Sioux City Journal History: Photos of the Bicentennial in Siouxland
From the America 250: Stories from Iowa's history and how they've shaped the country series
Remember the Bicentennial? Or did you miss it? Either way, check out these awesome photos taken in Sioux City and surrounding communities at the height of Bicentennial fever in 1975 and 1976.
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Costumed reenactments were a big part of the Bicentennial in 1976, including in Sioux City.
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Longfellow School fourth graders display large cookie sculptures portraying historic events at their Bicentennial program for parents and friends Wednesday. In pioneer costumes, from left, are Todd Ohl, Kevin Stieneke, Jeff Sales, Melody Bowen, Pam Lee, Stephenie Palmer and Vicki Kirchner. Their program was a narration of the history of Sioux City illustrated with murals. Their teachers are Mrs. Dorothy Shrader and Mrs. Ruth Hantla.
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Efforts were made in 1975 and 1976 to get kids involved in the Bicentennial celebrations.
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Sioux City School Superintendent Bill Anderson with students dressed in Bicentennial costumes, May 1976.
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Hello America! Beating the Bicentennial drums for the Ladies Association of Morningside Country Club stagette are Mrs. William (Connie) Crook, left, and Mrs. Keith Welcher, general chairman, in September 1975.
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Horse-drawn buggies -- or, in this case, a stagecoach -- were a frequent sight during the Bicentennial celebrations of 1976. In this photo, 99-year-old Leah Irvine (at left, holding the buggy whip) rides Al Palmer's stagecoach on June 29, 1976. Irvine, who was born July 4, 1876, played a prominent role in Sioux City's Bicentennial observations.
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Old-fashioned Laura Ingalls Wilder-style cotton dresses were a hot commodity in 1976.
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Arts and crafts played a prominent role in the Bicentennial commemorations. Here, samplers are shown in May 1976.
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Bicentennial dolls were a special project of Mrs. Barbara Burnside’s class at Cooper School for American Education Week in November 1976. Students are, from left, Mark Gettner, Jamie Davis, Lillian Bracy, Dave Sorgdrager and Jenifer Foulk. Each school in the city was encouraged to promote American Education Week with some Bicentennial project.
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Western Iowa Tech Community College shop class students show off a cannon they made to commemorate the nation's Bicentennial. From left: Tom Mohing, Tom Schmitz, Les Schuldt, Charles Dent and David Schulte. The students fired off the cannon during a bicentennial celebratation at the Sioux City campus in April 1976.
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Washington Elementary School students march in commemoration of the Bicentennial Veterans Day on November 1975. They're reenacting the famous scene from Archibald Willard's iconic 1875 painting, "The Spirit of '76."
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Mrs. Dale Dicus, center and Mrs. Robert Batcheller sell a PTA membership to Mayor George Cole for use at Hunt School. The mayor chose Hunt since his wife teaches there and is also a new PTA member there. The 1975 PTA membership drive is Bicentennial themed, with each school using its own ideas for individual contests. While the nation celebrates its 200th birthday, the PTA is celebrating its 75th birthday. The PTA Council will be giving awards to all schools who have increased their membership over the past year when the drive closes. Mrs. Dicus and Mrs. Batcheller are the council membership chairmen.
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Longfellow School fourth graders display large cookie sculptures portraying historic events at their Bicentennial program for parents and friends in November 1975. In pioneer costumes, from left, are Todd Ohl, Kevin Stieneke, Jeff Sales, Melody Bowen, Pam Lee, Stephenie Palmer and Vicki Kirchner. Their program was a narration of the history of Sioux City illustrated with murals. Their teachers were Mrs. Dorothy Shrader and Mrs. Ruth Hantla.
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Paul Revere rides again at Sunnyside School as members of the PTA use the theme “The members are coming, the members are coming” to recruit parents into the organization, September 1975. Mrs. Joyce Tobin, left and Mrs. Marilyn Greulich, membership chairmen, stand beside the huge replica of Paul Revere and his horse hanging on a wall at the school. He is surrounded with lanterns showing names of students who have signed their parents up in PTA. Mrs. Greulich and her husband Bill thought up the Bicentennial idea. Mr. and Mrs. Glen Stanton are presidents of the school PTA.
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An American flag painted on the side of a shed during the Bicentennial in June 1976.
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Hunt Elementary students perform at a bicentennial program in Sioux City in 1976.
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Abu Bekr Shrine members march south on Pierce Street, between Ninth and 10th streets, during a Bicentennial parade in downtown Sioux City in 1976.
