Overview of Clinton Iowa

“The Crossing City”

Where the Chicago & Northwestern Railway, the Lincoln Highway and the Transcontinental Air Mail cross the Mississippi river and the Mississippi River Scenic Highway

Eastern Gateway to Western Hospitality

The Clinton chamber of Commerce

Clinton, Iowa

A beautiful city, possessing exceptional transportation facilities. Served by: Chicago & Northwestern. Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific. Chicago, Burlington & Quincy, Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific. Clinton, Davenport & Muscatine Electric. Mississippi River and its tributaries.

Clinton is the gateway to Iowa, eastern Nebraska, and the Dakotas.

It is a prominent industrial city—a manufacturing center for agricultural and lumber products.

Population

Clinton is county seat and the larges city in the county, having a population of 26,436 according to the 1925 Official State Census. The population of its trade territory is approximately 85,000 people.

Retail

It is a city of good stores with full stocks. It is a city of hospitable people and courteous business men and women. It has excellent parking facilities and you will enjoy shopping here.

Size of city

The area covered by the city is 6,390 acres. Its elevation is 593 feet. Owing to its peculiar topography, Clinton has a very extensive water front area, which will be of inestimable benefit when river transportation resumes full away.

Parks and playgrounds

Clinton has 125 acres of parks scattered over various parts of the city. These parks now include athletic fields, tennis courts, children's playgrounds, and beautiful drives. At the last municipal election the citizens voted a bond issue of nearly $200,000 which will be spent in these parks during the coming year. Among other things, the improvements will include a $70,000 swimming pool and its equipment, and $28,000 for driveways. Clinton has two good golf courses, the Clinton Country club and the Kiwanis Public Links.

Educational Facilities

Clinton has a very fine public school system consisting of 15 grade schools, one junior high and two high schools. The total enrollment is approximately 5, 000 pupils. The faculty consists of 162 teachers.

It has two girls' academies and Wartburg College, an accredited co-education institution.

Hotels

Clinton has five hotels with a total of 383 rooms.

Public Organizations

The civic and commercial organizations of Clinton include: chamber of Commerce, Manufacturers' & shippers' Association, Associated Retail Merchants' Credit bureau, Motor club, Y. M. C. A., Y. W. C. A., and Boy Scouts of America.

It has Rotary, Kiwanis Gyro Clubs; the Clinton Boat Club, Wapsipinicon Club, and the Clinton Country Club; also several woman's clubs. All fraternal and religious organizations are fully represented, there being 29 churches in all.

Hospitals

Two thoroughly modern and splendidly equipped hospitals, and a detention hospital, amply serve present and immediate future needs. Their ministrations are supplemental by an efficient “Visiting Nurse” system.

Theatres

Clinton has six theatres; the new High School Auditorium with a capacity of 1200, and the great Coliseum with room for 2700 seats furnish ample accommodations for conventions and large gatherings, exhibitions, etc.

Public Library

Clinton's Free Public Library (Carnegie) erected in 1903, owns over 32,000 volumes, with an annual circulation of nearly 200,000. Its Staff consists of librarian and five assistants. It has a very good reference department and has five sub-stations not including books loaned to schools. 

Permanent Improvements

The city is widely known for its beautiful drives lined with great stately elms. It has 53 miles of paved streets, 105 ¾ miles of streets in all. It has six miles of paved alleys and nearly 425,000 square yards of permanent sidewalks. It has 53 miles of sewers.

Public Utilities

The water supply of Clinton is of exceptionally fine quality, being among the purest in the state. The supply system consists of six artesian wells, five of which are equipped with air lifts developed to produce 6,000,000 gallons per day, and a reservoir with a capacity of 1, 250,000 gallons. The average daily consumption is 2,000,000 gallons, although the total pumping capacity is 10,000,000. There is also an emergency filter plan to purify river water in case of necessity upon which no call has been made for more than fourteen years.

