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{State Bird, Eastern Goldfinch}
{State Flower, Wild Rose}  {State Tree, Oak}

Economy: corn, soybeans, oats, hay, wheat, barley, cattle, hogs, tires, farm machinery, electronics, chemicals.

The state does have a few sites, such as the original locations for the movies The Bridges of Madison County (in south central Winterset , birthplace of John Wayne) and Field of Dreams (near Dubuque in the northeast). You can also see, but not enter, the original house that featured in Grant Wood's much-parodied American Gothic painting (at Eldon in the southeast, and now owned by the state).

The Mississippi River hinterland, is liberally sprinkled with agribusiness towns that display the continuing influence of their central and northern European pioneers, plus religious communities - Amish, Mennonite and the Amana Colonies. All are easily accessible from Iowa City ; as home to a huge university it's one of the state's livelier centers. Riverside towns such as northerly Dubuque and Burlington, near the Missouri state line, have been enlivened since 1991 by gambling, though so far  poker and roulette games can only be played on board Mississippi paddle-wheelers, decked out in less-than-authentic Mark Twain-era trimmings.

Pigs outnumber people in central Iowa. The only city among the cornfields, state capital Des Moines struggles to lift the monotony, and many visitors may prefer the college town of Ames . The humdrum west has little to offer

Seventy miles southwest of Dubuque and home of Quaker Oats, CEDAR RAPIDS is Iowa's industrial leader. In the late 1840s, a meat-packing boom lured thousands of Czechs here. The Czech Village , 16th Avenue SW and First Street, features the excellent Sykora's bakery, gift shops, traditional houses and a new museum of national costumes and immigrant artifacts (Tues-Sun 9.30am-4.00pm; $5; tel 319/362-8500). The very modern Museum of Art , 410 Third Ave SE, boasts a comprehensive collection of paintings by Grant Wood, best known for his depictions of 1930s farmlife (Tues, Wed, Fri & Sat 10am-4pm, Thurs 10am-7pm, Sun noon-4pm;

DES MOINES , near the center of Iowa amid tree-covered hills at the confluence of the sluggish Des Moines and Raccoon rivers, owes its origins to a military fort set up in 1843. It had already grown into a trading center for farmers by the time the eighteen-year-old Frederick Hubbell arrived in 1855; within a decade he had founded the Equitable Life and Insurance Corporation to service their need for investment capital. Other companies soon realized the potential of agrarian business, and today the city is the world's third largest insurance center, behind London and Hartford, Connecticut. Illustrious former denizens of Des Moines include Ronald Reagan , who started out as a sportscaster on Radio WHO, and John Wayne , born and raised in nearby Winterset.
The City
The steel-and-glass skyline of downtown Des Moines, most of which shot up during the 1980s, is testimony to its ever-growing insurance trade. Towering above all is the boxy, 44-story 801 Grand building.