1889 HISTORY OF LINCOLN, NEBRASKA

      (164) On petition of 189 citizens, the town of Lincoln was ordered incorporated by the County Commissioners, April 7, 1869, about twenty years and three months ago at this writing. The corporate limits were made to include section twenty-six, the west half of section twenty-five, the southwest quarter of section twenty-four, and the south half of section twenty-three, in town ten north, range six east. The town officers were as subjoined:

     Trustees -- H. S. Jennings, S. B. Linderman, H. D. Gilbert, J. L. McConnell, and D. W. Tingley.

     Judges of Election -- Seth Robinson, A. J. Cropsey, and J. N. Townley.

     The town election was held on May 3, 1869, and a Board of Trustees were chosen, as follows: H. D. Gilbert, C. H. Gere, William Rowe, Philetus Peek, and J. L. McConnell. The officers of the Board were: H. D. Gilbert, Chairman; J. R. DeLand, Clerk; and Nelson C. Brock, Treasurer.

     The year 1869 was a prosperous one for Lincoln. The lot sales had been wonderfully successful, assuring all needed State improvement, to be derived therefrom. Land sales continued to be active, and population multiplied in town and adjacent country. Above all, the famously progressive Legislature of 1869 met early in the year at the new capitol, and not only approved all the splendid work of Governor David Butler and Commissioners John Gillespie and T. P. Kennard, but also made provision for further progress on a most wise and magnificent scale.

     Hon. C. H. Gere, in his address to the Old Settlers' Association, at Cushman park, on June 19, 1889, tells of the deeds of this great Legislature in the following terms, which are none too complimentary:

     (165) The members of the first Legislature brought their   cots, blankets, and pillows with them in their overland journeys in wagons (hired) or the jerkies of the stage line, and lodged, some in newly-erected store buildings, some in the upper rooms of the State House, while the wealthier law-makers boldly registered at the Atwood hostelry and paid their bills for extras, including "noise and confusion" during the Senatorial mill between Tipton, Butler, and Marquett; and how they all agreed, after some preliminary hair-pulling, that the new capitol was a success, and ordered a dome erected thereon reaching the upper atmosphere, and confirmed the deeds, regular and irregular, of the Commission, and gave us a cemetery in which to bury our dead; how they passed a bill for the organization of the State University, and ordered a further sale of lots and lands to build the dome and construct a university building, a wing of an insane hospital, and a workshop for the penitentiary, and how they were all built in part or in whole of the old red sandstone of the vicinity, and came to grief soon after, may not be an interesting story to-day; but it was full of eloquence, fire, and significance for those who were on the ground at the time.

     From the adjournment of that Legislature, the body that took in hand the building up of the new commonwealth and the laying of the foundation of its great institutions, so ably aided by the executive officers of our first State administration, to this memorial gathering, every six working days of every week of the twenty years has seen completed an average of ten buildings on the site of the city consecrated to the memory of the great emancipator and war President.

     No body of men in forty days accomplished more. Every law passed by that memorable Legislature of '69 weighed a ton. Its work was original and creative, and it did it well. Its moving spirit was the Governor, David Butler. Some of its members came down to Lincoln from hostile localities, and had it in their hearts to destroy him and his works; but before the session was a fortnight old, his genial though homely ways, his kindness of heart, his sturdy common sense, the originality of his genius, and the boldness of his conceptions, captured them, and when the forty days were done, no man in the two houses avowed himself the enemy of David Butler.

     The contract for excavating for and the construction of the basement of the State University was let to D. J. Silvers & Son, of Logansport, Indiana, on June 10, 1869, for $23,520, and work was immediately commenced. The corner-stone of the university was laid on September 23d, with Masonic ceremonies. The building was to be completed on or before December 1, 1870.

     Messrs. Silvers burned the brick for the university building near where the Burlington & Missouri river depot now is. They bought hundreds of cords of wood from the settlers, thus aiding them to obtain money for current expenses. The entire bottom in the region of the brick works was covered with cords of wood, sand, lime, clay, and brick. At times, during 1869, one hundred cords or more of wood would be in sight at one time. This was not the first brick burned (166) in the county or city. Milton Langdon burned a kiln of brick, on the site of West Lincoln, as early as 1867, assisted by John S. Gregory, who supplied the wood. Simon Benadom burned a kiln of brick, on the ground where the Burlington depot now stands, early in 1868, out of which a number of the chimneys were constructed. Seth Robinson used these brick to construct his residence, the same now occupied by R. E. Moore, on the northeast corner of Twelfth and P streets. Some of the same brick were used in building the Atwood House.

