Mount Vernon Historic Preservation Commission

12/02/2025

10/28/2023

The MVHPC partnered with the Linn County Historic Preservation Commission and the Mount Vernon Lisbon Community Development Group on the placement of two new informational kiosks about the history of the Lincoln Hwy in Lisbon and Mount Vernon. There was a commemoration at the Kiosk in Lisbon on Oct. 6 with a poem created for the event by Poet Laureate Amanda Kibbie. The MV Kiosk is located in Prairie Park next to the Cornell football field. The MV kiosk faces one of the last remaining brick portions of the Lincoln Hwy and is near the 10th Avenue Overpass. The overpass was built in approximately 1910 as a part of the Lincoln Hwy. Credit to Steven Ciha of the LCHPC for images.

09/20/2023

UPDATE!!! Thanks to Jay and Arlie Willems, the circa 1910 glass negatives are now in the Mount Vernon Archives. We are grateful to Arlie and Jay for transporting the negatives and to Joe Burkart of Crestview Florida for donating them.

Photo collectors in Crestview Florida have glass plate negatives of a photographer named Hodson who worked in and around Mount Vernon in 1910. The collectors have offered the negatives to the MVHPC. The plates are fragile and very heavy, so shipping them is not a good option.
Is anyone planning to travel by car to Florida anytime in the next year and willing pick up these negatives in the panhandle of the state? If so, please send a message on this site to the site administrator.

07/31/2023

The top image shows a general store where nearby children liked to buy candy was at the corner of the Military Road (Hwy 1) and Ivanhoe Road. The store eventually added Standard Oil gas pumps. An outhouse was behind the store.
Just below and to the left is a 1927 postcard showing 2 travel homes where travelers were able to secure a room for the night. In 2011, the larger home was said to still have numbers above some bedroom doors.
To the right, then, is a more a more modern type of accommodation for the increasing number of car travelers. The Home Sweet Home Tourist Court, located about 3 miles west of Mount Vernon on the Lincoln Hwy, is shown in this postcard from the mid-1950s.
The bottom image shows the Conoco station that was at the corner of 1st St and 5th Ave, on the NW corner of what is now Davis Park. Later the building was the Mount Vernon Record Printing Office. This building along with Altoona Hall (formerly a hotel and Cornell Residence Hall) and the Presbyterian Parish Hall were all on the National Register of Historic Places but were demolished in the early 1980s.

07/17/2023

Mushroom hunters in front of Northside Tavern

April 29, 1938 Mushrooms from Grand Mound, Iowa

Mark Wolrab, Skinny Ellison, Edward Pitlik, Marvin Turner, Prockie Dvorak, Joe Brokel, Joe Pitlik

07/04/2023

On this Independence Day the MVHPC salutes the citizens who give their time and risk their safety as members of the Mount Vernon Fire Department.

In 1877 a civil ordinance was passed establishing a fire department and a fire district that included Mount Vernon.

A large fire uptown in 1893 destroyed many buildings and was the impetus for development of a city water system.

The information in this post is from a report by MVHS student Evan Tvedt (https://mvhpc.org/mount-vernon-fire-department-evan-tvedt/)

05/28/2023

As we celebrate this Memorial Day, the MVHPC looks back to the way in which past generations commemorated the holiday with parades and full-dress picnics at the cemetary. At least 163 veterans are buried in the cemetary: Civil War, 69; Spanish American War, 1; WWI, 48; WWII, 81; Korean War, 19; Vietnam War, 14. We honor them and their families for their service and sacrifice.

05/15/2023

We are sorry to note the passing of the founder of the MVHPC, Rev. Dr. Richard Thomas, April 24 in Cedar Rapids at the age of 92. He headed historical research that placed to the entirety of Cornell College's campus and two other historic districts in Mount Vernon on the National Register of Historic Places. The MVHPC has named a Preservation Award in his honor.
A memorial service for Rev Thomas will be held on Saturday, June 3 at 10AM at the Mount Vernon Methodist Church.