Historic Muscatine, Iowa

Jim wanted to go on a beer run and I'd forgotten to get Grapenuts and floor cleaner when we got groceries yesterday.  So this afternoon we stopped at Aldi, a discount grocery store I'd never heard of even though their web site says they have one thousand stores in 31 states. It was clean, bright and had wide aisles -- but we didn't see anything we were shopping for and were out of there in five minutes.  Then we went to Walmart where we saw a big, shirtless guy with plumber pants whose photo I contemplated taking for the website "People of Walmart."  But that seemed cruel and he may have been able to beat me up if he caught me.  Finally we stopped at a brand new HyVee, a Midwestern chain based in Iowa -- and found our store.

Then we toured historic downtown Muscatine. The city feels southern to us instead of  Midwestern.  I keep thinking that's because it's a humid river town, but "humid" and "river" describe many a Midwestern location.  

Per Wikipedia, the name Muscatine is unusual in that it's not used by any other city in the U.S.  Wikipedia also says the town was formerly called Bloomington but changed its name to Muscatine because other Midwestern Bloomingtons caused a problem with mail delivery.  And, Wikipedia claims that before it was Bloomington, Muscatine was known as  "Casey's Woodpile." However, there's no attribution to that last statement so maybe someone is just jerking Wikipedia's chain.  Jim said he's guessing there is also no other town in the U.S. called "Casey's Woodpile."

Below are some shots of architectural details in the pretty town of Muscatine. Most photos also show the white/gray sky that dumped rain on us off and on all day.