Biohazard Cleanup Near Downtown Glidden Glidden, IA

Glidden was laid out as a town in 1866 and was named either for Capt. W. T. Glidden, a railroad promoter, or in honor of Joseph Farwell Glidden, the inventor of barbed wire — sources differ on which man the town honors.

Glidden's post office opened in 1867, a year after the town was laid out.

The 2020 census counted 1,151 people in Glidden living in 487 households; the town's peak population was 1,253 in 2000.

Glidden boomed in its first decade and a half, leaping from 177 residents in 1870 to 584 in 1880 — a jump of nearly 230%.

Glidden fought to keep the Lincoln Highway routed through its business district in 1913–14, and a Lincoln Highway Heritage Byway loop still passes through town in memory of that route.

The Glidden–Ralston Community School District operates two schools, both in Glidden — Glidden–Ralston Elementary School and Glidden–Ralston Junior-Senior High School — and its teams are known as the Wildcats.

The Glidden–Ralston district serves the towns of Glidden and Ralston across mostly Carroll County, with a smaller portion in Greene County, and since 2015 it has shared a superintendent with the Paton-Churdan district.

Glidden's population has been remarkably stable, holding between roughly 940 and 1,250 residents in every census since 1940.

Glidden covers 1.11 square miles in eastern Carroll County, a few miles east of the county seat at Carroll.