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Mansa Musa was the ruler of the Mali Empire in West Africa. Details recorded here should be sourced; unknown information is left blank.
MORE →Reflects the personal views, recollections, and perspective of the author, Mike Davis.
This is a personal recollection on the Move fire on May 13, 1985
 | This article contains promotional content. (June 2022) |
| Iowa 80 | |
|---|---|
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 Iowa 80 Truckstop exterior, 2007 | |
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General information | |
| Type | Truck stop |
| Location | Walcott, Iowa, United States, 755 W. Iowa 80 Rd, Walcott, Iowa 52773 |
| Coordinates | 41°37′05″N 90°46′53″W / 41.6180°N 90.7813°W |
| Opening | 1964 |
| Owner | Iowa 80 Group, Inc. |
| Dimensions | |
| Other dimensions | 900 parking spots, 15 fuel lanes |
| Technical details | |
| Floor area | 225,000 sq ft (20,900 m2) |
| Design and construction | |
| Known for | World's largest truck stop |
| Other information | |
| Facilities | Restaurants, convenience store, trucking museum, service center, barber shop, dentist, movie theater, laundromat, gift shop, truck wash, CAT scale |
| Website | |
| iowa80truckstop | |
Iowa 80 is the world's largest truck stop, located along Interstate 80 (I-80) off exit 284 in Walcott, Iowa. It sits on a 220-acre (89 ha) plot of land, three times larger than an average 75-acre (30 ha) truck stop,[1] and it receives 5,000 visitors daily. Iowa 80 features a 67,000 sq ft (6,200 m2) main building, parking for 900 trucks, 15 diesel fuel pumps, and also has a dedicated pump for dispensing bulk diesel exhaust fluid. Four-hundred and fifty employees staff the megaplex.[2][3] The stop offers numerous amenities for truckers and tourists, including a buffet, a food court, a movie theater, a dentist, a chiropractor, a church, and a museum dedicated to trucking.[4]
Iowa 80 is currently affiliated with the TravelCenters of America chain.[5]
Bill Moon, a regional manager for Standard Oil, purchased the land and built the original truck stop in 1964 along the emerging I-80, the 3,000-mile (4,700 km) highway that would directly connect San Francisco with New York.[6] "As they were building I-80, my father was responsible for finding land and building truck stops for Standard," says his daughter Delia Meier.[2] Initially a small white enamel building surrounded by cornfields, it housed a modest truckers' store, one lube bay and a restaurant.[6][7] Bill Moon took direct control in September 1965 and eventually purchased the site from the corporation in 1984. In 1992, the year of Moon's death,[8] it became a TravelCenters of America franchise, though the facility is still owned and operated by the Moon family.[6] In addition, the Iowa 80 Group also owns the Joplin Petro on I-44, and Kenly 95 off of I-95.[9]
In January 2025, Iowa 80 Group agreed to pay a $390,784 fine to the United States Environmental Protection Agency for alleged violations of the federal Clean Water Act. The fine is the result of Iowa 80 and Joplin 44 failing to adequately develop and implement plans that would prevent and control spills as required for facilities that store 1,320 US gallons (5,000 L) or greater of oil products in above-ground storage tanks.[10]
Iowa 80 has a large truck parking lot, truck scales, and fueling stations as it is customary for a truck stop. There are fifteen fuel stations. The stations have nozzles on each side, so tanks on both sides of the truck can be filled simultaneously. Since the introduction of trucks requiring diesel exhaust fluid, the fuel island at Iowa 80 has been renovated to include pumps for bulk DEF dispensing. Iowa 80 has a service center where vehicle diagnostics, minor repairs, oil changes or tire rotations can be done. A small convenience store is located on the fuel island. Iowa 80 also has a truck washing facility, and even the engine can be washed.[3] Iowa 80 also has Tesla Superchargers[11] and ChargePoint stations for electric vehicle charging.[12]
CAT (Certified Automated Truck) scale was founded by Iowa 80 owner Bill Moon. With over 2,000 locations in the United States and Canada, CAT is now touted as the largest scale company network in the world. An app (weigh my truck) allows those weighing to not only get the information on a device in their vehicle but also pay for it.[13][14][15]
The Iowa 80 facility also has a two-story, 30,000 sq ft (2,800 m2) showroom, which is the largest trucker's store in the country.[16] Here customers may purchase chrome accessories, books, DVDs, CDs, cell phone accessories, CB radio equipment, apparel and cleaners, chrome stacks, and bumpers. There are custom built show trucks, one on a rotating platform. A 20-by-40-foot (6.1 m × 12.2 m) wall displays 500 illuminated truck lights. Also located in the store are a vinyl graphics shop, a custom T-shirt shop, and an embroidery center.[2]
A number of food services are located at the stop. These include Blimpie, Wendy's, Caribou Coffee, Dairy Queen, Orange Julius, Taco Bell, Einstein Bros. Bagels, and Pizza Hut.[17] The Iowa 80 Kitchen has an extensive salad bar and provides 'home-cooked' meals. The Iowa 80 Kitchen serves 1 million cups of coffee and 90 tons of meat annually.[3] The restaurant seats 350 patrons, and a banquet room expands the total capacity by 60. The stop does not serve alcohol to discourage drunk driving.[4]
Opened in 2000, the Iowa 80 Trucking Museum showcases a collection of over 100 antique trucks, 304 pieces of petroliana and 24 gas pumps, many collected by the stop's founder, Bill Moon.[18] The museum does not charge admission.[4]
There are twenty-four private shower and toilet rooms (which may be requested at the fuel pump), a game room, and a Driver's Den Lounge. The lounge provides leather chairs and a fireplace for relaxing. Iowa 80 also features a business center with fax machines, logbooks & trip report forms and working stations, along with a small free gym. A 60-seat movie theater and an on-site barbershop are available.
