The League of Iowa Human & Civil Rights Agencies

The Vietnamese refugees arrived in Iowa with little but the clothes on their backs and the visions of a horrible war in their minds. Led by then-Gov. Robert Ray, Iowa was seen as a leader in welcoming Vietnam War refugees. It didn't end after 1975, when Saigon fell and American troops helped 130,000 refugees board cargo planes. The so-called "boat people" risked life to flee the communists from 1978-83. Vietnamese also arrived in the early 1990s after Congress passed the "Homecoming Act." And in the last 15 years, some 1,600 Vietnamese immigrants and refugees moved to Iowa, many to reunite with family members, totaling nearly 10,000 in the state.

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