Among the sandbaggers, a shared purpose

One shoveled, another held the bag. A third twisted and tied, then hefted it down the line. When one of them tired, a replacement stepped in with barely a word.

Countless volunteers turned out to fill sandbags and build levees along the Iowa River and around University of Iowa buildings threatened by the 2008 flood—an unprecedented campus effort that surprised even the sandbaggers themselves.

“I saw faculty I know, older folks, little kids who’d run to the top of the pile and push sand down to the shovels,” says Tricia Seifert, a postdoctoral research scholar at the Center for Research on Undergraduate Education. “We were all in it together.”

Sandbagging began the week of June 2, once it became clear that the University’s arts campus was in jeopardy. As the days progressed and the threat swelled, operations picked up speed and stretched downriver. By June 11, a hoard of volunteers had gathered outside the Iowa Memorial Union, building a wall that grew taller and deeper as the waters continued to rise.

On June 13, Seifert answered a call to help move at-risk materials in the Main Library, but joined the sandbagging crews outside instead. Like colleagues from the College of Education, she didn’t expect that floodwaters could stretch all the way to the Lindquist Center, home to the college and important information technology facilities.

Yet the next morning, she and the hundreds of volunteers who returned to Madison Street found themselves preparing for the unthinkable. The threat of thunderstorms late that afternoon put a halt to their work, but by then they’d barricaded Lindquist and other nearby buildings.

That night, word came down—the University had completed its levees and was preparing to wait out the flood. Volunteers had also managed to fill some 250,000 surplus sandbags for transport to other communities.

“I met a guy from Cedar Rapids, which had already flooded. He told me, ‘I just need to help,’” Seifert says. “I think that kind of spirit is what brought us all together.”