Iowa
‘Fearless’ 96-year-old Husband Calling Contest winner and Iowa State Fair mainstay dies
ROYYYYYY! IRRRR-VIN! See, hear the Husband Calling Contest at the 2023 Iowa State Fair
Contestants compete in the Husband Calling Contest at the 2023 Iowa State Fair. And it’s a 95-year-old who takes the blue ribbon.
Zach Boyden-Holmes, Des Moines Register
The Iowa State Fair’s Husband Calling Contest is marked by caterwauling and squawking and booming threats of Ohhhhh, you better get in hereeeeee, so help meeeeee …
But amidst all that boisterous screaming, 95-year-old Bonnie Eilert’s high-pitched reminder, hooked onto the end of her yowling and yelping for her husband “ROYYYYYYY” like a perfect little period, will always stick with me: “I Love You!”
Bright and punchy. Delivered with a little mischievousness, maybe. Or lovesickness. Definitely a smile.
“I Love You!”
She was the only contestant — out of the 17 participating in 2023 — who thought to add a little bit of tenderness. “You win more friends with honey than vinegar,” said Rob Sand, part-time Iowa State Fair judge and full-time state auditor.
Eilert’s choice of endearment reaped reward. In front of the largest crowd to ever watch the contest, a result of an old Iowa PBS segment going viral on TikTok the winter previous, Eilert won — a highwater mark in a year stained with grief.
“It feels wunderbar,” she told me. “I love it. I have other blue ribbons, too, but, oh, this is precious.”
Eilert — a State Fair mainstay on par with the chainsaw carvers and the 4-H stage volunteers — died March 22, 2025, on her “beloved farm,” according to her obituary. She was 96.
Born, raised and forever rooted to the land of Jasper County, Eilert graduated from Newton High in 1947 and married her sweetheart, Roy Eilert, in a ceremony at her parents’ home in 1949. The key to their loving marriage, she told me without a whiff of irony that day at the fair, was communication.
With a strong sense of community honed at an early age, she was a “lifelong advocate for agriculture and rural life” and a stalwart member of the Jasper County Chorus and the Farm Bureau, once serving as the group’s chairwoman.
“Her warm spirit, resilience and dedication to family and community left a lasting impression on everyone who knew her,” her family wrote in the obituary.
And, for more than 40 years, Eilert was the keeper of the First Church key at the State Fair, a volunteer position that let her visit about her cherished fair with tourists from far and wide. A replica of (you guessed it) the first Christian church built on Iowa land in 1834, the First Church was “a place dear to her heart,” her obituary says.
Indeed, the whole fair was much loved by Eilert. In her older years, she was known to wear old-timey clothes — lace stoles and pillbox hats — and tool around the grounds on her scooter. Hills be damned!
All day, every day, there was never too much fair for Bonnie, a legacy her family is honoring by asking for memorial contributions to the Iowa State Fair in lieu of flowers.
Find an excerpt of Courtney Crowder’s column on Bonnie Eilert and the Husband Calling Contest below, and read the full story here.
IOWA STATE FAIRGROUNDS — At 95 years old — or as Bonnie Eilert likes to classify: “I’m older than dirt” — she’s been coming to the State Fair nearly as far back as she can remember. Her parents were farmers, and she married a farmer, so, in August, it’s just what you did, you came to Des Moines, she says.
About four decades ago ― when she first started getting unsteady on her feet ― her daughter Sheryl bought a camper so they could stay on the fairgrounds instead of making the hike back and forth to Newton. She’s been spending her nights at the same site ever since, and passes her days tending to the First Church, a historical prairie church in the fair’s Heritage Village area.
Eilert has been entering the Husband Calling Contest since it began about 40 years ago, she says. But it’s hard to keep track, she admits. This contest is just one of many she enters, one of many of her “adventures,” as she calls them.
“I’m fearless,” she says. “My husband was so against it. He says, ‘Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare.’ ‘I’m going to do it,’ I said.”
So she entered and won: “He left me alone after that. He was proud of me.”
Roy died nearly a decade ago, and Sheryl ― Bonnie’s State Fair sidekick and her live-in caretaker ― died very suddenly this year. Being at the fair without her has been “pretty horrific,” she says.
But attending some of the contests that Sheryl loved so much has been a bit of salve.
“Yes, it’s brought me some comfort because people ask about my dear, charming child,” she says, clutching her ribbon and her winnings, a whopping $15. “Everybody’s just made my day.”
Read the full story here.
Courtney Crowder, the Register’s Iowa Columnist, traverses the state’s 99 counties telling Iowans’ stories. Her State Fair food must-get is the Bauder’s Peppermint Bar. Don’t be ashamed to have seconds! Reach her at ccrowder@dmreg.com or 515-284-8360. Follow her on Twitter @courtneycare.
Five people were shot and injured at an Iowa City pedestrian mall near the University of Iowa campus overnight, police said Sunday. Students from the university were among the injured, according to school officials.
The Iowa City Police Department responded to a report of a large fight in the 100 Block of East College Street at 1:46 a.m. early Sunday, the department said in a news release. Arriving officers heard gunfire.
