Keosauqua ( ) is a city and the county seat of Van Buren County, Iowa, United States. The population was 936 at the time of the 2020 census. Keosauqua was settled by the Meskwaki and Sauk people until it became US territory in 1832 as part of the Black Hawk Purchase and was "laid out" by European settlers in 1839.
Geography
Keosauqua is in the Southern Iowa Drift Plain, formed by Pre-Illinoian glaciers approximately 300,000 years ago. The topography of the area is heavily forested rolling hills, interspersed with farmland, and has many tributaries flowing into the Des Moines River. The Des Moines was large enough to handle steamboat traffic in the 1800s and was the reason that Keosauqua was founded.
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , of which is land and is water.
Climate
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History
thumb|[[Van Buren County Courthouse (Iowa)|Van Buren County courthouse in Keosauqua. The building, the oldest courthouse in the state, is on the National Register of Historic Places.]]
The word Keosauqua derives from the Meskwaki and Sauk name for the Des Moines River, "Ke-o-saw-qua", which literally translates as "Bend in the River", which accurately describes its position on the Des Moines.
After the Black Hawk War the United States' gained a large section of present-day Iowa in 1832 known as Black Hawk Purchase, including Keosauqua.
The 1839 Honey War, so named because three trees with beehives were cut down in the process, was fought south of Keosauqua in what is now Lacey-Keosauqua State Park. The event was a border disagreement between Iowa and Missouri. Before it was over, militias from both sides faced each other, though the dispute was ultimately resolved without a shot being fired.
Keosauqua was "laid out" by white settlers in 1839.
In 1840, out of the first four so called "Indian cessions" the Black Hawk Purchase, the Keokuk´s Reserve, the Half-Breed Tract, and the Second Black Hawk Purchase the settlers had laid out 22 Iowa counties.
In 1843, the Van Buren County Courthouse was built in the Greek Revival style. The courthouse was the scene for the murder trial of William McCauley. A guilty verdict led to his subsequent demise at Hangman's Hollow. It was the first legal hanging in Iowa history. the courthouse is the oldest in continuous use in the state, and second-oldest in the United States, on the National Register of Historic Places.
When Brigham Young and his followers were exiled from their base at Nauvoo, Illinois in 1846, their caravan crossed the Des Moines River at Ely's Ford, just upriver from Keosauqua on what is now known as the Mormon Trail.The 1847 Pearson House was a stop on the Underground Railroad.
By 1850 there were several "factories" in town including a pottery plant, a saw mill, plow factory, wagon factory, tanneries, and a packing plant.
Van Buren County native Voltaire Twombly who had received the Congressional Medal of Honor for actions taken at Ft. Donelson during the American Civil War became mayor of Keosauqua in 1884 and, as a businessman there, he built the Twombly Building, a stone building on 1st street that remains to this day.
20th century
21st century
In November 2025, Republican Iowa U.S. Representative Mariannette Miller-Meeks announced she would hold a town hall meeting during the middle of a workday, Monday in Keosauqua.
Sights and tourism
The Hotel Manning, a three-story relic from the Des Moines River's steamboat days, is Keosauqua's most notable landmark. Its unique Steamboat Gothic architecture mimics riverboats of the mid-1800s. The hotel was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in April 1973. In 2017, community supporters, organized as Engage Keosauqua, purchased the hotel. Over the next couple of years, through contributions and grants, they made repairs and updated improvements to bring the hotel back to its former grandeur. The Hotel Manning today continues to be a centerpiece of southeastern Iowa culture and history.
Lacey-Keosauqua is one of the largest Iowa state parks and was built by the Civil Conservation Corps during the Great Depression. The lake bathhouse and lodge stone work, from stone quarried within the park, remain outstanding testament to their work.
Keosauqua hosts its annual Fall Festival the second full weekend in October.