MUSCATINE  , a

city and the county-seat of Muscatine county, Iowa, U.S.A., on the Mississippi river (here crossed by a wagon bridge), at the apex of the " great bend," in the south-east part of the state . Pop . (r89o), 11,454; (1900), 14,073, of whom 2352 were foreign-born; (1gio census) 16,178 . It is served by the Chicago Milwaukee & Saint Paul, the Chicago Rock Island & Pacific, and the Muscatine North & South railways . It is built on high rocky bluffs, and is the centre of a pearl-button industry introduced in 1891 by J . F . Boepple, a German, the buttons being made from the shells of the fresh-water mussel found in the neighbourhood; and there are other manufactures . Coal is mined in the vicinity, and near the city are large market-gardens, the water-melons growing on Muscatine Island (below the city) and sweet potatoes being their most important products . The municipality owns and operates the waterworks . Muscatine began as a trading-post in 1833 . Itwas laid out in 1836, incorporated as a town under the name of Bloomington in 1839, and first chartered as a city, under its present name, in 1851 .