Migrants to Iowa strike different portraits where ‘American Gothic’ was created

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa (AP) — It was in Cedar Rapids, surrounded by cornfields, where Iowa artist Grant Wood painted “American Gothic,” the iconic 1930 portrayal of a stern-looking woman and a man with a pitchfork in front of a white frame house.

The city presents many different images today, after more than a century of international migration and faith-based resettlement efforts.

To many newcomers as well as lifelong residents, this heartland river city where migrants from present-day Lebanon built the oldest surviving mosque in the U.S. is a welcoming microcosm of America’s melting pot at a time when immigration enforcement is disrupting families and communities.

Hundreds of refugee families were resettled by The Catherine McAuley Center, founded by the Catholic Sisters of Mercy, until t