The collection below includes publications that have grown out of the “German Iowa” project, followed by a list of primary and secondary print sources on German immigration to Iowa. Literature on German immigration to the U.S. and the Midwest appears at the end. Links lead to online editions or pdf files of the original publications when available. For press coverage of our project, please see the Media Coverage section of our site.

GIGM-Related Publications

• Laurel Sanders and Elizabeth Heineman, “German Iowa and the Global Midwest. Discussing Immigration and Xenophobia in the Trump Era,” The Public Historian 46 (2020): 98-125.
• Glenn Ehrstine and Lucas Gibbs, “Iowa’s Prohibition Plague: Joseph Eiboeck’s Account of the Battle over Prohibition, 1846-1900,” Annals of Iowa 78 (2019): 1-74.
• Walter Kamphoefner, “The Quest of the Historical Jürnjakob: A Centennial Evaluation of an Immigrant Novel and the Real-Life Figure Behind It,” Yearbook of German-American Studies 51 (2016): 1-23.
• Maiken Umbach and Scott Sulzener, Photography, Migration, and Identity: A German-Jewish-American Story, Palgrave Studies in Migration History (Palgrave Macmillan, 2018).

Primary Sources for German Immigration to Iowa

• Joseph Eiboeck, Die Deutschen von Iowa und deren Errungenschaften (Des Moines, 1900)
• Iowa, die Heimat für Einwanderer (Des Moines, 1870) [English edition]
• Iowa, die Heimat für Einwanderer, revised edition (Keokuk, 1873)
• August P. Richter, Geschichte der Stadt Davenport und des County Scott (Davenport, 1917)

Select Bibliography on German Immigration to Iowa and Related Topics

• Dan Elbert Clark, “The History of Liquor Legislation in Iowa, 1846-1861,” The Iowa Journal of History and Politics 6 (1908): 55-87.
• Dan Elbert Clark, “The History of Liquor Legislation in Iowa, 1861-1878,” The Iowa Journal of History and Politics 6 (1908): 339-74.
• Dan Elbert Clark, “The History of Liquor Legislation, 1878-1908,” The Iowa Journal of History and Politics 6 (1908): 503-608.
• Robert Cook, Baptism of Fire: The Republican Party in Iowa, 1838-1878 (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1994).
• George H. Daniels, “Immigrant Vote in the 1860 Election: The Case of Iowa,” Mid-America 44 (1962): 146-162.
• Nancy Derr, “The Babel Proclamation,” Iowa Heritage Illustrated 85 (2004): 128-144.
• Nancy Derr, “Lowden: A Study of Intolerance in an Iowa Community During the Era of the First World War” The Annals of Iowa 50 (1989): 5-22.
• Robert R. Dykstra, Bright Radical Star: Black Freedom and White Supremacy on the Hawkeye Frontier (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1993).
• Stephen J. Frese, “Divided by a Common Language: The Babel Proclamation and its Influence in Iowa History,” The History Teacher 39 (2005): 59-88.
• Larry Grill, Schleswig in Iowa (Philadelphia: Xlibris, 1999).
• Richard Jensen, “Iowa, Wet or Dry?” Prohibition and the Fall of the GOP,” in Iowa History Reader, ed. Marvin Bergman (Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 2008), 263-290.
• William Roba, German-Iowan Studies: Selected Essays, New German-American Studies 28 (New York: Peter Lang, 2004).
• Joseph S. Schick, The Early Theater in Eastern Iowa. Cultural Beginnings and the Rise of Theater in Davenport and Eastern Iowa, 1836-1863 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1939).
• Rolf Swenson, “Ernst Hofer: A German Republican Journalist in Iowa, 1855-1890,” The Annals of Iowa 52 (1991): 565-602.
• Trumbull White, “Does Prohibition Pay? III. The Test of a State That Recanted,” Appleton’s Magazine 12 (1908): 343-350.
• Frederic H. Wines and John Koren, “The History of Prohibition in Iowa,” in The Liquor Problem in Its Legislative Aspects (Boston/New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1897), 96-140.

Select Bibliography on German Immigration to the Midwest and the U.S.

• Thomas Adam and Ruth Gross (eds.), Traveling Between Worlds: German-American Encounters (College Station: Texas A&M University Press, 2006).
• Heike Bungert, Cora Lee Kluge, and Robert C. Ostergren (eds.), Wisconsin German Land and Life, Max Kade Institute for German-American Studies (Madison, 2006).
• Kathleen Neils Conzen, Immigrant Milwaukee, 1836-1860: Accommodation and Community in a Frontier City, Harvard Studies in Urban History (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976).
• Alison Efford, German Immigrants, Race, and Citizenship in the Civil War Era (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013).
• Henry Geitz, Jürgen Heideking, Jurgen Herbst (eds.), German Influences on Education in the United States to 1917, Publications of the German Historical Institute, Washington, D.C. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).
• John Koegel, Music in German Immigrant Theater: New York City, 1840-1940, Eastman Studies in Music (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2009).
• Mark L. Louden, Pennsylvania Dutch: The Story of an American Language, Young Center Books in Anabaptist & Pietist Studies (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2016).
• Elliott Shore, Ken Fones-Wolf, and James P. Danky (eds.), The German-American Radical Press: The Shaping of a Left Political Culture, 1850-1940 (Urbana/Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1992).
• Johannes Strohschänk & William G. Thiel (eds.), The Wisconsin Office of Emigration 1852-1855 and Its Impact on German Immigration to the State, Studies of the Max Kade Institute for German-American Studies (Madison, 2005).
• Frank Trommler & Joseph McVeigh (eds.), America and the Germans: An Assessment of a Three-Hundred Year History, 2 vols. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1985).
• Frank Trommler and Elliot Shore (eds.), The German-American Encounter: Conflict and Cooperation between the Two Cultures, 1800-2000 (New York/Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2001).
• Carl Wittke, The Germans in America. A Students’ Guide to Localized History, Localized History Series (New York: Teachers College Press, 1967).
• Carl Wittke, The German-Language Press in America (Louisville: University of Kentucky Press, 1957)
• Carl Wittke, German-Americans and the World War (with special emphasis on Ohio’s German-Language Press) (Columbus: Ohio State Archaeological and Historical Society, 1936).
• Yearbook of German-American Studies (published since 1968; formerly German-American Studies [vols. 1-10] and the Journal of German-American Studies [vols. 11-15])