in his home by the Banditti of the Prairie men who thought he had a fortune in his safe.

Beaten and left for dead, he survived long enough to give a full description of the criminals before he died that night.

[7] On June 9, 1849, Maj. William Williams visited Davenport and provided a brief description in his journal:[8] Davenport is situated on the Iowa site of the river on a very extensive flat of land, gently rising from the River Mississippi for a mile back, when the bluff rises to considerable height affording most beautiful sites for improvements.

This is a charming place; buildings good but in some part scattered; streets very wide and beautified with trees on each side; some very pretty residences; a great deal of taste displayed.

Before a bridge was built, privately owned ferryboats transported passengers, wagons, and cargo across the Mississippi River.

In 1856, the first railroad bridge was built across the Mississippi River, connecting Davenport and Rock Island, IL.

The owner of the Effie Afton, John Hurd, filed a lawsuit against The Rock Island Railroad Company.

In 1858, the Committee on Commerce of the United States House of Representatives conducted an investigation to decide if the Rock Island Bridge was a serious obstruction to the navigation of the river.

The judge declared the bridge a nuisance and ordered the Mississippi and Missouri Railroad to remove the three piers and their superstructure that lay on the Iowa side.

[10] Just before the start of the Civil War, Governor Samuel J. Kirkwood declared Davenport to be Iowa's first military headquarters.

On February 11, 1861, a group of armed secessionists took Fort Armstrong and raised a Palmetto flag but soon left when they heard news that soldiers from Davenport were heading their way.

On November 9, 1887, at three o’clock in the morning, the third fire was started when lightning struck the main building which housed staff and students.

The next day’s Morning Democrat Gazette pointed out that if home was not set up with several different buildings as houses, all 350 children at the time would have been homeless and some may have not survived the fire.

The bulk of the funds came from a new state law (the "mulct tax") which applied to the city's 150 illegal saloons and amounted to around $50,000 per year.

The Blackhawk has been host to several high-profile people including Carl Sandburg, Herbert Hoover, Richard Nixon, and Jack Dempsey.

Big bands such as Guy Lombardo and Stan Kenton played at the Blackhawk on many occasions[20] On Christmas day in 1920, 10,000 people turned out to see the opening of Davenport's new, elegant theater, the Capitol Theatre.

They worked to extend the seawall along the riverfront and more than 200 jobs were created by the construction of Lock and Dam 15 project in 1932.

Most of the people who lost their lives were female patients trapped behind windows locked shut by rusty, iron bars.

Paved state and federal highways built to and through Davenport in the 1930s were expanded to handle new truck shipping patterns.

The farm crisis of the 1980s hit Davenport and the rest of the Quad Cities hard, with high unemployment and financial hardships.

In 1973, NorthPark Mall was built, drawing most customers away from downtown and leaving the area in its own economic depression.

In the late 1970s, Davenport city leaders began plans to construct a civic center in downtown.

Davenport (along with neighboring Rock Island, Illinois) won the "2007 City Livability Award" in the small-city category from the U.S. Conference of Mayors.