     The contract for building the asylum for the insane was let to Joseph Ward, about August 15, 1869, for $128,000, and work proceeded soon thereafter.

     Besides all this, the people of Lincoln still had a very high notion of the value of the Salt Basin as a commercial aid to the city. Mr. John H. Ames, who was the pioneer historian of Lincoln, having published a series of articles he had previously prepared for the Statesman a Democratic newspaper of Lincoln; these were reprinted in pamphlet form in 1870 by the Journal "power press." In that work, the correctness of which is formally attested by the Governor, Auditor, and Secretary of State, Mr. Ames estimates that 882,001.60 barrels of salt can be made from a single well. Allowing for cost of barrels and every possible shrinkage, he calculates that a single well would produce salt to the value of at least $488,970.22. He casts his eye over the field and says that: "While the railway now being constructed, and those projected, will give us direct connection with the Eastern markets, and enable us to compete with the Eastern salt manufactories upon their own ground, it is certain that we shall be called upon to supply all the vast territory lying between the Mississippi river and the Rocky mountains, so that three dollars per barrel may be considered an extremely low estimate for the minimum price at the wells."

     The foregoing estimate of the value of the wells seems a little fabulous at this time, but when Mr. Ames wrote, the faith in the salt wells was substantially represented by his views. Early in 1869 Messrs. Cahn and Evans leased a section of land from the Government, about one and one-half miles from the postoffice, expecting to open thereon extensive salt works. They were still drilling the well when Mr. Ames wrote his account.

     (167) With all these reasons for encouragement, Lincoln enjoyed a favorable growth during 1869. In reviewing the progress of the town early in 1870, Mr. Ames sums up the results as follows, in the work just quoted: "Only about two and one-half years have elapsed since the Commissioners, by official proclamation, called the town of Lincoln into existence. The village of Lancaster, which was included within its site, contained in all less than a half dozen buildings of every description. At the present time that number has been increased to over three hundred and fifty, and the number of inhabitants in town will not fall short of twenty-five hundred souls. The appreciation of real property, which was so slow at the time of the first public sales that the Commissioners nearly despaired of being able to make sufficient sales of lots to defray the expenses of building the State House, has risen to such an extent that means have been obtained from that source sufficient not only for the building of the State House, but also for building the State University, the Agricultural College, and the State Lunatic Asylum, and about six hundred lots belonging to the State yet remain to be sold."

     In a following paragraph Mr. Ames continues: "The cash valuation of the real property of the town belonging to private individuals, as ascertained from the assessment roll, is $456,956. Nine of the church societies, for which reservations of town lots were made, as has been stated, have erected neat and commodious houses of worship, and edifices will be erected by the remaining societies early in the present autumn. Six societies, namely, the Methodist Episcopal, Protestant Methodist, Christian, Presbyterian, Congregational, and Catholic, have been duly organized for some time past, maintain pastors, and observe the regular stated services. Advantage is being taken of the facilities offered in the width of the streets for setting out trees for park rows. Two large hotels, in addition to the one large and many smaller ones now in use, have been constructed, while the business of building substantial residences and business houses is being engaged in to an extent difficult of belief to one who has not seen it. And one thing at least is evident: that is, that every one in Lincoln is confident that he has cast his lines in pleasant places, and where there is to be, within a few years, a large, prosperous, and beautiful city."

     At this time, early in 1870, Mr. Ames explains that: "In Lancaster county there are no longer any Government lands subject to homestead and preemption."

     (168) In a paragraph further on he remarks that "the cars are now running on four railroads, which are surveyed and in all likelihood will be built to Lincoln. The Burlington and Missouri River railroad is now completed to Lincoln, and will take a westerly direction to Ft. Kearney, with the Union Pacific, thus placing it at nearly the center of a great transcontinental thoroughfare."

     During the summer of 1868 the Commonwealth had become the Nebraska State Journal, which now was a daily. The Statesman was a weekly Democratic paper, and the lntelligencer was a monthly real estate periodical.

     In brief; the town had a continual run of progress -- great progress, considering that it started in a wilderness in 1867. Then the wild and vicious Legislature of 1871 disorganized the condition of prosperity of the town greatly. It impeached Governor Butler, whose acts as Commissioner and Governor have seldom been equaled in history for sagacity, courage, and judgment in the founding of a city, and threatened to undo all that had been done. The public was led to believe that the location of the capital had been illegal, and property fell in value greatly, not to fully recover until after the grasshopper raids, which extended from 1873 to 1876. During the visit of these pests was the dismal period of Lincoln's history. Property fell to ruinously low prices, farmers had little to buy with, and hundreds not only left their farms, but the town of Lincoln also. But the more courageous of the people remained through the days of the scourge, and were well rewarded for their resolution. It was during the year 1873-74 that Mr. George B. Skinner was elected Street Commissioner for the purpose of giving a large number of men work to keep them from want. Mr. Skinner was fully equal to the situation, and proceeded to reconstruct the surface of the streets around Government Square, and where needed, and to make cuts and fills generally. Some criticized him severely and others applauded, but the needy grasshopper sufferers did what the people in later years conceded willingly: they admitted that he was a benefactor, without whose aid the wolf could not have been kept from the door of many a home.

