Cerro Gordo County, Iowa: History
Cerro Gordo County was formed in 1851 and takes its name from the Battle of Cerro Gordo in the Mexican–American War, where General Winfield Scott defeated the Mexican General Santa Anna on April 18, 1847. In 1851, the first white settlers came into the area of the present county and settled on Clear Lake. Four years later, on August 7, 1855, the first elections were held and the first legal proceedings occurred in 1857. In the summer of the same year, Livonia was chosen as the new county seat. In 1858, the seat was returned to Mason City. In 1866, the first courthouse was erected, which was used until 1900. The courthouse still used today opened on November 17, 1960.
In 1875, Cerro Gordo County was described thusly, "This county is situated in the second tier from the northern line of the state, and is the fifth west from the Mississippi. It is twenty-four miles square and contains an area of 368,640 acres. Like most portions of Northern Iowa, it has a very pleasing diversity of surface, particularly in the eastern portion, produced by the valleys of the numerous creeks and streams, by which the county is well drained, while the prairies, which form the greater portion of the area of the county, are not devoid of a good degree of diversity occasioned by their undulations. The prairies, except in the southwest, where a number of extensive marshes are found, are generally high, rolling and dry, though never being sufficiently broken or abrupt to render them unsuitable for pleasant and profitable cultivation."
Cerro Gordo County was the site of the airplane crash north of the city of Clear Lake, in which rock and roll stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and J.P. "The Big Bopper" Richardson, along with their pilot Roger A. Peterson, were killed on February 3, 1959. The site is in Grant Township, in the northwestern part of the county.