RUDD, Iowa - A North Iowa community is celebrating its birthday this weekend.
The town of Rudd is turning 150 years old, and the community is pulling out all the stops for celebrating, complete with a morning fishing kickoff, parade, live music, vendors, a hot dog lunch and barbecue chicken dinner, and evening fireworks, to name a few of the festivities.
Mackenzie Thieman is one of the co-owners of Maeve Boutique. She grew up in Rudd, and still has family in the area, and says it's been awhile since the town has come together to celebrate something monumental as this.
Even with the heat, she says the turnout has been great, as a celebration like this can mean a lot for small towns, and is open to the idea of doing a celebration like it more often.
"It'd be an awesome idea to do it every year, as the turnout has been great. Maybe we'll see going forward how it goes."
The area around Rudd was first settled in the mid-1850's, and went by the name Bennet's Ford, which would later be platted as Danville. According to town historian Joyce Navratil, the story on how Rudd got its name is a bit of a mystery, though the most well-believed theory is the director of the railroad would pay $1,000 to build a church if the town was named for him.
