Nov/Dec 2026 (Volume 18, Issue 6)

 

By Clark BreDahl 

 

At the ripe old age of 10 years, I didn’t realize I was treading on hallowed ground as I meandered a quarter of a mile down our pasture lane near Greenfield every summer evening to retrieve my small band of sheep.

 

But often, as shadows began to lengthen, the animals and I would trudge back to the farmstead and a strange thought would cross my mind… surely, something like this had happened before? As time passed, I began to understand why.

 

According to documented records and local folklore, large numbers of sheep once traveled along the old Mormon “Trace”—likely passing across the very ridgetop where the house on our Century Farm stands today near Greenfield. That “trace” would become one of America’s great sheep trails.

 

At an early age, my father took great pride in explaining to me that we lived atop the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail. Parallel wagon tracks could clearly be seen across a ridgetop a mile west of us. And, as a high school farmhand, I bounced over similar ruts in a field one mile east while baling hay. Dad lamented that someday both of those grassy knolls might succumb to the moldboard plow, and sadly, he was right. Still, however, undisturbed remnants of the trail remain close by in Adair County near Mormon Trail Lake east of Bridgewater.

 

Though the sheep industry in Iowa now operates in the long shadows cast by cattle, swine and poultry, historical accounts tell us that at one time the ovine species dominated here, and it all began several months before Iowa became a state on Dec. 28, 1846. 

 

In February of 1846 the first Mormon party of about 500 persons ferried across the Mississippi River from a settlement near Nauvoo, Ill., to prepare for the long trek west. Then, by what could be considered either a blessing or curse, temperatures plunged and the river froze completely, allowing a much larger contingent to safely cross on solid ice. Though shivering without shelter in the meantime, by early March, some 2,000 Latter Day Saints and 500 wagons set out from nearby Sugar Creek to begin the long journey across the Iowa Territory and ultimately on to Salt Lake Valley in Utah in search of religious freedom.

 

The 1,300-mile journey across several states including the southern portion of Iowa that began between Montrose and Keokuk paralleled the Des Moines River into Van Buren County, then headed west approximately 30 miles to a site in Davis County near the present town of Bloomfield. From there it continued west and north through Appanoose, Wayne, Clarke, Union, Adair, Cass and Pottawattamie counties to Kanesville—the current city of Council Bluffs—on the banks of the mighty Missouri River.

 

 

It is unknown exactly how many sheep accompanied that first party of Mormon immigrants crossing the Iowa Territory in 1846. They were interested not only in getting themselves west, but in blazing a trail that would benefit all those who would follow. As word began filtering back regarding climate, terrain and feed resources, both en-route and in the Great Salt Lake Basin, large numbers of sheep quickly followed to help build an agricultural base. Until completion of the Transcontinental Railroad in 1869, the only way to move animals west was on foot via well-established trails—and sheep handled the rigors best.

 

Most of those sheep might have passed through the state barely stopping had the prairie not proven so harsh. Finding they could not subsist on the land’s resources or the limited supplies they could carry, the first Mormon travelers established temporary villages or “way stations” to serve as supply points for future parties. Crops were planted, wells dug, buildings built, fences and corrals constructed. The sheep left behind at southern Iowa supply points such as Garden Grove, Pleasanton and Mount Pisgah were probably the first flocks established in Iowa.

 

Most of the sheep moving with the travelers were believed to have been fine-wooled Spanish Merinos. Wool was the primary reason for bringing the sheep along and it was said that most families carried in their wagon a pair of hand shears, at least two wool cards, a drop spindle or spinning wheel, and a loom.

 

 

Besides their high-quality wool, Merinos were noted for their hardiness, adaptability and strong “follow-the-leader” flocking instincts, making them better suited for harsh, frontier travel. Still, they needed help and protection. At some of the stopping points, containment pens for the sheep were constructed literally overnight. Even so, many of the animals were dispersed into the surrounding countryside by wild dogs, wolves and coyotes. Others were bartered to pioneer settlers along the way in exchange for food and other supplies.

 

The initial boom in Iowa sheep numbers lasted roughly a decade as Mormon hand cart brigades continued to travel west along the original southern route and a newer northern branch running through central Iowa. The California Gold Rush of 1848 provided another burst of energy for the trail blazed by Mormons just two years prior as it became the primary path west for would-be gold miners and sheep as well. 

