Iowa

The first American Indians arrived in the area of Iowa around 13,000 years ago. The Louisiana Purchase of 1803 ceded control to the United States, after 130 years of French and Spanish colonial rule. The entire population of the Louisiana Purchase was 60,000, half of whom were African slaves. The US encouraged settlement and moving the indigenous people to the west. Following the Civil War, Iowa's rich farmland and the introduction of railroads in the 1850/60s saw population increase dramatically and passing 1 million. There are now 3.1 million people. The Great Depression and World War II shifted the economy from small holdings to larger farms and manufacturing. The counties of the three biggest cities Des Moines, Cedar Rapids and Davenport were all won by Clinton in the 2016 Election, but urbanisation has left much of the state very sparsely populated. The Rural areas went Red, and the state backed the Republican party for the second time since 1984 (backing G.W.Bush in his second term).

United States Expansion

1803 - Louisiana Purchase