After a three-year delay, the Jefferson Highway Association’s annual conference to be held in Mason City this week

MASON CITY — If you see people around Mason City and the rest of north-central Iowa the next few days wearing clothing and hats with the initials “JH” on them, those are likely participants in the 2023 Jefferson Highway Association’s annual conference being held in Mason City.

Named in honor of President Thomas Jefferson, the historic north-south route is one of America’s earliest automobile highways, stretching 2300 miles from New Orleans to Winnipeg. Through most of Iowa, the highway is currently known as US Highway 65.

Visit Mason City executive director Lindsey James says the conference was supposed to be here before this year, but it was a victim of the COVID pandemic.  “The conference, like many, rotates every year to different locations. We bid to bring the conference to Mason City initially in 2018, and we were announced as the 2020 site for the annual conference, and here we are five years later.”

The group is holding a caravan that started in Lamoni Monday and stopped in Des Moines Monday night. Tuesday’s route is from the Des Moines metro to Iowa Falls, with the group heading up the final stretch between Iowa Falls and Mason City on Wednesday. James says members will then go further north on Thursday.  “They actually take a bus tour, and they are going to travel a portion of the Jefferson Highway, and they are going to head north up to Minnesota, their final destination being Owatonna, but they’ll stop at sites along the way and get to see other communities in the region, learn more about the history of each community as well as the Jefferson Highway in those communities.”

James says members will spend much of Friday in seminars at the Historic Park Inn Hotel, learning a variety of things.  “They have a great lineup of speakers talking about historic preservation, marketing for communities along the Jefferson Highway, how to celebrate the history and use history to promote tourism as well as other things in line with that preservation theme.”

On Saturday starting at 10 o’clock, James says the public is welcome to join association members at the Kinney Pioneer Museum for a special community day.  “There will be a flag ceremony starting shortly after 10:00 AM, and admission is free. It’s a good opportunity for local residents to come out and learn more about the Jefferson Highway, about the association, but also see the Kinney Pioneer Museum if you haven’t been there recently, a great opportunity to come out there and join us.”

The public is also invited to meet the caravan when it comes into Mason City at about 3:30 Wednesday afternoon at the Band Shell in East Park. 

To learn more about the Jefferson Highway Association, click here to go to their website and click here to go to their Facebook page