Hi, my name is Doug Clough and welcome to Ida Grove, Iowa.

You know, Midwest Industries is one of our industries here in Ida Grove and our founder, Byron Gobberson loved castles.

He loved everything castle like.

Starting, I believe it was in the seventies.

The castle started coming to town, and it seems like no matter which way you enter Ida Grove, you're going to see, for instance, on the east end of town, a castle that says, welcome to Ida Grove.

So that's your first impression.

And if you go down to the shopping center and Ida Grove, you're going to see knights that welcome you into those areas.

You made the Courier building what you see right down the street, which is a castle.

Lake Lajune is Midwest industries test plot for our products.

We make marine products.

So there's an airport hangar out there, there's a chalet out there and also on the hill, there's a residential area he named after his wife Lake Lajune estates, where there's all kinds of private homes that are shaped like castles.

So, you know, you see a lot of different images that basically scream Castletown USA, which, you know, that is our trademark.

And a big part of it was having this idea of a balcony where people could look down at the stage or at the movie and just enjoy a unique experience for northwest Iowa.

We're in the King Theater, you know, every castle town's got to have a king.

And we were lucky enough that in 1917, Frank King built this theater.

We're so happy to have a community that's been incredibly involved with us.

They did all of the wood work, they did all the staining, volunteer labor that that installed all of this.

So that was a big part of what this became.

It became kind of a it's a resurgence of the heartbeat of Ida Grove in a lot of ways because it's one of those hallmarks of downtown.

We're here at the Skate Palace in Ida Grove, and this is a significant building for me as Mayor of Ida Grove, as a child, I grew up coming here on the weekends.

Our parents would take a skating.

This is a great building that reminds me, as a kid brings out imagination and dreams.

You walk into this castle and there's a beautiful skating rink in there and they're playing good music and just a good family fun on a Saturday and Sunday growing up and enjoying the castle here.

There's just a lot of potential in Ida Grove, and there's a lot going on.

There's a section here of antique boat motors, but there's also areas where there's antique ski equipment and antique golf clubs, toy cars, you know, just a wide variety of Americana.

If you look, there's always something to do.

I think Ida Grove has something for everybody.

You know, I live here for a couple of reasons.

Of course, we're all raised to be productive, interesting people, but we also hope that's reflected in the towns that we're in.

First of all, when I came to town, there was that charm.

You talked about the Castle Town charm that it had.

It had the theme again, the King Theater.

We have a, you know, car museum, we've got a skating palace.

So for me, when I came here in 89, it was like hitting the jackpot in a way not only was wonderful at the time, but there was there's places to grow and things we can do.

My dad always said that every person should have an opportunity to volunteer in a small town to take part in becoming either what it is or what it can become, and Ida Grove gave me a chance to do both.

And that's the reason.

I mean, Ida Grove.