I have been reading a historical novel that includes John Brown as a character.

I have been learning some new things about John Brown, including that he had a significant presence in Iowa. I have always associated him with Bleeding Kansas and Harper’s Ferry, but haven’t thought much about his time in Iowa.

I did remember that there were some images and articles about John Brown in my Grandma’s Scrapbooks. I thought she had saved them as she was interested in Harper’s Ferry since her Grandfather served there during the Civil War.

But then I also remembered that some of the images had been created by Frank Andrea Miller. I decided to take a closer look at the articles.

The articles were part of a 1960 series on Iowa in the Civil War. I have not read the articles in detail yet, but the articles start in the time before the Civil War. There were some interesting things that happened in Iowa just before the war.

The Underground Railroad had a significant presence in Iowa and John Brown was very active in several of the cities that are marked on the map above.

After further research, I plan on writing more about John Brown in Iowa. It may be some time before I write as I have several other projects I am working on.

However, my mind has wandered to John Brown this evening and I had to write about him to help focus my thoughts.

Steven