Walcott, Iowa, is home to the World's Largest Truckstop, but it could be argued the truck stop is home to Walcott. Before the Moon family came to town, Walcott was little more than farmland with an interstate being built near it. Not until a site selector from Kansas City came to town did things begin to change.
The legend of the truck stop begins with Bill Moon, a man who had a vision before there was much of a town to build one in. The Iowa 80 Truckstop is the largest truck stop in the world. "As they were building the interstate system he was siting Standard Oil truck stops," said his daughter Delia Meier, senior vice president of the Iowa 80 Group Inc.
which now owns and operates the truck stop and its affiliate businesses. "In the Midwest, he site selected and built them in the '60s and this one opened in May of '64." Moon called it the Iowa 80 Truckstop and had an operator and restaurant on site.
The couple who operated the stop lived in a trailer and intended for it to be their retirement plan, but the stop became much busier than they expected. The following year, Moon and his wife, Carolyn, bought the stop and moved their family from Kansas City to Walcott to start their dream of being business owners. Construction on the Interstate 80 Mississippi River Bridge, which connects LeClaire, Iowa, to Rapids City, Illinois, was still underway.
Drivers had to take an alternate exit, driving through town and over the Centennial Bridge. The I-80 bridge was ultimately completed.