     But the locusts passed away in 1877, probably forever, and the city revived with phenomenal rapidity: so much so that the census of 1880 showed a population of 14,000. And from that day to this the growth has been both constant and rapid. The population of the (169) city is now fully fifty thousand, as indicated by the city directory, the voting population, and the school census.

     The growth of the city was so rapid that the wild animals of this region did not seem to appreciate the situation for several years, and failed to move westward away from civilization. Deer, wolves, and other wild animals, were captured within the present city limits as late as 1872, and Lincoln was a game and fur market for a number of years later. Mr. Simon Benadom was the wholesale fur and game merchant of Lincoln and all surrounding country for many miles, from 1869 for a subsequent period of ten years. In the winter of 1871 and 1872 he went east with his stock, and in a couple of months returned to find that Rich & Oppenheimer had purchased $2,000 worth of furs at their store, in course of business in his absence. He purchased these at once and bought $1,800 worth besides of Simon Kelly, who had taken a few barrels of whisky out on the Blue river and traded it for these fur, with trappers he found there. Mr. Benadom used to buy furs to the value of about $20,000 a season along about 1870 to 1872. The best of the pelts he sold in New York, in person. Others were disposed of in Chicago and elsewhere. The fur trade was rather depressed in the winter of 1873-4, and to be busy Mr. Benadom bought prairie chickens and quail. In two months he shipped sixteen thousand of each to New York, packing then) in boxes and barrels and sending them East in a frozen condition. It can be seen that this city was in a great game country fifteen years ago, whose natural wildness was not by any means subdued. ln this connection we can illustrate by saying that Benadom alone killed fully fifty deer on the present plat of Lincoln during a few years after he came here, in 1868. He generally found them in the brush and tall grass of the Salt creek bottom, and his deer hounds having started one, he would catch the animal on the fly, being a precise rifleman. He also shot twenty-one wolves on the present plat of Lincoln.

     The Government postoffice was begun in 1874 and completed in 1879, at a cost of $200,000. It is built of gray limestone from the Gwyer quarries on the Platte river. Its architecture is modern Gothic.

     The Lincoln Gas Light Company was organized in 1872, with a capital stock of $60,000, and has grown and prospered ever since.

     In 1880 the Lincoln Telephone Exchange was organized, with a capital stock of $10,000. At this time 615 instruments are in use in (171) the city, with connections 

Image of The Postoffice (170)

with fifty-seven towns in Nebraska and sixty-six towns in Iowa.

     The city voted the Lincoln Street Railway Company right of way on the streets in April, 1881. Now that company has lines connecting all parts of the city, of which C. J. Ernst is the efficient manager. Besides, there are four other lines. The Rapid Transit line was built in 1887, and extended in 1888. At first its cars were operated with dummy engines, but these are now used only on the part of the line from U street to West Lincoln. The Rapid Transit connects West Lincoln with the asylum, by way of Twelfth street in the city. The Capital Heights line has its present terminus at O and Twelfth. It thence runs to N, thence to Eighteenth, thence to G, and eastward about two miles. This line was built in 1888. The Standard Street Railway was built in the fall of 1888, to connect the Lincoln company's line on North twenty-seventh street with the Wesleyan University. The Bethany Heights line is being built this year, to connect the Lincoln company's line at V and Thirty-third with the Christian University. One of these companies has a capital of $1,000,000, and all now operate over thirty-one miles of track.

     The City Water Works were begun in 1881, and consisted for seven years of a single well in the park bounded by D and F and Eighth and Sixth. The supply then was only about 1,000,000 gallons per day. This well proving inadequate to the demands of the growing city, an attempt was made in 1887 to increase the supply by sinking, a pipe in the center of the well. This caused the water to become salty in taste. The same year Mr. Joseph Burns was employed by the city to attempt to construct a system of driven wells in Sixth street, and connect them with the pumping station. These wells were driven a little too deeply, perhaps, and most of them produced salt water after a few days' use. After great annoyance and much delay, it was finally decided to attempt to establish a well near N and the channel of the Antelope. This well was completed in July of the present year, and is now producing about 1,000,000 gallons of pure water daily, to the great satisfaction of the city. Operations for an additional supply in that vicinity are now going forward. During the last six weeks operations have been progressing at the park wells, and it is now believed that the trouble will be done away with, and that pure water will hereafter be supplied from that well also.

