Davenport Public Library

Downtown Davenport Business District Greetings, Dear Primary Selections from Special Collections Readers, We have bittersweet news to share about our blog. Due to the upcoming Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1 Level AA requirements for state and local governments to ensure digital accessibility, we have been developing a new blog that will make our content “Perceivable, Operable,…

Davenport’s Historic Fredlo Studio Shows its Roots Through an Historic Undocumented Jazz Recording In May 2023, Special Collections staff applied and were awarded the State Historical Society of Iowa’s Historical Resource Development Program (HRDP) Grant. With this grant, we strove to digitize and make the Fredlo Recording Studios Collection accessible. The project was completed in 2025. Now, we…

The Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center is pleased to be working with the Contemporary Club to make its papers more readily available to the public for research. Since the autumn of 1896, the members of the Contemporary Club have gathered in Davenport, as their chosen name would suggest, “for the purpose of studying and discussing topics of timely interest.” The first series of papers…

Edward Michael Catich was born in Stevensville, Montana on January 4, 1906. Father Catich began working at St. Ambrose University in 1939, where he was professor of math & engineering as well as art & music. He became internationally renowned as a calligrapher, typographer, stone-cutter, and stained glass artist. The Rev. Edward M. Catich died April 14, 1979 in Davenport, Iowa. Passport photos…

As we approach the New Year, we are featuring some old-but-new books in the RSSC Center’s collection. They are “old” because they have been here in the library for many years, and more obviously, because they were published in the mid-1800s. Yet they are “new” to us because during our recent move, we discovered them amongst materials belonging to our longtime partners, the Scott County Iowa…

On December 12, 2025, the staff of the Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center celebrated their new space on the second floor with an open house. Many wonderful guests joined us in marking this momentous event for the Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center. From a single room on the first floor in 1982, the Special Collections’ original location, Special Collections expanded after…

Velma Schmidt was born in Davenport, Iowa on March 6, 1886 to Oswald and Agatha (Bruhn) Schmidt. Her father, one of the owners of the Roddewig-Schmidt Candy Company, named a chocolate candy after his oldest child and only daughter. “Velma” chocolates became very popular locally and were sold in sweet, bitter-sweet, and milk chocolate varieties. The Roddewig and Schmidt families also owned the…

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! The 2025 Scott County Iowa Farm & Home Plat & Directory and the 2025 Davenport City Directory are now available in Special Collections. The Scott County Plat & Directory has been published by Farm and Home Publishers since 1987. We also have older Scott County directories by various other publishers. Published by R. L. Polk & Co. since 1908, and…

The images below documenting Davenport’s 1947 and 1950 Christmas parades come from the Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center’s “Davenport Chamber of Commerce Photograph Collection” (1986-01). This group of approximately 1,000 images ranging in date from about 1900-1950 was donated to the library in the mid-1980s, when the Special Collections department was just coming into being. It formed…

Get your pens ready for creating Turkey Notes! For this year’s Turkey Notes blog, we have some special guests who shared their creations with us! As noted in our blog, Turkey Notes: Our 2024 edition, Turkey Notes are a short poem using three or four lines, with the word “Turkey” in the first two lines, which has been a Davenport and Scott County tradition since approximately 1890. Some of our…

It was 160 years ago on November 16, 1865 that the steamboat Keithburg arrived on the levee in Davenport, Iowa. It was an hour earlier than expected, covered in American flags, and carrying 150 children who had lost their fathers in the Civil War. Once they disembarked, 149 children were fed by local women and then carriages from local liveries drove them to the former Union soldier training…

Wilhelmina, or Mina, (Schmidt) Fahlenkamp did not appear to have an easy life. Born to Christ and Maria Schmidt about 1844 in Germany, Wilhelmina had immigrated to the United States with her family in 1860. She married Carsten Fahlenkamp in 1867 in Clinton, Iowa. Little is known about Carsten and Wilhelmina’s days in Clinton, Iowa. We do know that in the 1870 United States census, the family…

We’re thrilled to share that the Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center is ready to assist patrons with their local history and genealogical questions! Ask our staff members for a tour of our new space. Our hours have been expanded to better serve our patrons! Please see our updated hours below: Monday: 12:00 pm – 8:00 pmTuesday: 9:00 am – 5:30 pmWednesday: 9:00 am – 5:30 pmThursday: 9:00…

Interior view of Ovson Egg Company taken by the Fromader Studio circa the 1930s. http://www.umvphotoarchive.org/digital/collection/scdpl/id/523/rec/1 Moving in Progress: Richardson-Sloane Special Collections Center will be closed beginning June 16th for the process of moving to the 2nd floor of the Main Library. Our anticipated opening date is July 12th – date subject to change. We will not be…

Summer has arrived in our area as thousands of children are enjoying summer vacation. We are joining in the celebration by sharing this casual outdoor photograph of Robert “Bobby” Evans taken c. 1920 from our J. B. Hostetler Studio collection. DPLVolume 114 dplx1126. Hostetler Studio Collection. Robert, son of Harry and Grace Evans, was born August 21, 1910 in Davenport. He attended local…

This negative image was found on our Upper Mississippi Valley Digital Image Archive from our Hostetler Photograph Collection. It is of a young woman named Florence Becker. From our research, we believe her to be Miss Florence Becker born on December 29, 1895 to Fritz H. Becker and Louisa C. Struckmann in Davenport. On June 24, 1915, Miss Florence married Charles V. Rider at the First Christian…