What Are the Great Pyramids of Avery? Iowa’s Hidden Mystery Explained

[NEBBE] As you travel across Iowa, you may, if you're lucky, come across an intriguing site.

An unusual place beyond the beaten path.

The kind of thing you won't find unless you know where to look.

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[NEBBE] Hickory Grove Cemetery is one of those places, and it holds a piece of Iowa history that has sparked curiosity for decades.

The great pyramids of Avery.

[birds chirping] 

[NEBBE] To explain how they got there, we're going to start with the man who built them.

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[NEBBE] Like many men in Monroe County in the early 1900s, Axel Peterson worked as a coal miner.

But beyond that, there was little about him that was typical.

A bachelor with a knack for saving money and a head full of ideas, he was something of an eccentric.

Axel called himself the philosopher of Avery and published his own newspaper called the Avery Boomer.

Using it as a platform to share his theories with anyone willing to listen.

[TOM WOODARD] It's a very interesting little newspaper.

Mostly his opinions, his beliefs about religion and politics and how people should conduct themselves and, boys and girls should act in certain ways.

Basically, what he thought and hoping that people would side with him on that.

Actually, he won the printing press in a poker game.

[NEBBE] Axel was also an avid reader who became fascinated with Egyptian history and culture.

[TOM WOODARD] And he decided that he wanted to be buried in a pyramid.

[NEBBE] The pyramids were to be monuments to a religion he founded based on truth and common sense.

[TOM WOODARD] He thought that if everybody would just debunk the bunk, everybody would just get on and all the ills would be cured.

[NEBBE] Axel once said, it is impossible to save the world from sin who does not make mistakes.

But if we try to save the world from bunk, then we will get somewhere.

[NEBBE] To help bring his vision to life, Axel turned to those who owed him money, enlisting their labor to pay off their debts.

[TOM WOODARD] We started this project in 1939 and they were pretty much done by 1941.

[NEBBE] Axel's three pyramids were made out of sandstone and concrete.

The tallest rises 15 feet and has a crypt at its base, with walls and ceiling fashioned from an upside down dump truck bed.

[TOM WOODARD] He wanted his printing press put in the crypt with him, and he wanted to be buried, sitting up at the printing press.

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[NEBBE] In the end, Axel was not buried in his pyramids.

[TOM WOODARD] The state wouldn't allow him to be buried in them.

Of course, it kind of irritated him.

So he's not even buried in that cemetery at all.

He's buried a few miles down the road at Cuba Cemetery.

[NEBBE] Though his final wishes couldn't be carried out, Axel's pyramids have endured securing his place in Iowa history.

[TOM WOODARD] I mean, Axel will always be an icon for Monroe County.

There's no doubt.

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