Iowa City, Iowa, is a university town, a good, peaceful and thrifty community and one of the most useful in the West. The foreign element in that district has been rather Bohemian than German, but the population has the usual admixture. There are two precincts populated by Mennonites, whose religion is work and not war. One of these good folk refused to buy Liberty Bonds but sold enough walnut logs from his farm to make several thousand gun stocks. This man was finally persuaded to buy as many dollars in bonds as his logs made gun stocks. Some conscientious objectors from Camp Dodge were sent out to farm among these Mennonite brothers and thus escaped the draft, whereas local loyal farmers’ sons had to go to the front. This created bitter feeling. Most of these dodgers were recalled.
Oskaloosa, Iowa, had its own share of local wrangles over League war activities. One suspect was brought up under charges of disloyalty by reason of many reports coming in against him. He was indicted and the local Chief says: “I have no doubt of his conviction had he not died since.”
Hardin County, Iowa, had an organization which kept this community decent and orderly and up to the front in all of the war activities. The chief was a member of the Bureau of Military Affairs for Hardin County, which had charge of all the war work. He was also on the County Committee of Four on Military Instruction, whose duty it was to instruct and train drafted men. Other members of the A. P. L. were on the Legal Advisory Board and also were of assistance to the drafted men. A steady-going and firm-stepping community.
Corning, Iowa, worked in the usual unostentatious way with the Food and Fuel administrations, etc. Two indictments were brought against a man who blocked war activities, the fines going to the Red Cross.
Green County reports: “All quiet in this section. Very few Germans in our county. None showed disloyalty except one old German woman who wrote to her son, a missionary in China. Her family promised to keep her loyal. We examined into the German Lutheran schools and German language assemblages. Nothing of much consequence.”
Decorah, Iowa, is another peaceful community in a peaceful State. Little or no trouble was met here. “The A. P. L. was organized rather late,” says the report, “owing to the fact that we had a most thorough and efficient Defense Council at work.”
Indianola, Iowa, is also a place of peace. The League had been organized only a short time when the Armistice broke, and there were but few activities. “Indianola has a rural population,” says the Chief, “with a very small percentage of foreign born. No trouble of any consequence.”
SOUTH DAKOTA.
Aberdeen, South Dakota, must have been a good talking point for German propagandists, because it reports 122 cases of propaganda by word of mouth, and 128 cases of propaganda by printed matter. The division was called on to take active part in the I. W. W. labor troubles, and this part of its work is described at some length in the Chief’s report:
Thousands of I. W. W.’s drift here at harvest time. Their jungles sometimes contain as many as one thousand men. They take charge of whole trains, and force railroads to carry them wherever they wish. They have forced the city authorities in small communities to send them a specified amount of food, and have defied the authorities of larger cities to control them. By their methods of sabotage, murder and arson they have terrorized certain sections of this state and destroyed millions of dollars’ worth of property. In the summer of 1917 the annual influx started. The A. P. L. was called on for assistance, and decidedly effective measures were adopted. Home Guards and citizens were organized—later called by a D. J. officer “the Klu Klux Klan of the Prairies.” Anyhow, this section of the prairies was soon clear. In consequence, a strike was declared by the Minneapolis branch of the I. W. W. and some of their gunmen were sent out. The property of the Chief of Police at Aberdeen was burnt. In less than two weeks four of these men were under arrest and two of them are now serving sentences in the Federal Penitentiary at Leavenworth. The methods adopted by this branch of the A. P. L. have proved efficacious. Thousands of dollars’ worth of property have been saved.