Main Street in downtown Keokuk is also U.S. Highway 218, which is usually not the best arrangement as it brings heavy traffic that does not want to stop at local businesses, but still brings the negative effects of automobiles, particularly tractor trailers and their pollution. Nonetheless, Main Street is overall in good condition and has high occupancy with numerous interesting businesses to patronize.

While there is some demolition, such as seen above, we found a nice coffee shop, Blue Umbrella Bakery.

There are many old bank buildings, such as these, and one of them, above, is now Keokuk’s City Hall, which is a nice reuse for the Beaux-Arts structure.

Keokuk’s population is now lower than at its height when Mark Twain was writing about it, but its legacy is still left in many tall buildings.

The Hotel Iowa is perhaps the most prominent, with a rich history. I believe it is apartments now.

Opened on November 15, 1913, the hotel hosted eighteen guest on its first night of business, with 744 people staying there in the first fifteen days of operation.

G.H. Gazley was the developer, and it seems that while he had great success in other hotel ventures before this one, the Hotel Iowa had some rough patches financially for the first couple of years. He had actually worked at the Waldorf Astoria in New York before moving to the Midwest.

The first floor featured storefronts, and the original stained glass is preserved on many of the windows.

There was a drug store and soda fountain on the corner of Fourth and Main.

There are also a plethora of older row buildings, many in the Italianate style.

Next we get to the Pilot Grove Savings Bank building. While it definitely served as a bank on the first floor, there were apparently offices for various companies on the upper floors.

The J.C. Hubinger Co, which had a branch factory in Keokuk, also had offices in the building. The O’Brien Worthen Co. also had offices there, as well.

State Central Savings Bank, however, was the financial institution in the first floors before Pilot Grove moved in.

Moving to the east, it might be unbelievable, but I determined that basically every building below within easy sight has been demolished and is now a parking lot. A sad statement for the suburbanization of downtowns in America. The equestrian statue has been moved elsewhere.

I did get this bad photo of a cool saucer shaped building on the way to the bridge across the Mississippi, though!