      The pork-packing business was begun at West Lincoln in 1881, (172) with a capacity of 10,000 hogs. Now there are two large packing houses there, capable of handling all the hogs that can be bought for many miles around. The dressed beef business is also carried on there, having been begun last year. The packing business of the city is growing constantly, and will soon be one of the most important commercial interests of Nebraska. There are extensive stockyard facilities connected with the packing houses.

     The Board of Trade was organized January 16th, 1880, with a large membership, designed to benefit the city in every possible way. It is now in a very prosperous condition, and has several hundred members. It raised $10,000 by subscription this summer to advertise the city, and is a most enterprising organization, from which the city will reap great benefit for years to come. The officers of the board are given elsewhere in this chapter.

     In 1887 a contract was awarded to H. T. Clarke and Hugh Murphy to pave the central portions of the business part of the city, from N to S on Seventh, Eighth, and Ninth, and from N to Q on Tenth and Eleventh, and from N to P from Eleventh to Fourteenth, the outside streets named being included, and all comprising the first and second paving districts. The city had had no experience in paving whatever, and when the contractors were ready to lay blocks, it was found that gas pipe, water mains, sewer pipe, and street car tracks, must all be put down before paving could go on. This required a vast amount of work and expenditure, and delay upon delay accumulated until the patience of the public was wholly exhausted. The newspapers were filled with criticisms of the council, board of public works, and contractors. The streets presented the appearance of a fortified city, with ditches, trenches, heaps and ridges of earth, and business men were blockaded for entire blocks, for weeks at a time, with no outlet but the sidewalk, and in many cases with no crossings for pedestrians. The streets were frequently flooded with water to settle them. The worst siege was around Government Square. The Capital Hotel was confronted with a small swamp for several months.

     But the work was finally done, in 1888, and everybody agreed that the results were worth the worry. The city was beautified, verily transformed from a raw-looking western town, with sidewalk full of ups and downs, and a general evidence of disorganization and lack of system. The paving was followed by a general leveling down and extending of the walks to conform to the line and grade (173) of the curbstone, and now the city is as beautiful as any place of its age in the United States. During 1888 and the present year, Stout & Buckstaff, who have contracted for paving districts three, four, five, six, seven, and eight, have added several miles of paving, so that over eight miles of the streets of the city are now paved, and about fifteen miles are under contract. Much of the paving has been done with cedar blocks, but that now being constructed is being laid with vitrified brick, manufactured for the purpose in this city by Stout & Buckstaff. It is believed that this kind of paving will prove durable and successful.

     The sanitary sewerage of the city is an extensive system, now in perfect operation. The storm-water sewers perform the service intended, in the heaviest storms. The water service of the city is very complete in all but the supply, and that defect will be fully remedied within a short period.

     In brief, Lincoln is in a condition to continue its prosperity, and afford such enjoyment to its inhabitants as only a completely-built city can do, possessed of such ample improvements and acquirements in the way of educational, commercial, social, and religious facilities. With equal progress, relatively, for ten years, such as Lincoln has made in ten years past, it will be one of the most beautiful home cities in the Nation. The real value of the property of Lincoln is now not far from fifty million dollars. Owing to the pernicious system of assessment in vogue, it appears much less; but it is believed that a careful calculation will show that the genuine worth of the property within the city limits is fully equal to the sum stated.

     The county is now erecting a court house in the city, to cost about $200,000. It will probably be completed the present year. The Board of Trade announces the material progress of the city during 1888, taken from official sources, as follows:

     (174) The State Fair is located at Lincoln, and has been very successful ever since it opened at this point. Funke's Opera House, at the southwest corner of O and Twelfth, is a first-class theatre, and supplies all the leading attractions. It is now under the direct and very skillful management of Mr. Robert McReynolds who, with Mr. L. M. Crawford, of Topeka, Kansas, organized a large theatrical circuit in 1888, covering Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado, and several other States. Companies can be engaged at the Lincoln office for all the theatres in the circuit, which includes all the principal towns, and may be billed through without further trouble to their managers.

     In 1888 Mr. F. H. Andrus supplied a great need to the city by improving a well watered and amply shaded tract of land, about three and one-half miles west of the city, with conveniences for outdoor recreation. He has since conducted it as a park where picnics, conventions, camp-meetings, games, and all manner of excursions, can resort and find pleasant accommodations at all times. Outings of an entire week are often held there, and excursions of twelve and fifteen hundred people frequently visit the park, especially on Sundav, when excellent musical and appropriate programmes are carried out by the leading musicians and speakers of the city.

