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While their neighbors were still trying to come to grips with what happened to their country on Sept. 11, 2001, citizen soldiers and airmen from the Fort Dodge region were going to work to make sure it didn't happen again.
An Army Reserve unit from Pocahontas and an Air National Guard unit from Fort Dodge were called to active duty within days of the attack. They would make key contributions to the nation's defense.
The Army Reserve unit in Pocahontas was called the 4249th Port Security Co. And despite being in the middle of the country, it specialized in protecting harbors.
On Sept. 13, 2001, 24 soldiers from the unit who had volunteered for the mission flew to Beaumont, Texas, to secure the port there.
"I feel very proud to be a part of this group of volunteers supporting this mission," said Capt. Chad L. Jensen, the commander of the unit. "We are ready, willing and able to support our nation at this time."
The soldiers were in Texas for one week.
Then on Sept. 25, the entire company was called up to a year of active duty. It was the first Army Reserve unit in Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska to be called to active duty.
The majority of the troops went to Military Ocean Terminal Sunny Point in North Carolina. Small groups of the unit's soldiers went to Military Ocean Terminal Concord in California and other ports.
Later, the unit would get a new name and mission as the 415th Military Police Detachment (Law and Order). It would serve two deployments to Afghanistan in four years.
The 133rd Test Squadron, an Iowa Air National Guard unit based in Fort Dodge, was also called to active duty very soon after the Sept. 11 attacks. It received its activation orders on Sept. 21, 2001.
However, it stayed at its Fort Dodge quarters and worked on ways to improve that nation's air defense.
The airmen devised a way to eliminate gaps in the nation's radar coverage using off-the-shelf electronics.
In 2017, about 60 airmen from the unit deployed to the Middle East for about six months.
The unit was shut down in March 2025 as a result of reorganization ordered by U.S. Force leaders in 2023.
The Iowa Army National Guard unit in Fort Dodge was later called up for a year of active duty. The soldiers of Headquarters and Headquarters Battery, 1st Battalion, 194th Field Artillery, Its soldiers stayed in the United States guarding facilities like Selfridge Air National Guard base in Michigan and Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana.