Who's Who of Iowa

Notable Families, Companies & People of Eastern Iowa

The families, companies, and famous figures of eastern Iowa, from Collins Radio and HNI to Herbert Hoover, Grant Wood, and the Palmer family.

Arthur Collins (Collins Radio / Rockwell Collins)The Cedar Rapids teenager whose radios reached the North Pole, and later the Moon.Read profile →HNI Corporation (Home-O-Nize)The Muscatine company that became a Fortune 500 leader in office furniture and hearths.Read profile →The Kinzenbaw Family (Kinze)The self-taught blacksmith whose inventions changed how America plants and harvests, from a shop in Williamsburg.Read profile →The Amana ColoniesThe German religious settlers whose communal Iowa villages gave the world Amana refrigerators, and the microwave oven's Radarange.Read profile →Herbert HooverThe orphan from West Branch who became a global humanitarian, a mining engineer, and the 31st President of the United States.Read profile →Grant WoodThe eastern-Iowa painter whose “American Gothic” became one of the most famous, and most parodied, images in American art.Read profile →Buffalo Bill CodyThe Le Claire-born scout and showman whose Wild West show carried the American frontier to the world.Read profile →Bix BeiderbeckeThe Davenport-born cornet player who became one of the first great white jazz soloists of the 1920s.Read profile →The Palmer Family (Chiropractic)The Davenport family that founded the chiropractic profession, and one of radio's earliest stations.Read profile →Lou Henry HooverThe Waterloo-born First Lady: a Stanford-trained geologist who modernized the role and led the Girl Scouts.Read profile →Paul EngleThe Cedar Rapids poet who built the Iowa Writers' Workshop into the center of American creative writing.Read profile →Roy J. CarverThe Muscatine industrialist behind Bandag and Carver Pump, and one of Iowa's great philanthropists.Read profile →James Van AllenThe Mount Pleasant–born physicist who discovered the radiation belts around Earth and helped launch the Space Age.Read profile →Arabella MansfieldThe Iowa woman who in 1869 became the first female lawyer in the United States.Read profile →Alexander ClarkThe Muscatine businessman whose 1868 lawsuit desegregated Iowa's public schools: 86 years before Brown v. Board.Read profile →Julien DubuqueThe French-Canadian miner who became the first European settler in Iowa, and the namesake of its oldest city.Read profile →Chief KeokukThe Sauk leader whose name Iowa's southeastern river city carries to this day.Read profile →The Sullivan BrothersThe five Waterloo brothers who served, and died, together aboard the USS Juneau in World War II.Read profile →W. A. SheafferThe Fort Madison jeweler whose lever-fill fountain pen built a world-famous Iowa writing-instrument company.Read profile →William FrawleyThe Burlington-born character actor America knew as Fred Mertz on “I Love Lucy.”Read profile →Susan GlaspellThe Davenport-born writer who won a Pulitzer, co-founded the Provincetown Players, and wrote the classic “Trifles.”Read profile →Phil StongThe southeast-Iowa novelist whose “State Fair” turned the Iowa State Fair into a Hollywood classic.Read profile →Carl Van VechtenThe Cedar Rapids–born writer and photographer who championed the Harlem Renaissance and portrayed its greatest figures.Read profile →Eugene ElyThe Williamsburg-born aviator who first flew an airplane off, and onto, a ship, inventing naval aviation.Read profile →Samuel J. KirkwoodIowa's Civil War governor, who raised the troops that made the state's wartime reputation.Read profile →William B. AllisonThe Dubuque senator whose 35 years in Washington made him one of the most powerful men in the Gilded Age Senate.Read profile →Annie WittenmyerThe Keokuk reformer who fed Civil War soldiers, built homes for orphans, and led the national temperance movement.Read profile →Antoine Le ClaireThe frontier interpreter of French and Potawatomi heritage who founded the city of Davenport.Read profile →Dan GableThe Waterloo wrestler who won Olympic gold without surrendering a point, then built a college dynasty at Iowa.Read profile →Kurt WarnerThe Burlington-born quarterback who went from stocking grocery shelves to Super Bowl MVP and the Hall of Fame.Read profile →Zach JohnsonThe Cedar Rapids golfer who won the Masters and the Open Championship and captained the U.S. Ryder Cup team.Read profile →Ashton KutcherThe Cedar Rapids–born actor turned tech investor and anti-trafficking advocate.Read profile →Elijah WoodThe Cedar Rapids–born actor who played Frodo Baggins in “The Lord of the Rings.”Read profile →Mildred Wirt BensonThe Iowa journalist who, as “Carolyn Keene,” wrote the first Nancy Drew mysteries.Read profile →Bess Streeter AldrichThe Cedar Falls–born novelist whose warm stories of pioneer life reached millions of readers.Read profile →
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