Greetings, I'm Herb Schaffer, and welcome to Bentonsport, Iowa.

We like to think of this village with a simple motto nestled in beauty and immersed in nature.

And much of the beauty has to do with the historic architecture here that's left over from the steamboat era, and much of this town really is remnants from the 1840s and 1850s when all kinds of people came here and passed through here on their way west.

First of all, with the native population that goes back to the end of the Ice Age, when the Des Moines River was a wide, wide thoroughfare of travel and provided habitat for game and place for people to live in, it's been that way ever since.

Fur traders came through and bartered with the native population for beaver pelts.

That was our story, in the 1820s, and by the 1840s, when America was expanding west, this became the Silicon Valley of the American West.

Silicon Valley means for Iowa is that this is a place of opportunity and certainly in the 1840s it was.

And this river providing power to run machinery became the opportunity to make economic gain and to build industries and give people a place to call home and a hope and a promise for their future.

If you have a mill, you have to have a place for the farmer to have his horse shoes, that becomes a blacksmith shop.

There's clay along the river bank.

So you have a pottery works.

You have a general store and pretty soon you have a town.

So I guess that's what excites me about Bentonsport, because it's the whole story of America right here.

When people visit Bentensport, I like to think it's because of the natural beauty nestled in beauty, immersed in nature, and geode becomes, I think, a metaphor for what this village is about.

It may not look like much from afar, but you open it up and it is a thing of beauty.

So there are hiking trails.

Lower Des Moines River Water Trail is is here through this area, with both accesses along the river way.

The Historic Hills Scenic Byway passes through the county and through this village, crossing the Des Moines River multiple times and gives people a whole different feel for the pace of life.

Well, what I love about living in Iowa is the transparent, genuine warmth of people and that we value the interactions with one another, and we're always delighted when someone from someplace else comes to visit.

Hi there.

Hi there.

And this is the iron and lace shop.

It's those sorts of things that make me glad to live in Bentonsport.

Glad to live in Iowa.

I think this is one of the best places on the face of the Earth.