1849 the first road reached Chicago; in 1854 the first railroad touched the Mississippi at Rock Island. On New Year's eve, 1855, the Mississippi and Missouri company laid their last rail to Iowa city by the light of burning tar-barrels at midnight. Far out along the track the bonfires blazed and crowds of citizens laid rails with a right good will, to enable the contractors to complete the work before the advent of the new year. Preparations had been made to celebrate the event with befitting splendor. Thousands of invitations had been sent to the east summoning the world in general to participate in their jubilee. Here is the form, raked out of the ashes of the old capitol days: GRAND RAILROAD FESTIVAL! IOWA CITY AND THE ATLANTIC CITIES CONNECTED BY RAILWAY! THE NATIONAL TRUNK ROAD HALF COMPLETED TO THE PACIFIC ! IOWA CITY, DEC. 18TH, 1855. Dear Sir: You are respectfully requested to attend a celebration, at lowa OPENING OF THE MISSISSIPPI AND MISSOURI RAILROAD ON THURSDAY, JANUARY 3D, 1856. We hand you herewith a card, which will serve you as a PASS over the Chicago and Rock Island Railroad, over the Mississippi and Missouri Railroad, to and from Iowa City, and to the hospitalities of her citizens. This was signed by Le Grand Byington and others of the committee of invitation. January 3 was ushered in by one of the coldest days of winter, the mercury twenty degrees below zero. The crisp snow creaked under foot, the trees glittered with frost, and the keen air nipped the unprotected ear. For weeks the whole town had been busy-turkeys by the hundred, butter by the ton, cake and pastry, fruit and flowers in sumptuous profusion awaited the bidden guests. At 2 P. M., the booming of cannon announced the arrival of the first passenger train with seven car-loads of people. Sleighs and carriages were in waiting, but, in that fierce cold, no one waited for conveyances, but rushed wildly to the warmed and decorated capitol. All the country round about was pouring in; up the winding stairs of the legislative halls, a thousand, two thousand poured to a welcome and a banquet that in point of magnificence has not to this day been surpassed by anything of the kind ever attempted in Iowa. It was the very blossoming of hope in the ambitious capital of a proud young state. At that feast, multitudinous lights shone over as fair women and as brave men as ever assembled in the west. Among the dignitaries from abroad were, General John A. Dix, of New York; Henry Farnum, the great railroad magnate; the mayor of Chicago; and capitalists and editors from many leading cities. As night sped on they heeded not the wintry blast. Within were speeches and music and dancing; without, the frost sparkled on the snowy breast of the glad New Year; and not till the wee, sma' hours of morning did the last strain die away, and the last footfall resound among the corridors of the capitol. Such was the welcome accorded the first railroad into the heart of the great world west of the Mississippi. In those early days, when legislators lived in log cabins, and were chosen for worth, not wealth, they met in that old stone capitol to frame laws and constitutions, to discuss banks and boundaries, to establish counties, state institutions, and public improvements, and thus firm and sure they laid the corner-stones of Iowa. Three constitutional conventions and four territorial and six state legislatures held their sessions in those halls. Among their members were future judges, generals, and eight governors, who here read their first lessons in the science of government. Almost every member of the earlier legislatures attained distinction. Emerson says: "America is only another name for opportunity," and nowhere is this greater than in a state just doffing her territorial frock and pinafore. There were some exciting sessions in that old state house, as when the territory was about to assume statehood, and two United States senators and three Supreme Court judges were to be elected by the legislature. The death-like silence of the crowded house was broken only by the roll-call of the clerk, as one by one the vote of each member told upon the fortunes of whig or democrat. No choice was made, and none could be made, so for two years after Iowa became a state she was unrepresented in the United States senate. In 1855, during the fifth general assembly, the galleries were thronged with the eager ladies of Iowa city when a prohibitory liquor law was discussed, a question that had its birth in the very first message of the first governor, and that, like Banquo's ghost, would not down until it became a law in 1882. few days after this the election of James Harlan to the United States senate called out the rank and file of both parties. Just out of college, Harlan came to Iowa city to take charge of a proposed Methodist college. The eloquence of the young minister marked him for political favor. The Whigs nominated him for governor, and the Democrats proved him too young. He was elected superintendent of public instruction, and through some technicality the election was declared of no effect; but now the budding strength of a party yet unnamed bore the young preacher into the senate, where for seventeen eventful years he continued to represent the state of Iowa. His only child, Mary Harlan, born in Iowa city, is the wife of Robert T. Lincoln, of Chicago, so that among the queens of Garfield's cabinet