 

Historical accounts list numerous individual flocks of 1,000 to 2,000 head traveling the “trace” across Iowa during the early-to-mid 1850s. Though most of those animals were brief visitors in the state, numbers gleaned from old Iowa Board of Agriculture records showed steady growth of the state’s sheep population from an estimated 150,000 in 1850 to 260,000 a decade later.

 

The American Civil War in 1861, however, brought a sudden demand for uniforms. The Confederacy initially had an abundance of cotton while the North turned to its staple crop of wool. As bridges spanning the Mississippi River were constructed, sheep began pouring into eastern Iowa by rail. And midway through the war in 1863, as Mormon movement was beginning to wane, a large water-powered woolen mill was constructed adjacent to the Mormon Trail along the Des Moines River at Bonaparte.

 

Because of the war, wool prices sky-rocketed to more than a dollar per pound (roughly $22 in today’s market) and for a brief time wool was the stuff fortunes were made of. The war’s demand also provided the impetus for rapid flock expansion into western territories with the original trail being a major conduit.

 

Scarcely 20 years after the first significant numbers of sheep entered Iowa via the Mormon Trail, an 1867 census showed the state with nearly two million head and more than 60 woolen mills of various sizes. Excited county and state agricultural societies reported that: “Wool growing is receiving increased attention in many portions of the state… One of the sources of future wealth in Iowa will be from sheep… Wool is much more profitable than pork or beef!”

 

It marked the largest sheep population in state history. But it didn’t last.

 

 

Wool demand after the war dropped sharply and Merinos, despite their luxuriant fleeces and unmatched hardiness, started fading from the Midwest scene. Iowa farmers, already known for the production of grain on the state’s fertile farmland, increasingly turned to sheep that could more efficiently turn grass and grain into lamb chops and mutton. British breeds such as Hampshires, Shropshires, Southdowns and Suffolks gradually gained favor. But, without help from the wool market, the state’s ovine population shrunk to 350,000 head by the mid-1880s. It was the lowest level since official state records had been kept and also marked the first time cattle numbers equaled sheep in Iowa.

 

Since then, sheep numbers in the state and nation have cycled through various ups and downs. The slogan “Raise More Sheep!” was widespread during World War I. From 1914 to 1918 meat packers were discouraged from buying ewes so that more would be available to shear and bear lambs. But by war’s end price controls and plummeting demand caused the wool market to collapse again. Troop casualties from the war and a brief anti-meat campaign had a significant impact. Estimated per capita meat consumption in the U.S. dropped from 185 pounds in 1908 to 143 pounds in 1917.

 

Sheep numbers in the U.S. as a whole, ultimately peaked in 1942, once again during wartime. Agriculture census figures then showed 56 million head on farms and ranches nationwide. Since 1960, however, there has been a nearly uninterrupted decline in numbers to a mere five million head on Jan. 1 of this year.

 

Two contributing factors, in particular, stand out: Rapid adoption of cheaper, petroleum-based, synthetic fabrics after World War II, and more recently, a dramatic rise in lamb meat imported from abroad. Despite that, nearly 17 percent of all sheep produced in the U.S. still come from the five states bordering the original Mormon Trail, while Iowa ranks ninth in the nation in total sheep numbers.

 

With somewhere between 80 to 85 percent of Iowa now devoted to crop production and nearly 23 million acres of that being corn or soybeans, grasslands in the state are slowly slipping away, taking sheep and even some cows with them. Both, however, still quietly graze the southern Iowa pastures where the original Mormon “Trace” once ran.

 

So, if some summer evening you crest a hill in that part of the state, heading west as shadows begin to lengthen, it would be easy to let the mind wander… perhaps to a young boy with a stick in his hand guiding a handful of ewes homeward bound… or to a tired, dusty flock trudging single file into the sunset beside a great pioneer caravan. Both are part of the history of sheep along the Mormon Pioneer National Historic Trail in Iowa.

 

(Clark BreDahl wasn’t “born” into the sheep business but at a very early age invested his life savings to purchase a small band of nondescript commercial ewes for his first 4-H project. Sheep have been a part of the family’s diversified Century Farm ever since. He and his wife, Linda, continue to reside on the “home place” nine miles southwest of Greenfield—aptly christened years ago as Mormon Trail Farm.)

 

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