Small Town [Muslim] America

Thoughts and observations from a brief stay in western Illinois.

This weekend I visited a community in Moline, Illinois, on the western border across the Mississippi river from Iowa. It’s a small town, lumped together with a few other towns to form what is called the Quad Cities.

It was an unexpected trip, to a place I never planned to go. But my father’s friend was an Imam there, and he suggested I go visit his friend and speak to the local youth in a community that did not have many resources.

I prepared a speech that would be interactive and relevant to Muslim youth growing up in America. From New York, I flew to Chicago and rented a car for the 2.5 hour drive west.

Since my talk was not until the next day, I had time to explore Moline and the Quad Cities metro. Moline was a booming industrial town in the mid to late 1800s. In fact, John Deere, who has a major road named after him here, created the first steel plow factory in Moline. His steel plow invention replaced traditional cast iron plows and revolutionized the way people farmed in the Midwest and across America. The city became an industrial hub and attracted thousands of immigrants, especially from Sweden and Belgium.

Over time, industrial jobs waned, and Moline’s strategic location on the Mississippi river became less important. Like many other midwestern stories, the town is a shadow of its former self, and houses an aging population. During my drives, I passed through many neighborhoods full of elderly white residents sitting on porches and mowing their lawns, and saw little in the way of children or teens.

Moline’s small town personality was mostly new to me as someone who grew up in Dallas and now lives in New York City. Although Dallas is not the most exciting place, it is still a massive population center that contains one of the world’s busiest airports.

In Moline, I overheard several conversations that distinguished the difference for me.

At my hotel, I heard a guest chatting with a worker while I loaded my plate at breakfast.

“I was arguing with ChatGPT the other day…” the guest began.

“Oh, I’ve heard of that!” the hotel worker interjected.

“Breathtaking views over the Mississippi River”- My hotel

At a Panera bread off the highway, I heard an old man speaking to the waitress about his day’s plans.

“Justine and I have a funeral to go to today,” he told her matter of factly.

“Sorry to hear that!” the waitress replied.

“We’re going to splurge at the Olive Garden after to cheer ourselves up,” he added.

“Oh, I’m going to the Olive Garden tomorrow!” she said.

It was fascinating to me that “the” Olive Garden seemed to be the nicest restaurant in town.

Speaking about food, it was sad to see the diet of most people here. All the restaurants were fast food chains, and if it was a small restaurant like “Hungry Hobo”, the type of food was still the same. And the physical signs of this on the people were evident.

In a Dave’s hot chicken across the river in Davenport, Iowa, I overheard someone say to their friend, “I didn’t grow up eating vegetables.”

I found it funny, but didn’t think much of it until I visited the Imam at his home, and he showed me his garden.

“I grow cherries, peaches, tomatoes, figs…” and he went on. Impressed, I asked him about the soil in the region.

“The soil is great,” he said. “Anything can grow here. The season is a little short, however.”

Midwestern winters are notorious, and my visit in late April was the first weekend of decent weather (I just needed a light jacket).

As I asked him more about the food he grows, I became curious why there wasn’t more fresh produce and farm-to-table restaurants in the area.

“Everything they grow here is corn and soybeans,” he explained.

During my drive from Chicago I noticed large farms that stretched to the horizon on either side. But with farmers prioritizing the growth of cash crops like corn and soybeans, the locals weren’t benefitting from the rich soil around them.

Corn and soybeans are crops that are insured and subsidized by the government, so even if they make more than the market needs one season, the farmers get paid. In fact, the government is known to burn harvested crops when there’s a surplus. Corn and soybeans are also very hardy crops, so unlike a crop like tomatoes that need more attention and care, corn and soybeans will survive most challenges.

Luckily for me, the Imam had a healthy dinner prepared for me, and sent me back to the hotel with a bag full of fresh fruits.

The next day, I arrived at the masjid early. Before my talk to the youth, there was a community town hall scheduled. I was curious to see how this would go in a small town.

The community at the Islamic Center of Quad Cities in Moline is comprised of mostly African immigrants. I met people like the Imam, who was from Algeria, people from Morocco, and especially people from West Africa, from countries like Mali, Togo, Senegal, Burkina Faso, and more. During covid, the Imam said, the community more than doubled in growth.

There were also a few south asian families, and also some white American converts.

The Islamic Center of Quad Cities

The community was mostly working class I was told, and many worked in manual labor jobs in factories and warehouses in the area. It seemed some of Moline’s old spirit was still alive.

Many of the new community members were refugees. I asked how they found out about Moline in the first place, and was told that the government actually sent them here to populate the declining region and take up the manufacturing jobs that desperately needed workers. It seemed that the children of the aging white boomers had left to more exciting pastures to start their families and nobody was left fit to work. But according to MAGA, immigrants steal jobs!

The Masjid’s town hall brought this diverse tapestry of people to one room. I grabbed some of the homemade goat jollof and took my seat in the back of the basement of the mosque. While I watched them discuss their community’s issues, I was amazed. In this small, quiet town in the middle of America, we had people from Togo to Pakistan and White Americans passionately debating issues that affected the community that they were trying to build together.

It wasn’t the agenda of the meeting that was interesting, because it was not. The things that were brought up were mundane topics like Whatsapp etiquette, the youth needing to be less messy, and balancing the sunday school budget. But to hear people with different perspectives, speaking in White country accents to West African accents, made me think an inspiring thought.

Only Islam would bring these people together.

Once the town hall concluded, the youth were gathered into the same conference room and I presented my talk. The topic I was given was deen vs dunya, but I slightly pivoted my content to speak on how as American Muslims, we need to be grateful for the sacrifices of the immigrant generation who worked hard and built masajid for us, but our role was not to sit back and enjoy their hard work but to push the community forward by building what I dubbed “an American Muslim Culture.”

The suggestions I gave to the youth were to choose careers based on what could push our ummah forward, rather than just prioritize income, and to find ways to embed ourselves in the local culture. One idea I suggested was to turn Eid Al Adha into a sort of State Fair, where we set up a local farm for Udhiya, and serve fresh barbecue and have carnival games afterwards.

While the youth seemed to understand what I was saying, I sensed a slight disconnect during my speech. This was confirmed when I opened up for Q&A.

“How do we become proud of our American Muslim identity if we aren’t around a lot of Muslims at school and we’re always trying to fit in?”

It was a wake up call that I had not done enough to understand my audience.

I quickly shifted the rest of the talk to address the important question I was asked.

I spoke about what I’ve seen in Muslim communities across the nation, from Texas to Virginia to New York and New Jersey, sharing inspiring stories of the achievement of Muslim communities elsewhere. I also spoke about Chicago as a hub for Muslims that was only a short road trip away. Surprisingly, many of the youth had not been there.

As I shared stories and observations from my travels throughout Muslim America, and even London, I saw the youth begin to get excited and inspired. When they asked how they can learn about other communities, I shared my YouTube channel, where I make documentaries about Muslim communities, and they excitedly went to subscribe.

One of my videos on my channel.

I concluded the talk and we went to pray isha upstairs. After prayer, some of the uncles who had attended came to talk to me. They were very happy I visited, having not known of me before, just as I had not known of them. They appreciated the way I was able to bring in personal stories and open the minds of their children to possibilities they had not imagined.

I went down to the gym in the basement where the youth went to play after prayer, entering a chaotic basketball gym full of kids from ages 5-17 simultaneously playing volleyball, basketball, and soccer in the same space. I took off my thobe and got picked up by a kid to join his team. My only highlight was one layup I made through heavy contact.

“AND ONEEEEEE!” the kids shouted, as I ran back on defense.