24/7 Trauma and Biohazard Cleanup in Donnellson, IA

Donnellson is a city in Lee County in far southeastern Iowa, and its motto is "The Heart of Lee County."

Donnellson was named for Esten Donnell, for whom the townsite was first surveyed; his son W. R. Donnell helped build the town's first buildings and served as both railroad agent and postmaster.

Donnellson began to grow after the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad passed through, and it was incorporated on October 25, 1892, when it covered about 120 acres and had roughly 200 residents.

Donnellson built its first firehouse in 1897, and in the decade that followed it added a telephone system, a cheese factory, an electric light plant, and a water system.

Donnellson's first school was built in 1915; today the town is served by the Central Lee Community School District, which consolidated Donnellson, Argyle, and Montrose students onto one campus in 1986.

Donnellson hosts the Lee County Fair, which the town proudly bills as Iowa's oldest county fair.

Donnellson is home to the Lee County Speedway, a 3/8-mile dirt oval racetrack that draws stock car racing fans from across the tri-state area.

Donnellson is home to a museum dedicated to Richard Proenneke, the wilderness conservationist famous for building a cabin alone in the Alaskan bush and chronicling it in One Man's Wilderness.

The 2020 census counted 885 people in Donnellson living in 363 households.

Donnellson's population peaked at 972 in 1980 and has eased down gradually since, and the town is part of the Fort Madison-Keokuk Micropolitan Statistical Area.