     The city possesses a public library, founded in December, 1875, which is supported by taxation. It contains over 5,000 volumes, designed for common use, and most of the leading periodicals of the day are in its files. It is open every day in the week.

     The State Library, at the capitol building, comprises over 30,000 volumes, mainly on legal subjects. As a law library it is considered very complete.

     The State University library includes over 10,000 volumes of miscellaneous books. Its list of works on science and special subjects is very elaborate.

     The Young Men's Christian Association has also begun to found a library, so that Lincoln is well supplied with scholastic appurtenances for a place but twenty-two years old.

     Lincoln is at the point of confluence of five or six small streams of different sizes, which together drain a surface of over 700 square miles. During Monday, August 12, 1889, and part of the following night, the rain poured down over all this territory. The combined waters began to gather at the Lincoln basin during Monday, (175) and rose rapidly all night, covering much of the low land near the city and along the creek to various depths, depending on the elevation. From one to two thousand families live on this low ground, mostly in little cottages, and before Tuesday morning many of these houses were surrounded by water, and in many cases partly submerged, though generally the water only covered the first floor but a few inches. In many cases, however, the water rose to the depth of two or three feet in the buildings, and in a few instances even to greater depths. Hundreds of people were not aware of the rapid rise of the water until it began to penetrate their houses, and then there was a general hurry to escape; but wading to high ground over submerged and mirey streets in the dark, was no easy task, and many did not dare attempt it. The waters continued to pile up until Tuesday morning, and then the police, city officers, and many citizens, came to the rescue, and the frightened residents of the valley were gathered on shore, along the hill. Many came to dry land on small rafts, others in boats, and still others waded. The unfortunate people whose homes were flooded were generally poor, and they presented a forlorn spectacle as they huddled along the margins of the advancing flood, and watched the progress of the threatening waters. During the day Mayor Graham and other city officials threw open the Park schoolhouse and other buildings to the refugees, and they were cared for the lest that circumstances would permit. All were rescued by Tuesday noon. The water reached its height toward evening on Tuesday, the 13th, and before morning began to recede, and continued to fall slowly until within usual limits, which required most of the week. Fortunately the weather was warm and pleasant after Tuesday morning. After the flood the houses were wet, the yards sloppy, and the streets mirey, in the flooded district, and it required several days for the people to get back into their homes. Not much damage was done the houses, though gardens were ruined, furniture partly spoiled, and the atmosphere rendered unhealthful and disagreeable. No lives were lost.

     Many factories, lumber-yards, and similar business institutions. were flooded and damaged. The water was over most of the tracks south of O street, and trains were delayed on all lines. The Union Pacific to Beatrice did not use its own track for three or four days, and the Burlington road to Tecumseh was impassable for a longer time. (176) Within the city the damage to railroad property was not very severe. A rise of a foot or two more would have proved very disastrous.

     The water did not quite cover the crown of the pavement at the crossing at Seventh and N streets. The blocks on that corner were nearly all displaced, and the pavement had to be repaired a little distance north on Seventh and east on N. Boats landed against the bank on the west side of the northwest corner of the park, at F and Sixth streets.

     This was not the highest that Salt creek has been since Lincoln was founded, though it was vastly the most damaging flood the city has known, owing to the development of property on the low lands. In fact, big freshets have been frequent, and the waters have piled up in front of Lincoln in a formidable way on several occasions, especially since the stream was blocked by dams below the city. There was a good deal of a flood in 1868, and a deluge in 1869, when a prominent editor of the city went boating, fell in, and was tortured with cramps for hours afterward. The torrent of 1874 was especially memorable, the water being made very high by a gorge of brush and drift below the town. Boats landed at the foot of the hill, Eighth and O streets, and a son of William Hyatt was drowned on the block bounded by Seventh and Eighth and O and P streets. A man named T. W. Taylor was also drowned near the city during this freshet. But Mr. M. G. Bohanan, who had particular reason to observe the relative rise of the creek on account of the location of his slaughterhouse, is sure that the flood in April, 1887, following the winter of almost unprecedented snow fall, surpassed all other freshets before or since by a foot or two. Owing to the accumulations of ice, and succeeding cold weather, it was the hardest deluge to contend with, though it affected the city but little, as there was but little settlement and few factories on the low land at that time.

     Salt creek has shown a disposition to flood the flat land once or twice since, but there has really been no freshet of the formidable character of that of the present summer for several years past.

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