The small Iowa town of Fort Dodge was never destined to be the owner of a large shopping mall. It wasn’t a particularly big town, nor was the economy flourishing in any way. But in 1989 it seemed like a great idea. The Rothchild Mall of America finished constructed by 1993.
Unfortunately, and quite predictably, the mall failed to meet the level of income needed to keep the lights on. By 2002, not a decade after first opening, the building closed its doors to the public.
The lot was foreclosed to some big company that had no plans on doing anything with the land in 2006. It was bought cheap, as the location was not ideal.
For over a decade it’s slept, rotting, uncared for by the majority of towns population. But some still see it as an important part of their town. A monument to the failures of a city with a set destiny trying to become more than what it is. At the very least, people say there’s a certain spirit about the place. An essence it exudes as it lays physically lifeless in its lot off the main highway on the edge of town.
It’s even been rumored that some nights, in the dead of summer when the chittering of the night life is just loud enough to make it difficult to parse, it calls out to the people of the town. It begs them to return and to bring life and purpose back to it’s existence.
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