Des Moines (pronounced /d
ɪˈmɔɪn/ ) is the capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Iowa. It is also the county seat of Polk County. A small portion of the city extends into Warren County. It was incorporated on September 22, 1851, as Fort Des Moines which was shortened to "Des Moines" in 1857. It is named after the Des Moines River, which may have been adapted from the French Rivière des Moines , literally meaning "River of the Monks." The five-county metropolitan area is ranked 91st in terms of population in the United States according to 2008 estimates with 556,230 residents according to United States Census Bureau. The city proper population was 198,682 at the 2000 census.Des Moines is a major center for the insurance industry and also has a sizable financial services and publishing business base. In fact, Des Moines was credited with the "number one spot for U.S. insurance companies" in a Business Wire article. The city is the headquarters for the Principal Financial Group, the Meredith Corporation, Ruan Transportation, EMC Insurance Companies, and Wellmark Blue Cross Blue Shield. Other major corporations such as Wells Fargo, ING Group, Nationwide Mutual Insurance Company, Marsh, and Pioneer Hi-Bred have large operations in or near the metro area. Forbes magazine ranked Des Moines as the fourth "Best Place for Business" in 2007. Kiplinger's Personal Finance 2008 Best Cities List featured Des Moines as #9.
Des Moines is an important city in United States presidential politics as the capital of Iowa, which is home to the Iowa caucuses. The Iowa caucuses have been the first major electoral event in nominating the President of the United States since 1972. Hence, many presidential candidates set up campaign headquarters in Des Moines. A 2007 article in The New York Times stated "if you have any desire to witness presidential candidates in the most close-up and intimate of settings, there is arguably no better place to go than Des Moines."
Origin of name
The French "Des Moines" (pronounced
(help·info) ) translates literally to either "monks" or "of the monks." "Rivière Des Moines" translates to "river of the monks", known today under the anglicized name of Des Moines River. This refers to the French Trappist monks, some of whom lived in huts on top of what is now known as Monks Mound, the largest mound in the Cahokia Mounds complex on the banks of the Mississippi. However, the term could have at one time referred to the river of the Moingona , named after an American Indian tribe that resided in the area.
A more recent hypothesis uses a study of Miami-Illinois tribal names to say the word Moingona, one of the names given to the region, comes from word mooyiinkweena, a derogatory name which translates roughly to "the excrement-faces." The name was seemingly given to Marquette and Joliet by a tribal leader in order to dissuade them from doing business with a neighboring tribe.
However, the creator of this etymology admits it is improbable ("strange" as he puts it), but that is an understatement. It is based on a body of misconceptions that, it must be said, would be unexpected from anyone who professes expertise in the subject. The historical evidence discredits this "excrement face" etymology as anything more than a paronomasia, that is, a play on words that some people find amusing and that is therefore widely repeated.
Prehistory
Prehistoric inhabitants of early Des Moines
The juncture of the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers has attracted humans for at least 3,000 years. Several prehistoric occupation areas have been identified in downtown Des Moines by archaeologists. At least three Late Prehistoric villages stood in Des Moines, dating from about A.D. 1300 to 1700. In addition, 15 to 18 prehistoric American Indian mounds were observed in downtown Des Moines by early settlers. All have been destroyed.
History
Origin of Fort Des Moines
The City of Des Moines traces its origins to May 1843, when Captain James Allen supervised the construction of a fort on the site where the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers merge. Allen wanted to use the name Fort Raccoon; however, the U.S. War Department told him to name it Fort Des Moines. The fort was built to control the Sauk and Meskwaki Indians, who had been transplanted to the area from their traditional lands in eastern Iowa. The fort was abandoned in 1846 after the Sauk and Meskwaki were removed from the state. The Sauk and Meskwaki did not fare well in Des Moines, the illegal whiskey trade, combined with the destruction of traditional lifeways, led to severe problems. One newspaper reported: “It is a fact that the location of Fort Des Moines among the Sac and Fox Indians (under its present commander) for the last two years, had corrupted them more and lowered them deeper in the scale of vice and degradation, than all their intercourse with the whites for the ten years previous.” Even after official removal, the Meskwaki continued to return to Des Moines until ca. 1857. Archaeological excavations have demonstrated that many fort-related features survived under what is now Martin Luther King, Jr. Parkway and First Street. Soldiers stationed at Fort Des Moines opened the first coal mines in the area, mining coal from the riverbank for the fort's blacksmith.
Early settlement
Settlers occupied the abandoned fort and nearby areas. On May 25, 1846, Fort Des Moines became the seat of Polk County. Arozina Perkins, a school teacher who spent the winter of 1850-1851 in the town of Fort Des Moines, was not favorably impressed;
This is one of the strangest looking "cities" I ever saw... This town is at the juncture of the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers. It is mostly a level prairie with a few swells or hills around it. We have a court house of "brick", and one church, a plain, framed building belonging to the Methodists. There are two taverns here, one of which has a most important little bell that rings together some fifty boarders. I cannot tell you how many dwellings there are, for I have not counted them; some are of logs, some of brick, some framed, and some are the remains of the old dragoon houses...The people support two papers and there are several dry goods shops. I have been into but four of them... Society is as varied as the buildings are. There are people from nearly every state, and Dutch, Swedes, etc.
In May 1851 much of the town was flooded. "The Des Moines and Raccoon rivers rose to an unprecedented height, inundating the entire country east of the Des Moines river. Crops were utterly destroyed, houses and fences swept away." This flood provided a clean slate for the city to grow on.
Era of growth
On September 22, 1851, it was incorporated as a city with its own charter and was later approved in a vote on October 18 . In 1857, the name Fort Des Moines was shortened to Des Moines alone and the state capital was moved from Iowa City. Growth was slow during the Civil War period, but the city exploded in size and importance after a railroad link was completed in 1866.
In 1864, The Des Moines Coal Company was organized to begin the first systematic mining in the region. Their first mine, north of town on the west side of the river, was exhausted by 1873. The Black Diamond mine, near the south end of the West Seventh Street Bridge, sunk a 150 foot mine shaft to reach a 5 foot thick coal bed. By 1876, this mine employed 150 men and shipped 20 carloads of coal per day. By 1885, there were numerous mine shafts within the city limits, and mining began to spread into the surrounding countryside. By 1893, there were 23 mines in the region. By 1908, the coal resources of Des Moines were largely exhausted.
By 1900, Des Moines was Iowa's largest city with a population of 62,139.
"City Beautiful", industrial decline, and rebirth
At the turn of the 20th century, Des Moines undertook a "City Beautiful" project in which large Beaux Arts public buildings and fountains were constructed along the Des Moines River, this effort continued through the 1930s. The old Des Moines Public Library building (now the home of the World Food Prize) and the City Hall are surviving examples, as is the ornate balustrade that still lines the river. The ornamental fountains that once stood along the riverbank were buried in the 1950s, when the city began a post-industrial decline which lasted until the late 1980s. The city has since rebounded, transforming from a blue-collar ind
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