Liz Garst tells the remarkable story in a Jan. 12 program at Jefferson museum
~by Chuck Offenburger, Greene County Historical Society
A special program of the Greene County Historical Society this Sunday afternoon, Jan. 12, will re-tell the amazing story how in the fall of 1959, the Garst farm of Coon Rapids hosted a visit from the leader of the Soviet Union, then America’s No. 1 enemy. He came to learn how farm practices here might benefit his own nation.
Liz Garst, a regional business and environmental leader who today lives outside Coon Rapids, will use both stories and PowerPoint photos in presenting “Peace Through Corn.” She will recount how her grandparents Roswell and Elizabeth Garst came to host the farm visit by Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev and his wife Nina, at a dangerous time in what was known as the “Cold War.”
The Historical Society’s program at 2:30 p.m. at the museum in Jefferson will be presented free, with support from Humanities Iowa, the statewide organization that encourages preservation and enhancement of our culture and heritage. There will be free popcorn and lemonade, and people are invited to spend time browsing the rest of the historical displays after the program.
“It’s a little hard to convey to people today, especially younger people, the magnitude of the Khrushchev visit,” Liz Garst said in an interview. “First, you have to explain what the Soviet Union was, who Khrushchev was and what the Cold War was all about. But if you want to compare the visit to more recent events, in terms of how big it was, it’d be a little like when the Pope came to Iowa (in 1979), or when the rising president of China came to Iowa (in 2012), or when President Nixon went to China” in 1972.
On the day of the Khrushchev visit, Sept. 29, 1959, security was tighter than anybody had ever seen it around here. Iowa National Guard soldiers lined Iowa Highway 141 all the way from Des Moines to Coon Rapids. The U.S. Secret Service and Soviet security were all over the farm and community. More than 400 news reporters and photographers, from around the world, swarmed the farm.
Khrushchev was then the 65-year-old Premier and thus supreme leader of the Soviet Union. Roswell Garst was a 61-year-old farmer and entrepreneur, a co-partner then in Garst & Thomas, a seed corn company that was marketing hybrid corn to the world from its base in Coon Rapids. That product ultimately not only brought huge yields to corn producers, and thus new economic prosperity here in the Midwest, but more nobly it helped ease hunger around the globe.
Liz Garst was only 8 years old then, and she now chuckles about how different her childhood perceptions were of the events, compared to what she’s learned about them as an adult. She has done extensive research in preparation for her “Peace Through Corn” presentations.
“In about 1996, I opened Garst Farms Resort and had people staying here,” she said. “I would often tell them the story about how the Khrushchevs had visited the farm, and before long I was getting invited to tell the story to a Rotary Club and other audiences.” She has been doing so in Humanities Iowa-sponsored programs the past two years.
Liz, 62, grew up in Coon Rapids and then graduated from Stanford University with a degree in literature. She earned advance degrees in agricultural economics, and her career has been in banking and farming. Today she is business manager of the Garst family interests, which also includes insurance. She serves on the boards of Home State Bank in Jefferson, several other banks, Whiterock Conservancy and the Iowa Environmental Council.
Now, she and all the other Garsts enjoy reflecting on the unique position their father, father-in-law and grandfather Roswell Garst put them in the state, nation and world before his death in 1977.
“I feel lucky to be Roswell’s granddaughter,” Liz told Offenburger in 2009, during a celebration of the 50th anniversary of the Khrushchev visit. “It’s a legacy to be really proud of. The ideas that we should reach out to our enemies, try to find common interests, and feed hungry people as a way toward world peace – that’s a fabulous legacy.”