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Kids show off a Bicentennial quilt-like creation, June 1976.
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Washington School’s first graders carry small American flags and do some high stepping to Sousa’s Washington Post March during their Bicentennial Veterans’ Day ceremony in November 1975. The Morningside school’s 75 first graders practiced their formations for more than a month before their downtown debut.
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Costumed reenactments were a big part of the Bicentennial in 1976, including in Sioux City.
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Schoolchildren show off their Bicentennial models depicting the White House, Mount Vernon and Monticello, May 1976.
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Mrs. Jack (Dolores) Vogt, left, and her daughter Carol of Bancroft, Neb., display a Bicentennial quilt they made as their own special project for the Bicentennial. Carol, a freelance artist, designed freehand drawing patterns for each quilt block depicting the state seal of each of the 50 U.S. states.
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Three women with a large tissue paper bell decoration are shown in June 1976 at what is believed to be the Sioux City Boat Club.
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Tricorn hats, cannons and powderhorns were back in style in a big way in 1976.
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Bicentennial celebrations at Western Iowa Tech Community College, April 1976.
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Bicentennial Royalty during the Bicentennial celebration in Dakota City, June 1976.
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Arend Schreur, fifth grade teacher at Hunt School, discusses the Spirit of ’76 with one of his students, Teresa Rowe, in October 1975. This raised plaque is a permanent inset placed in the building many years ago but has special significance during the Bicentennial year. Schreur is the building representative on the Bicentennial Committee.
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Students visit the American Freedom Train in Sioux City, August 1975.
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The American Freedom Train arrives in Sioux City and is greeted by costumed militiamen and a marching band, August 1975.
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Little Princess contestants during the Bicentennial in Smithland, Iowa, June 1976.
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Bicentennial costumes at East High School in Sioux City, November 1975.
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The Bicentennial parade in Hartington, Neb., May 1976.
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Bicentennial parade in South Sioux City, May 1976.
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Sioux City barber John Berger gives advice on how to maintain a beautiful beard ahead of the Old Fashioned Fourth of July Beard Contest in Sioux City in 1976. (Berger in more recent years became famous as the oldest working barber in Sioux City.)
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Hoisting the Bicentennial flag in Dakota City, June 1976.
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A horse-drawn Conestoga wagon at the Bicentennial celebration in Correctionville, July 1976.
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The Magnet, Neb., Bicentennial parade, May 1976. That year Magnet proclaimed itself "The Town Too Tough to Die," having survived a tornado the previous May.
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Bicentennial celebration in Remsen, Iowa, June 1976.
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The Bicentennial parade in Hartington, Neb., May 1976.
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A Bicentennial cake in Vermillion, S.D., July 1976.
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Students at Lawton-Bronson Elementary planted red, white and blue flowers in commemoration of the Bicentennial, May 1976.
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Ms. Bicentennial Queen of Wausa, Neb. (Mrs. Elmer Peterson) and her court, April 1976.
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Bicentennial celebrations in Dakota City, June 1976.
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Bicentennial celebrations at Western Iowa Tech Community College in Sioux City, April 1976.
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Sioux City's first "Bicentennial baby" (the first born in the year leading up to July 4, 1976) was born shortly after midnight July 4, 1975.
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Two young lads mount the steps on their way to inspect the Illinois Central Gulf Railroad’s Bicentennial American Eagle locomotive which visited Sioux City in August 1975. The engine was decorated in a symbolic American flag motif with cab and nose painted as head and beak of an American eagle. Numbered “1776”, the engine had 2,000 horsepower and a maximum speed of 76 m.p.h.
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Hartington, Neb.'s Bicentennial Queen, May 1976.
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Leah Irvine, Sioux City's "Bicentennial Belle," was taken for a special helicopter ride in July 1975. Between July 1975 and July 1976, the 99-year-old Irvine, who had never been married and had lived a semi-quiet life for her first 98 years, was the center of attention: wined, dined, taken for rides in helicopters and stagecoaches, flown to Mount Rushmore, interviewed and photographed repeatedly. At one point after she'd taken her first-ever flight in an airplane, Irvine said she next wanted to ride an elephant. She wasn't able to do that, but she did get to meet a Shrine Circus elephant.
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George Cole and John VanDyke show off a Bicentennial flag outside the old Sioux City Journal offices, October 1974.
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A fire hydrant in Ricketts, Iowa, painted for the Bicentennial, June 1976.
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Bicentennial service at Smith School, May 1976.
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America 250: Stories from Iowa's history and how they've shaped the country
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