ATALISSA, Iowa — Segreta Davis sat quietly among the early morning  crowd gathering around the old school in the rural Muscatine County town of Atalissa Saturday. 

The rapid-fire voice of an auctioneer echoed through the grounds, referencing items that, until recently, had been used inside the structure.

Davis, 71, who once worked in the building after it became a group home for young men with mild forms of mental retardation, wasn’t there to buy. 

The auction, conducted by Herrold and Herrold Auctions of West Liberty, drew approximately 300 people.

Among them, Cameron Henderson, co-owner of Port City Underground in downtown Muscatine, who came to the auction to bid on restaurant kitchen equipment.

He wasn’t alone in that quest. Many bidders represented grocery and restaurant businesses.

Pedro Ramriez of West Liberty left the auction with a 32-inch color television for which he paid $3. He said his kids will put it to good use.

The array of items that lined the yard of the 106-year-old building included freestanding wardrobes, metal mixing bowls, a coffee maker and stoves.

But Davis knew there was more inside.

“The boys’ personal stuff is staying here,” she said. “The people of Atalissa are going to keep it and hope the Department of Human Services will come and take it for them.”

The “boys” Davis referred to are the 21 men, ages 39-70, who, until early February, lived at the home and worked at the West Liberty Foods turkey plant.

In February, Iowa state officials began investigating the bunkhouse after concerns about substandard living conditions  were reported.

On Feb. 10, many of the men were taken to a facility owned by Exceptional Persons Inc., in Waterloo

to live as the case is

investigated.

All that remains …

 Davis asked her husband, Warren, 73, to open the padlocked door. She walked through the wide hallways into the old gym where lines of lockers displayed names such as Raymond Vaugh, John Hatfield and Preston Pate.

Segreta Davis opened a locker. “They have clothes, hats, video tapes and everything in here.”

A cautious, orange cat walked through the room that once served as the school’s gym as Segreta pointed out the personal items that are being stored for the boys.

“Are you looking for your baby?” Davis asked the cat.

The cat ran up the small set of steps connecting the gym to the next area of the school and snuggled against a tiny kitten curled up on a soft, clean blanket. Soon, a male cat joined his family.

Davis said the animals were the men’s pets.

“I don’t know what will become of them,” she said. “I’ve been taking care of them and feeding them, but we have to go home pretty soon, and I can’t take them with me.”

And she doesn’t know what will become of the men, some of whom she met almost 35 years ago when she and Warren were hired by the Texas-based Henry’s Turkey Service and Hill Country Farms to care for them.

Arriving in Atalissa

Davis said the men were in their 20s and 30s when they arrived in Atalissa. They had been living in institutions for people with mental retardation and other disabilities and Henry’s Turkey Service set up working contracts with their families.

The company was hiring people with milder degrees of mental retardation who wanted to learn basic job skills. The company would receive a portion of the men’s pay to provide housing, supervision and daily living assistance. 

“Some of those boys’ families had heard about the company and contacted them and asked if their sons could be hired,” said Davis.

State officials have reported the men took home approximately 44 cents an hour or $70 a month after their living expenses were paid.

“The families knew all about the boys’ wages and how much they were being charged to live here,” said Davis. “There was no secret.

Though Davis said that if there were a reason for concern, she’s glad someone reported the situation —  “If anyone did anything wrong, I hope they don’t cover it up,” she said — she’s quick to point out that she believes the men were cared for when she and her husband were involved.

The Davises began working at the Atalissa bunkhouse in the early 1970s.

“We were like their mom and dad,” she said. “We told them, ‘If there’s anything you need, you tell us.’”

Davis said many of the young men had been in institutions for many years, and thrived in the family atmosphere.

Henry’s Turkey Service also made sure the men took supervised vacations to the Ozarks and other tourist sites, said Davis.

“People forget, that if it wasn’t for Henry’s Turkey Service taking the boys out of those institutions and training them to work, they never would have left those places.”

The last site

The Davises worked in Atalissa throughout the 1970s and spent much of the 1980s working at a similar bunkhouse at a Goldthwaite, Texas, cattle ranch also owned by Henry’s Turkey Service.

The couple returned to Atalissa in the late 1980s and worked there until they retired in the mid-1990s.

Henry’s Turkey Service used to run more worker  contract facilities, said Davis, but the Atalissa operation was the last operating site.

Henry’s Turkey Service co-owner Thurmond Johnson had been taking care of the Atalissa bunkhouse until a few years ago, said Davis.

“Then he got sick and went back to Texas,” she said. “He died last year.”

Johnson’s partner, Kenneth Henry, lives at the cattle ranch in Goldthwaite, said Davis and the men from Atalissa were going to retire to that Texas ranch this year.

“Some of them were just getting ready to go,” she said. “And they were really looking forward to going home.”

Davis said the men would have had the option of doing work at the ranch or just relaxing.

Now, she doesn’t know if any of them will ever see Texas again.

 Saying good-bye

Davis said Henry’s Turkey Service called her and Warren out of retirement and asked them to return to Atalissa to help the men get ready to go with Iowa state officials.

The men were still living at the bunkhouse when the Davises arrived.

“They were scared,” recalled Segreta Davis. “They didn’t know what was going to happen to them. They’d been told they would be going to live in old folks homes.”

Davis said some of the men were returned to their families in Texas but most of them are in Waterloo. She tried several times to convince officials at Exceptional Persons Inc. to allow her to visit the men before she  and Warren go home to Oklahoma next week.

But Segreta said she was told the men are adjusting to their new lifestyle and a visit could disrupt the transition.

“I said, ‘Why are you depriving the people who haven’t done anything wrong of seeing each other?’” said Davis.

She worries about the men leaving behind a lifestyle that included a degree of independence,  familiar, annual events and a town full of people they knew well.

“They loved the people of Atalissa, and the people loved them,” she said. “They are really going to miss the Muscatine County Fair this year, and the stock car races. They just loved that.”