Biohazard and Crime Scene Remediation in Pocahontas, IA

Pocahontas — nicknamed "The Princess City" — is the county seat of Pocahontas County in northwest Iowa.

The town was first settled and surveyed in 1870 by Warrick and Buelah Price of Cleveland, Ohio, and it incorporated as a city on May 16, 1892.

Both the city and county are named for Pocahontas, the Powhatan woman of Jamestown, Virginia fame, and Pocahontas County is one of only three Iowa counties named for a woman.

Other Jamestown names dot the map around it — Rolfe, Varina, and Powhatan Township all echo the Virginia colony.

The community, first known as Pocahontas Center, became the county seat in 1876.

A 25-foot-tall statue of Pocahontas stands in Princess Park on Highway 3 at the east edge of town, recognized as the world's largest Indian maiden monument.

The statue was a Shaw family project begun in 1954 and completed in 1956 — designed by W. C. Ballard of Nevis, Minnesota, built under the supervision of Marcell Moritz, and still maintained by the Shaw family and the city.

Pocahontas had 1,867 residents at the 2020 census, living in 846 households and 492 families, down from a peak of 2,352 people in 1980.

With a median age of 46.9 years in 2020, Pocahontas skews older than most Iowa towns — about 28% of its residents were 65 or older.

The town sits at the northwestern rim of the Manson crater, a meteorite impact structure buried beneath glacial deposits.