Number of Water Meters 4,390
Number of Consumers 5,617
Miles of Water Mains 61
Gas Meters 6,310
Electric Meters 6,370
Miles of Gas Mains 64
Street Intersection Lamps 335
Number of Telephones 8,000

It is supplied with good street railway transportation, having sixteen miles of equivalent single track, including two and a half miles of double track. Good service is in effect to all industrial and residential sections.

Banking Facilities

Clinton has seven good banks with a combined capitalization of $1,085,000. Combined resources, $21,551,124. Combined deposits, $18,186,000.

Public Safety

Police Department---One station, force of sixteen men.

Fire Department—Four stations, five companies, seven pieces motorized equipment, twenty-three regular and three extra men. Fire loss in 1928 less than $35,000.

State Militia---One Battery of Artillery

Climate

Average temperatures: winter, 23.1 degrees; spring, 48.7 degrees; summer, 72.5 degrees; autumn, 50.2 degrees. Average annual rainfall 36.06 inches. Average number of growing day, 159.

Industrial

The latest compilation of industrial data shows:

Number of Industries 92
Number of Wage Earners 5,400
Annual Value of Products $33,000,000
Annual Payroll $ 9,000,000

Clinton is centrally located for such raw materials as grain, live stock, lumber, oil, minerals, fruits, cotton and coal, and therefore the rates for transportation of these products to Clinton are much more favorable than to many eastern points.

Clinton has two especially good industrial sections in which are a number of available sites. In these sections railroad sidings are already available or may be made so with a minimum expense. Government dredges have opened the channel of Beaver Slough, now known as the West Channel of the Mississippi. This channel runs by one of these sections, making it even more desirable for large manufacturing.

Clinton has now a sufficient number of diversified industries so that there is practically no unemployment at any time of the year. However, the surrounding territory is largely agricultural and in case of the establishment of new industries, sufficient labor may be drawn from immediate rural districts.

Products

Among the principal products of the city, many of which are nationally advertised and exported are: Artificial ice, blinds, bridges, boilers, confectionery, crackers and cookies, clothing, corn syrup, corn oil, corn oil cake meal, corn gluten feed, doors, dairy products, fly swatters, electrical fuse plugs, furniture of all kinds, glucose, harness and saddlery, internal combustion engines, locks and keys, optical goods, paper boxes, poultry equipment, refrigeration plants, sash, starch, shoes, structural iron, toys and puzzles, truck bodies, wagon boxes, wire goods, wire cloth, etc.

The city is a jobbing center of considerable prominence, especially in groceries, meats, hardware, confectionery, shoes, and other essentials.

Highways

East to West: Entering the city from the east, via Lincoln Highway, Federal Highway No. 30, paved with concrete all the way from Chicago, one gets a magnificent view of the wide-spreading Mississippi when crossing the high bridges connecting Illinois with Iowa. Westward, one may drive on hard surfaced roads to Omaha, North to South: The north or southbound traveler through Clinton uses the Mississippi River Scenic Highway, a very attractive route, extending from Winnipeg. 

Manitoba, and Port Arthur, Ontario, to the Twin Cities, thence following the Mississippi River to the Gulf of Mexico, where it again branches to Tampa, Florida, and to Port Arthur, Houston and Galveston, Texas. The Scenic Highway is exactly what its name implies, and when thoroughly developed will be without question America's most delightful tourist highway, through the very heart of the Mississippi Valley, serving as the agency to let the world know that Iowa, in addition to being a wonderful agricultural state, also has scenic attractions rivaling the Hudson. To the north, passing through Almont, Sabula, Green Island and Bellevue, it leads on to Dubuque, and through the “Switzerland of North America” to the Twin Cities. Southbound, one follows the river through Camanche, Follets, Princeton and LeClaire, by a paved road to Davenport. This route is No. 99 in the Iowa Primary Road System.

Primary Road No. 136 is now paved to Charlotte, 25 miles northwest of Clinton. 

This road will be paved to the Jackson county line this year.

Aviation

Two air mail routes pass through Clinton—the New York-San Francisco and the Chicago-Lincoln Line. Clinton has a very good airport of sixty-two acres. It is well located and is equipped with beacon, boundary and flood lights.