there were two Iowa city ladies, as we shall presently see. At the time of Harlan's election, a miller in his flour-covered suit made daily visits to town in the pursuit of his avocation who was destined to become the most illustrious of the men who sought their fortunes in early Iowa. On that memorable day when the Republican party of Iowa had its birth in the old capitol, the miller drove into town as usual and went into the meeting a mere spectator. At that crisis, after many others had spoken, the miller was called upon to express his opinion. Flour-dusted as he was, he came forward. "Come upon the platform," said the chairman, as he stopped at its foot. "No, I always prefer to stand on a level with the people," was the reply, and the prompt and persuasive eloquence that followed electrified the house and made Samuel J. Kirkwood the leader of the new-born party. Some weeks after, a delegation waited upon the miller and told him he had been nominated for the state senate. Slowly he tied up a sack of meal and seating himself upon an old log told them he could not be a candidate, that he loved the music of his mill better than the strife of politicians. "But you must run," was the verdict of the visitors. That year he went to the state senate, and three years later ran for governor against Hon. A. C. Dodge, who had been in the United States senate, and minister to Spain. Dodge came home for the campaign, and a series of joint debates was arranged for the rival candidates. Dodge had been nom spoken, homespun-clad pioneer. Kirkwood has been called another Lincoln; Dodge was his Douglas. In the newspaper language of the day, Kirkwood "flayed him alive," and he ran away from the debates. At one place where they were to speak, Dodge's party met him with a carriage and four beautiful horses. Kirkwood's people met him with a hay-rack and a yoke of oxen. By storm he carried the hearts of the pioneers, and by storm he carried the state for three gubernatorial terms with ever increasing majorities. During his first term as governor the war broke out, and through private contributions Governor Kirkwood fitted out the first Iowa regiment, and sent it to the front long before the general government was ready for that duty. Kirkwood was governor of Iowa at a time when the office implied exalted honor and power. By virtue of that office he signed the commissions for the most part of the officers who commanded the eighty thousand men Iowa sent into the field; he levied armies, and was the faithful custodian of vast sums of public treasure. With a firm hand he quelled incipient rebellion in Iowa, and by his firmness, his economy, and his liberality, the "Old War Governor" of Iowa caused one of the youngest states to stand foremost in the annals of honor. His nomination for the third term was after a period of retirement. The convention was divided as to candidates, when, without his knowledge or consent, the name "KIRKWOOD" startled the contending sides. "By whose authority is Kirkwood's name brought here?" asked a member in deprecating tones. "By authority of the great Republican party of Iowa," thundered the speaker, towering above the heads of the convention. The magic of the name reconciled the rival factions, and rolled up the greatest majority Iowa ever had known. At the In his two congressional terms Kirkwood seldom spoke, but when he did he was awarded strict attention from both sides of the senate. close of one of his speeches, Ben Hill of Georgia rose and said: "The senator from Iowa has made a speech worthy of a senator anywhere and in any age. I want my friend to know and I want his people to know that the patriotic, the manly, the catholic, the national, the unsectional sentiments which fell from his lips and which I know animate his bosom, meet with a warm response in mine and in the bosoms of my people. He, and such as he, whether Republicans or Democrats, we can take to our arms and our hearts and call our fellow citizens." Blaine once said of him that he would rather have Sam Kirkwood on his side before a Maine audience than any other public speaker he knew, because of his knack of pleasing the common people. Garfield said, when he chose him to his cabinet, he "loved him because he got so near the people." In Kirkwood the days of old simplicity lived again. That the homespun senator from the west did not "live up to his blue china," was well known in Washington. A tailor there once put a fashion plate in his window of Garfield's cabinet in the latest style. An old friend in passing was so amused that he bought a lot of the plates and sent them to Kirkwood's friends in Iowa. On a part of the old Governor Lucas estate is the Kirkwood home, where he who has been honored as no other man in Iowa was ever hon ored is spending his declining years. On any pleasant summer's day the ex-governor's patriarchal figure can be seen on the vine-clad porch, or lounging under his favorite linden reading the news. In winter he sits before the genial open fire of his pleasant library and greets with a warm hand-clasp the frequent visitor, and ever by his side is his sunny-tempered wife, domestic in her nature as Martha Washington herself. In their cabinet days a Washington correspondent said of Mrs. Kirkwood, "I saw her enter the marble room at the capitol the other day attired in a quiet, elegant costume of black velvet, and I thought how proud Iowa ought to |