When Iowa City was established as Iowa’s new territorial capital, the priority was getting accessible transportation in and out of Johnson County. With the Iowa River too unpredictable for riverboats, stagecoaches were the wave of the future. Thus, between 1840 and 1870, the stagecoach business was a-rolling all over the Hawkeye State, with Iowa City being right in the center of the action.
1840 – Frink & Walker is the first company to bring stagecoach service into Iowa City. $3 will buy you a seat on the thirty-mile trip to Bloomington (Muscatine) via a two-horse stage coach. Keep in mind that traveling back east from Iowa would mean accessing the Mississippi River, so that trip would always include getting, first and foremost, to Bloomington, our nearest Big River city.
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