Facilities also include a dentist's office and a chiropractic clinic. The dentist usually arrives at around 9am; some of his patrons are local residents rather than truckers.[19] In the Modern Marvels episode "Truck Stops" on the History Channel, the dentist states that he is sometimes the "truckers best friend" because he is providing treatment that is usually aimed at "taking them (the drivers) out of pain". According to the dentist interviewed for the episode, the dentist office in Iowa 80 is very beneficial because it provides a service to patients that might not otherwise get to visit a dentist due to the nomadic lifestyle that over-the-road truck drivers lead. The dentist's office in Iowa 80 accepts both private pay and most all of the major dental insurance plans offered to drivers by companies, making its services accessible to a much wider range of clients.
Across the hall from the dentist is a recently added chiropractic clinic. Services include chiropractic adjustments and Department of Transportation physicals.
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Source: Wikipedia. Article content is retrieved live through the MediaWiki API.
Iowa 80 is the world's largest truck stop, located along Interstate 80 (I-80) off exit 284 in Walcott, Iowa. It sits on a 220-acre (89 ha) plot of land, three times larger than an average 75-acre (30 ha) truck stop, and it receives 5,000 visitors daily. Iowa 80 features a 67,000 sq ft (6,200 m2) main building, parking for 900 trucks, 15 diesel fuel pumps, and also has a dedicated pump for dispensing bulk diesel exhaust fluid. Four-hundred and fifty employees staff the megaplex. The stop offers numerous amenities for truckers and tourists, including a buffet, a food court, a movie theater, a dentist, a chiropractor, a church, and a museum dedicated to trucking. Iowa 80 is currently affiliated with the TravelCenters of America chain.
Interstate 80 (I-80) is a transcontinental Interstate Highway in the United States, stretching from San Francisco, California, to Teaneck, New Jersey. In Iowa, the highway travels west to east through the center of the state. It enters the state at the Missouri River in Council Bluffs and heads east through the southern Iowa drift plain. In the Des Moines metropolitan area, I-80 meets up with I-35 and the two routes bypass Des Moines together. On the northern side of Des Moines, the Interstates split and I-80 continues east. In eastern Iowa, it provides access to the University of Iowa in Iowa City. Northwest of the Quad Cities in Walcott is Iowa 80, the world's largest truck stop. I-80 passes along the northern edge of Davenport and Bettendorf and leaves Iowa via the Fred Schwengel Memorial Bridge over the Mississippi River into Illinois. Before I-80 was planned, the route between Council Bluffs and Davenport, which passed through Des Moines, was vital to the state. Two competing auto trails, the Great White Way and the River-to-River Road, sought to be the best path to connect three of the state's major population centers. The two trails combined in the 1920s and eventually became US Highway 32 (US 32) in 1926. US 6, which had taken the place of US 32, became the busiest highway in the state. In the early 1950s, plans were drawn up for the construction of an Iowa Turnpike, to be the first modern four-lane highway in the state, along the US 6 corridor. Plans for the turnpike were shelved when the Interstate Highway System was created in 1956. Construction of I-80 took place for over 14 years. The first section of the Interstate opened on September 21, 1958, in the western suburbs of Des Moines. New sections of the highway opened up regularly over the next 12 years, even though construction in eastern Iowa was completed in 1966. The final piece of I-80 in Iowa, the Missouri River bridge to Omaha, Nebraska, opened on December 15, 1972. By the 1980s, I-80 had fallen into disrepair in Iowa and across the country. Federal funding was freed up in 1985 to allow reconstruction of the highway.
The 1979–80 Iowa Hawkeyes men's basketball team represented the University of Iowa as a member of the Big Ten Conference during the 1979–80 college basketball season. The team was led by head coach Lute Olson and played their home games at the Iowa Field House. They finished with a 23–10 (10–8 Big Ten) record, and reached the Final Four of the NCAA tournament as champions of the East Region. To date, this is Iowa's most recent appearance in the NCAA Final Four in men's basketball.
Walcott (/ˈwɔlkɔt/ WAWL-cawt, sometimes locally [ˈwɔlkət]) is a city in Muscatine and Scott counties in the U.S. state of Iowa. The population was 1,551 at the time of the 2020 census. Walcott's interchange on Interstate 80 is home to an enormous complex of restaurants, motels and truck stops, including the Iowa 80 truck stop, which is the world's largest. Most of Walcott is part of the Davenport–Moline–Rock Island, IA-IL Metropolitan Statistical Area, but the Muscatine County portion of the city is considered part of the Muscatine Micropolitan Statistical Area.
Before the 1921 destruction of Tulsa’s Greenwood District, Black residents had created a remarkable center of business and community life. The district included stores, professional offices, entertainment venues and homes owned by Black citizens. Understanding Greenwood means learning what was built—not only what was burned.
MORE →Madam C.J. Walker