DUBUQUE | Iowa's oldest city
 

Dubuque is a city of 57,000 on the Mississippi River in eastern Iowa, directly across from the Illinois-Wisconsin state line. The downtown and dense working class neighborhoods are laid out on the narrow flats between the bluffs and the river, while the upper-income areas are at higher elevations.

Dubuque was settled by French lead miners in the late 1700's, and chartered as a city in 1833, five years before Iowa was created as a territory.

The city weathered the 20th century's industrial downturns and has a refreshingly healthy economy for an old Midwestern city.

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The Dubuque County courthouse
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I spent two hours in Dubuque, counting lunch, and took a long looping walk, but feel like I missed a lot of good stuff.
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This is the first in a series of smaller Mississippi River cities in Iowa that I visited over the course of two days. I found them to have an interesting combination of steep hills, large, ornate downtowns, beautiful old houses, and heavy industry. These Mississippi River towns of Iowa are some of the neatest small cities in the Midwest, so look out for upcoming threads on them.

Damn that is a cool city that I have never heard of. Nice housing stock for sure!

The larger Galena of Iowa.

great looking housing & brick in there. Well done!

It's got some nice old residential styles!

what a neat looking place - never heard of it before

What a beautiful little city. That courthouse especially. Great photos, thanks!

sweet! I like it. It reminds me of every other small midwestern town but I like places that are built around pedestrians.

Great town. Blue collar, sturdy buildings, cool hill cut neighborhoods, and nice activity downtown. Wonderful tour Tt.

Did you have a chance to get to Grandview Park (south of downtown on the hill)?

Very neat, thanks.

Very nice. I had a high school psychology teacher named Mr.Rhomberg from there..loved the town to death

Nice pictures. Dubuque looks like a great small river city. A lot of the scenes remind me of Pennsylvania and Ohio towns.

Wow...what a surprise. Beautiful town and topography.

Very nice photothread!! :tup: I guess I can scratch Dubuque off my list!! :D I've been sorely lagging behind on photoshooting this year!! Can't wait to see some of the other towns along the Mississippi that you have in store for us. I would guess Clinton, Burlington, Quad Cities, and Muscatine are among your stops!!

Some nice houses there. Looks like a neat little town.

youre touching my nerves there...


mmm...
...who makes your money...

oh Dios...

"in the spirit of three stars"

Pretty place. And yeah, I love the architecture. Those old churches and courthouse are gorgeous.

Awesome. Thanks for that. I'm planning a trip around Iowa as a kind of an economic pilgrimage to thank the state for legalizing gay marriage. Definitely should stop off at Dubuque.

Wow, had no idea. I've been to Galena many times, but never made it across the river to Dubuque. I always had the image of a dusty small town with a chicken plant. Glad I was wrong! You didn't make it to Galena, did you? Much smaller town, but a fascinating one, with less 1960s facade butcherings!

Although I love most of the brick buildings you photographed, especially the utilitarian warehouses and rowhouses, that courthouse is just ugly to me. The proportions are off and it has ornamentation plastered excessively.

This shot looks like a much larger city... :tup:
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I've always been impressed with Dubuque's building stock and topography. There's a great selection of rowhouses in that town.
A drive just to the north of there takes you to the most scenic areas of Iowa.
Thanks for the pics.