Off to Iowa

Did your family go West? If they moved West from states like Ohio, have you wondered why and wondered where they went?

Many people have ancestors who lived in Ohio. After Ohio became a state in 1803, it quickly became one of the most popular areas for settlers coming from New England, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Kentucky. Growth was so rapid that by 1850, Ohio had a population of two million settlers.

Compared to other Midwest states, Ohio’s land area is relatively small—only Indiana is smaller. As families had children and they came of age, land simply wasn’t available.

But where did they go to find land?  You might expect places like Indiana and Illinois—but a land rush in Iowa in the 1840s pulled many Ohioans there. Rich prairie soil made for successful farms, and by 1840, John Deere invented a steel plow that could cultivate prairie land.

You might be surprised to learn how settlers traveled to Iowa—by 1857, it might have been on the train, as that’s the year that the railroad crossed the Mississippi River opposite Davenport.

From the US census in 1860:

Iowa:        15% of residents came from Ohio

Indiana:    13% of residents from Ohio

Illinois:       8% of residents

Kansas:     11% of residents

Colorado:  12% of residents

Nebraska:  11% of residents

Where did your family go?

Sources:

Image: Iowa. Railroad Commissioners. Railroad map of Iowa. Des Moines, 1881. Map. https://www.loc.gov/item/98688480/.

1860 Census Compendium: https://www.census.gov/library/publications/1864/dec/1860a.html