Q&A: Author Art Cullen on Rural Iowa and Screaming Louder

2 days ago

15 5 minutes read

Art Cullen photo 1.jpg

Editor’s Note: This interview first appeared in Path Finders, an email newsletter from the Daily Yonder. Each week, Path Finders features a Q&A with a rural thinker, creator, or doer. Like what you see here? You can join the mailing list at the bottom of this article and receive more conversations like this in your inbox each week.

Art Cullen is editor and co-owner of the Storm Lake Times Pilot in rural northwest Iowa. Born and raised in Storm Lake, Iowa, he won a Pulitzer Prize in 2017 for his coverage of the agricultural surface water pollution in Iowa and has written multiple books on Storm Lake. His latest book Dear Marty, We Crapped in Our Nest: Notes from the Edge of the World weaves connections between Iowa’s past and present to tell a nuanced story about rural Iowa and its relationship to immigration, climate, and agriculture.

This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

The Daily Yonder: Dear Marty, We Crapped in Our Nest covers a lot of ground – from immigration to agriculture to climate change. What inspired you to write this book and why is this the moment to put it into the world?

Art Cullen: During the pandemic, my friend Marty Case and I tried to write a book together. We pitched New York publishers and wrote a sample chapter called “The Corn Gospel,” but they rejected it and basically said rural doesn’t sell. We thought the chapter was pretty good, but that was the end of it. While we were licking our wounds, Steve Semken, a publisher in Iowa City who had been bugging me to write a book, reached out again. I decided to take The Corn Gospel and build a set of essays around it to see if they held together. I think they do, and that is how the book came about.

The purpose was to add something to the discussion heading into the 2026 midterms. Iowa has been reeling with population loss, polluted surface water, the dissolution of family farms, and a political shift toward a one-party state when it should be a two-party state.

There has been a 50-year degradation of rural America, 50 years of emptying out and hollowing out through consolidation that is totally unnecessary, wasteful, and counterproductive. If people actually stood up and shouted about that, we could change things. Instead, many people just got pissed off and voted for Trump.

If rural folks stood up and said, “Don’t we need single-payer healthcare out here? We’re getting screwed over by insurance companies,” then I think we could have an impact. It’s about speaking to rural people about the economic realities we live with.

DY: You grew up in a version of Storm Lake that differs notably from the community it is today. Tell me a bit more about how Storm Lake has changed in the decades you have experienced it and how that change tells a more nuanced story about rurality?

AC: Storm Lake today might be the most cosmopolitan town in the Midwest, with over 30 languages spoken and people arriving from all over the world. Many of these immigrants are here to work in the meatpacking industry. It makes the town vibrant and diverse, especially if you like food, because Iowans love to eat. Latino immigrants revitalized St. Mary’s Parish and introduced festivals like the Virgin of Guadalupe celebration on December 12.

When I grew up, a Catholic marrying a Lutheran was controversial. That cultural tension remains, but now it is layered with economic realities. These immigrants enrich the town in countless ways, yet they are getting paid half of what, in relative terms, workers did in 1975 and there is no union or real voice for them. The meatpacking industry and the food system have changed dramatically in 50 years, with consolidation driving down costs. You see the impact in local wealth, in the peeling paint near the railroad tracks, and in the daily lives of people who work hard and get very little in return.

DY: Your book emphasizes the importance of immigrants in Storm Lake’s community and economy. How is escalating hostility toward immigrants, in policies and in culture, reshaping the social and economic fabric of the area?

AC: Even under the Obama administration, Latinos in Storm Lake faced aggressive deportations and harassment – Eric Holder [former U.S. Attorney General] was no friend of immigrants – and that helped push some to vote for Trump.

Today it is even worse. People live in real fear, and that fear quietly reshapes the community. Downtown is emptier, and if people don’t have to go out, they won’t. There are absences from school and church, and it impacts the town in many ways. For sure, it is bad for business. That is not what Calvin Coolidge had in mind for the Republican Party. What is good for business is good for America, and this hostility is clearly bad for both.

DY: Climate change is central to the future of agriculture, and in your book you highlight research that paints a stark picture of declining crop yields, rising temperatures, and deteriorating soil health. In your reporting and writing, how have rural Iowans responded to these realities, and what does their perspective reveal about the challenges, and possibilities, ahead?

AC: It’s hard to say exactly where Iowans are on climate, but they are very concerned about water quality. Nitrates in drinking water are being linked to cancers, neurological disorders, and toxic algae, and people are becoming aware of it. Nitrate rates in Storm Lake are doubling, largely because of livestock expansion but also because of climate impacts.

Livestock are moving north into Iowa and South Dakota as water becomes scarcer, and that is driving up beef and other protein prices. Droughts and hotter temperatures have been affecting the region for decades, and these pressures on food and water are happening right now. Yet few people acknowledge the role of climate change. Most people are still living in denial, but the stress on rural food and water systems is real and ongoing.

DY: You highlight rural Iowans adopting new approaches, from sustainable farming to rotational agriculture. What do these choices signal about the future of corporate agriculture and rural communities?

AC: What comes to mind is that profit goes to innovators. I honestly don’t see how the poultry industry can continue with five million layers in a single building, or how we can sustain the current pork production system that is intensifying production and draining water supplies. The people who figure out how to adapt are the ones who will survive. It may not be the farmers planting corn and beans, but someone grazing goats between solar panels who represents the future of agriculture. Our current system is being challenged by nature, and nature will dictate the terms. Farmers like the ones mentioned in the book are showing the way forward, and this new era of agriculture will have to put petrochemicals in the rearview mirror because people will no longer accept nitrates in their water or Roundup in their air.

DY: What impact do you hope the book will have?

AC: I hope the book helps keep the conversation alive in Iowa. Ideally, it would make Democrats realize they need to show up here, but I’m modest in my ambition. Iowa is a crucial, politically central state, very much like Ohio used to be, a purple state that Democrats have largely abandoned. I hope the book offers some insight on how to restore a two-party system.