Courtney Crowder

As esports grows across Iowa, the State Fair offered the strongest sign yet that gaming has gone mainstream.

It’s one of the fair's best-kept secrets: The Garden where students grow produce that finds its way to Iowa families in need.

Tin Lam turned a language barrier into EatFuti, a growing Iowa startup helping immigrant-owned restaurants — and now State Fair food lovers.

Beyond the butter cow: From quilts to crafts, state fair art finds a home at the Smithsonian.

Iowa has more pieces in the Smithsonian's State Fairs exhibit than any other state. Here are the backstories behind these Iowa-made treasures:

What happens when one of Iowa's most celebrated storytellers comes home? For Peter Hedges, it became a search for hope, connection and a way forward.

From gas pumps to after-school programs — former Kum & Go CEO Tanner Krause is now working for free to keep Des Moines kids learning, fed and safe.

Cystic fibrosis used to be a death sentence. Until Dr. Michael Welsh gave back breath.

William O'Neal's life carried an early expiration date, until Dr. Michael Welsh's breakthrough gave him and other cystic fibrosis patients new hope.

After false starts and incremental gains, scientists crack the problem that made breathing impossible. Will answers come fast enough to save the sick?