Multiple victims were hospitalized, police said. Police confirmed to CBS News that one person was in critical condition, while the other four victims are stable.
University of Iowa President Barb Wilson said in a statement that three students were among those shot. None of the victims has been publicly identified.
No arrests have been made, and the investigation is ongoing. Police said they are seeking information about five “persons of interest associated with this shooting.” The university also shared the request for information.
The pedestrian mall was closed for several hours and reopened Sunday afternoon.
Here are the candidates for High School on SI’s Iowa high school athlete of the week for April 13-18. Read through the nominees and cast your vote.
Voting closes at 11:59 p.m. PT on Sunday, April 26. The winner will be announced in the following week’s poll. Here are this week’s nominees:
Taylor Roose, Pella boys track and field
Roose competed in three events at the Norwalk Invitational, winning all three in the 100-meter dash, 200-meter dash and long jump.
Daxon Kiesau, Urbandale boys track and field
Kiesau swept the throwing events at the Norwalk Invitational, taking first place in the shot put and the discus.
Alex Burger, Southeast Valley boys track and field
Competing at home, Burger dominated, earning four gold medals. He won the 400-meter hurdles and the long jump while running on the winning 4×200-meter relay and shuttle hurdle relay.
Kolby Hodnefield, Clear Lake boys track and field
Hodenfield, a defending state champion, broke the meet, venue and school record in the 200 and the 400 at the Clear Lake Invitational. He added victories as part of the 4×100 and 4×400 relays. Both relays also set meet records.
Easton Moon, North Polk boys tennis
Moon has started off his senior season on the courts unbeaten, winning all four matches while dropping just one game in 44 played.
Ava Lohrbach, Gilbert girls golf
One of the top golfers in the state, Lohrbach has had a hot start, firing a 35 in her nine-hole debut and a 72 for her 18-hole opener.
Nathan Manske, Algona boys golf
An elite quarterback and basketball player, Manske is showing his golfing skills this spring, coming out with a state-low 30 in a nine-hole event.
Ella Hein, Tipton girls track and field
Hein set school records in the 400-meter run and long jump at the Tiger/Tigerette Relays while also locking in the Blue Standard and qualifying for the Drake Relays. She won the long jump (18-6) and was second in the 400.
Maeve Bowen-Burt, Iowa City High girls track and field
The sophomore helped the Little Hawks land three Drake Relays events on the last night of qualifying, advancing in the 400 hurdles, along with the sprint medley and 4×400 relays.
About Our Athlete of the Week Voting
High School on SI voting polls are meant to be a fun, lighthearted way for fans to show support for their favorite athletes and teams. Our goal is to celebrate all of the players featured, regardless of the vote totals. Sometimes one athlete will receive a very large number of votes — even thousands — and that’s okay! The polls are open to everyone and are simply a way to build excitement and community around high school sports. Unless we specifically announce otherwise, there are no prizes or official awards for winning. The real purpose is to highlight the great performances of every athlete included in the poll.
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The late boxing great George Foreman lies buried in a cemetery in the northwestern corner of Iowa – a place he has no connection to outside of a lone visit to the region nearly 40 years ago.
Foreman died March 21, 2025, at the age of 76 in Houston and was buried in Logan Park Cemetery at Sioux City, Iowa, a month later, city officials confirmed. Foreman’s family returned Thursday to his burial site, holding a news conference with Sioux City Mayor Bob Scott to reveal Foreman’s burial place, marked by a large monument that bears an image of him as a teen following his Olympic gold medal boxing win.
The family explained in a statement released by Sioux City officials that he had visited the Iowa city in 1988, and often recalled the sense of peace he experienced there.
After traveling to the city on April 17 last year to bury Foreman, his family said they immediately understood the region’s appeal.
“Our father lived a life of purpose, faith and gratitude,” the family said in a statement released by Sioux City officials. “To see him laid to rest in a place that brought him peace means everything to us.”
Scott joined the family at Foreman’s monument that lies just a few miles north of the Missouri River in an upper Midwest city of nearly 87,000 people. The cemetery overlooks the scenic Loess Hills, created by windblown silt deposits that reach up to 200 feet high (about 61 meters) and line the river along the Iowa border for 200 miles (322 kilometers).
“Their story is a reminder of how one place can stay with someone for a lifetime,” Scott said.
A native Texan, Foreman rose to fame when he made the 1968 U.S. Olympic boxing team, winning gold in Mexico City. He became the heavyweight champion of the world in 1973 by defeating the great Joe Frazier, only to lose the title a year later to Muhammad Ali in the famous “Rumble in the Jungle.”
A full 20 years later in 1994, Foreman became the oldest man to win the heavyweight championship at 45, defeating Michael Moorer in an epic upset.
Foreman retired in 1997 with a 76-5 career record.
He then moved on to the next chapter in his life as a businessman, pitchman and occasional actor, becoming known to a new generation as the face of the George Foreman Grill. The simple cooking machine sold more than 100 million units and brought him more wealth than boxing.
A biographical movie based on Foreman’s life was released in 2023.
Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
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