Alden, IA

Alden is a city in Hardin County on the Iowa River, laid out in 1855 and named for founder Henry Alden. The 2020 census counted 763 residents. The river runs beside the town's palisades, and Alden Community School District serves the surrounding farm country. For a small central Iowa city, the public library carries an outsized piece of the local story: the first library association was organized here in 1882, and residents kept building on that effort for decades.

ATTRJamo2008 / CC BY-SA 3.0

The Dr. Grace O. Doane Alden Public Library began in a storefront, became tax-supported in 1911, and won a $9,000 Carnegie grant in 1913. The present building opened in 1914 and still operates as a library; it was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1966. Alden is often described as the smallest American community to receive a Carnegie library grant, a distinction that makes sense once you see how much rural territory the library has served. The town's character comes through the river, the school, and a library that has kept its doors open across generations.