In 2017, Iowa lost a number of remarkable Iowans. On this edition of River to River, we hear about severable notable Iowans who passed this year by speaking to people who knew them well.
We hear about Willie Glanton, the first African-American woman elected to the Iowa Legislature; Harold Hayes, the last surviving member of a band of airborne American medics and nurses who crash-landed in Nazi-occupied Albania in 1943; Jason Olgesbee, a heroic Iowan at the center of Pulitzer-prize winning photo; Archie Willard, a man who didn’t learn to read until he was 54 because of undiagnosed dyslexia, who then became an advocate for adults with learning disabilities; Don Nickerson, the first African-American to serve as U.S. attorney in Iowa; and Joy Corning, a moderate Republican who served two terms as Iowa’s Lt. Governor.
