Leanna Field Driftmier: Iowa Time Machine September 30, 1976

Iowa Time Machine ⏰: On September 30, 1976, Leanna Field Driftmier died in Shenandoah, closing a remarkable chapter in Iowa broadcasting history. For half a century, listeners welcomed her voice into their homes through Kitchen-Klatter, a daily program that blended recipes, household advice, family stories, gardening, and gentle encouragement.

Born on a farm near Shenandoah on April 3, 1886, she had worked as a teacher before marrying Martin H. Driftmier in 1913 and helping raise their large blended family. Her brother, Henry Field, founded the Henry Field Seed Company and built radio station KFNF in Shenandoah in 1924. The station’s farm programming connected rural listeners with seed information, music, weather, news, and entertainment as radio transformed daily life across the Midwest. Driftmier first helped her sister Helen with The Mother’s Hour, then took over in 1926 and renamed the broadcast Kitchen-Klatter.

The program’s success rested on Driftmier’s ability to make broadcasting feel personal. Her half-hour show offered recipes, homemaking suggestions, child-rearing advice, reflections on faith and family, and news from her own household. After a serious automobile accident in 1930 left her using a wheelchair, she continued her broadcasts from a studio arranged in her home.

Kitchen-Klatter eventually moved to Shenandoah’s KMA radio station and reached listeners across much of the Midwest. In 1936, Driftmier expanded the program into Kitchen-Klatter Magazine, which at its height reached a circulation of 150,000. She marked the program’s fiftieth anniversary in 1976, the same year she died at age 90. #Iowa #OTD #History #Broadcasting #Kitchen