Glenwood Map
Glenwood is a city in and the county seat of Mills County, Iowa, United States. The population was 5,269 in the 2010 census, a decline from 5,358 in the 2000 census.
Located in a hollow of the Loess Hills, Glenwood was established by Mormons in 1848 as Coonsville and prospered during the California Gold Rush largely due to the grain mill on Keg Creek. Coonsville was the scene of anti-Mormon mob violence, became the county seat of Mills County in 1851, and was renamed Glenwood after the bulk of Mormons left for Utah in 1852. The community was active in the creation of Nebraska Territory in 1854, including two Glenwood attorneys elected to the Nebraska territorial legislature who were run out of town for accepting shares in Scriptown. At the end of the Civil War, an Iowa Veteran's Orphans Home was located here where evangelist Billy Sunday spent time as a child.
The Burlington and Missouri River Railroad was completed through Glenwood in 1869 and during the late 19th century the community was widely known as Iowa's center of fruit production, particularly apples, and hosted an annual Apple Carnival. Other early industries included an iron foundry, an expansive marble and stone works, the Glenwood Creamery, and a large cannery that covered a city block on the east side of Locust Street and distributed its products under the brand-name "The Glenwood". Darting & McGavern's "Sanitary" cannery on South Vine and Railroad Avenue canned tomatoes, pumpkin, apples, and beets into the 1920s.
Nearby cities include Bellevue, Tabor, Murray, Treynor, Randolph.