Tipton, Iowa

Tipton (/ˈtɪptən/) is a city in Cedar County, Iowa, United States. The population was 3,149 at the time of the 2020 census. It is the county seat of Cedar County.

Tipton was platted within Center Township in 1840 and was named for General John Tipton, a personal friend of the founder, Henry W. Higgins. The city was incorporated on January 27, 1857.

Tipton was continually bypassed by Iowa railroads, beginning with the collapse of the Lyons Iowa Central RR in 1854. The Iowa Southwestern RR, organized in 1870, planned to connect with the Chicago & North Western to the north but failed, even with the help of the Chicago Burlington & Quincy and considerable construction activity. Meanwhile, the Tipton & Stanwood RR, organized in 1858, had been trying unsuccessfully for years to connect with the Chicago Iowa & Nebraska RR building from Clinton to Cedar Rapids. The CI&N was in fact the road that had by the 1870s become the C&NW, 8.5 miles to the north of Tipton.

Finally in 1872 the C&NW decided to assist the T&S and make the connection. Col. James Henry Howe, General Manager of the C&NW, notified Isaac B Howe, Supt. of the Iowa Div. by telegraph:

Green Bay 29 I.B. Howe [no relation],

We have concluded substantially to build the Tipton branch. Can you make the survey and estimates at once or set somebody at it.

J. H. Howe

"The first train of cars arrived at Tipton on Thanksgiving day, 1872."