Region
Progress
2026
THE
essenger
Pocahontas
CELEBRATING HISTORY
Pocahontas marks 150 years, looks toward future By BRET HAYWORTH POCAHONTAS — The year 2025 in Pocahontas was a notable one, with a huge sesquicentennial celebration, plus pool, housing and hospital updating continued. Looking at the year ahead, there is a new grant in 2026 that will link a school initiative with businesses. “There are a lot of projects going on,” City Administrator Laura Holmes said of the town of 1,650 people. “The mood is very positive. We are hearing from the residents that they want upgrades to the pool.” There was one unique aspect to the sesquicentennial. Since Pocahontas was founded in 1870, the 150-year celebration was all planned for summer 2020. However, the international coronavirus pandemic squashed that, and city leaders initially pushed back the date later into 2020. But the planners saw that wasn’t in the cards, since vaccines were not yet available. The celebration finally happened July 18-20, 2025, as an expanded version of the annual summer Heritage Days and also overlapping with the Pocahontas County Fair. There was an All School Reunion, and Holmes said people really enjoyed the fireworks and food stands. “We had the biggest turnout ever,” she said. The annual summer parade lasts about 20 minutes, while the sesquicentennial version took 90 minutes, and many of the people in the entries ran out of candy to throw along the route. Concerning the Pocahontas city pool, Holmes said a well-functioning pool is an important community asset, as it is desired by young families. Some of the pool upgrades in 2026 will be a new heater at a cost of $90,000, while the sides of the swimming area and shower house floor may be sandblasted and repainted for another $100,000. City officials are looking to add a high diving board, and are applying for grants to do more. The large statue of the indigenous woman for whom the town is named was built in 1952. That Pocahontas princess statue was showing its age, so it was modernized in 2024. More than a year later, Holmes said she sees scads of travelers pulling over to pose for pictures by the statue, including last month in spite of a snowy day. In another highly visual ele-
ment, in the last couple years, the Pocahontas County Economic Development group began the quest of adding large, spinning, colorful kaleidoscopes in all the county towns. Pocahontas got its kaleidoscope in late 2024, and in 2025 the final three units were placed in the final three towns. Holmes said those kaleidoscopes are already drawing people, but to take that to a higher level, county officials will use a $10,000 grant to do marketing over a wider swath. Additionally, the School To Work program in the Pocahontas Area Community (PAC) School District will become more robust by fall 2026. PAC was among 30 Iowa school districts that received state grants for the fields of STEM, or Science Technology Engineering and Math, with $50,000 to PAC. The grants came from the Governor’s STEM Advisory Council at the Iowa Department of Education. The school districts can use the money for existing or new programs related to science and math. PAC teacher Kristyn Olson led writing the grant proposal. She said a career fair will be added, and through the School To Work program, many more high school
students will be paired with Pocahontas businesses to get a first-hand glimpse of careers in which they are interested. Holmes said students via School To Work will have good opportunities to get job experiences. In other areas, the Pocahontas Community Hospital “is moving up and is booming with specialty services,” Holmes said. A helipad for emergency helicopter shuttling was added in 2025, while in 2024 a former nursing home was bought and this space has enabled the addition of a community clinic affiliated with UnityPoint Health. There are also plans for an additional rehab-services location, just north on the same property. All those things are important in an area with an elderly, rural population, Holmes said. She said the second phase of the Prairie Estates Addition on the northeast side of Pocahontas was getting infrastructure completed in 2024. Fifteen of the 24 lots were sold last year. With a recent inquiry on four of the lots, Holmes fully expects all 23 lots will be sold by the end of 2026. “I have people asking all the time about it,” she said, adding that getting two completed phases of Prairie Estates Addition in short order is a big success story.
-Submitted photos
ABOVE: The initiative to place colorful kaleidoscopes in all the towns of Pocahontas C o u n t y continues to be successful. They are a tribute to the late Leonard Olson, whose Main Street shop where he made toy kaleidoscopes became a tourist attraction.
ABOVE: The sesquicentennial parade in Pocahontas was a large event in July 2025. MIDDLE PHOTO: The Pocahontas statue on the east side of the city on Iowa Highway 3 draws people to stop for photos — even in the winter.
January 1–March 31, 2026
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