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So, what was it like to live in a sod house? Some people found life in a sod house unendurable, others felt like they were on top of the world. It is difficult to judge the way of life by today’s standards because each person looked at their life in a slightly different way.
For example, dirt floors were found in the majority of the early sod homes. A family that could afford them might fasten carpets to the dirt floor. ... Read more
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Keeping warm in the winter was a common problem for residents of the plains, and different groups had different solutions to the problem. For instance, John W. Hartman came to eastern Nebraska in 1890 and got to know some of the first generation of settlers. Hartman wrote,
"John Gilbert was a stage-driver working for the government. . . . The Pawnee were great friends to John Gilbert. Many of their tribe would come each fall to make Gilbert a visit. In ... Read more
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Because there were so many cattle in Texas and so few people, the cattle were worthless. But those same cattle were worth a lot in the north, where Americans’ taste for beef had grown. The four-dollar steer in Texas was worth 30 to 40 dollars in the north. The problem was getting the worthless cattle to the place where they had value.
The creation of the Union Pacific and Southern Pacific Railroads solved that problem. Texans could drive their cattle north ... Read more
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After a short trial, Judge Elmer Dundy issued a ruling that surprised many observers and caused comment across the country. The judge found that "an Indian is a person within the meaning of the law" and that Standing Bear was being held illegally. He issued a "writ of habeas corpus" — which is an "order to produce a body" or release someone held illegally. Here are the five key points of the ruling:
"First. That an Indian is a person with ... Read more
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The ends to which a rancher might go to acquire land were quite extensive. Some used a provision of the amended Homestead Act that allowed Civil War veterans or their widows and orphans to acquire land. These ranchers would locate war widows and have them file for the land, then get the land from the widow, who often never stepped foot on the property.
In one inventive, if reprehensible, scheme, land speculator John A. Walters of Lincoln took particular advantage of ... Read more
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Technology and innovation dramatically changed beef in the first quarter of the 20th century. Improvements to railroad cars ended the days of shipping live cattle. Initially, railroads had been resistant to change because of their large investments in a system of corrals where they could feed and water cattle in transit to the Omaha or Wyoming stockyards.
But live cattle took up a lot of space in a rail car, lost weight in transit, and occasionally injured each other. Moreover, when ... Read more
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William Jennings Bryan was a prominent force throughout his political life from the 1890s to the 1920s. During his early career, he had supported a variety of progressive measures, but prohibition was not at the top of his agenda. In his private life, he did not drink alcohol, had taken a temperance pledge as a child, and felt prohibition would contribute to the moral improvement of the individual and to civic progress. He stressed temperance and opposed the ... Read more
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Construction of the Tri-County Project began on March 13, 1936. Kingsley Dam was completed in 1941.
Part 1: Digging & Filling in the Dam
Part 2: Laying Concrete Blocks
Part 3: Construction Camp
At the time of its construction, Kingsley Dam was the second largest hydraulic-fill dam in the world. (Only Ft. Peck Dam in Montana, which remains the largest hydraulic-fill dam in the ... Read more
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Just as the Nebraska economy was settling down after the war, the blizzard of 1948-49 hit. Its magnitude staggers the imagination. It was the worst blizzard in recorded history. A series of storms began in November of 1948 and continued straight through to February of 1949. The snow stopped trains, buried houses, and threatened nearly a million head of cattle. Operation Haylift was a massive, perhaps desperate, effort to save livestock.
By the fourth week in January, it was evident that ... Read more
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One day after the Kansas troop train misunderstanding, a young, 26-year-old woman, Rae Wilson, wrote to the North Platte Bulletin (now North Platte Telegraph) and suggested running a canteen for soldiers traveling through North Platte.
"During World War I the army and navy mothers, or should I say the war mothers, had canteens at our own depot. Why can’t we? . . . I say get back of our sons and other mothers’ sons 100%. Let’s do something and do ... Read more
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The national United Service Organization (USO) was organized on April 17, 1941. It was created to serve the religious, spiritual, and educational needs of the men and women in the armed forces. USO clubs were to be financed by the public through voluntary contributions.
During the war, volunteers, mostly women, organized USO clubs throughout Nebraska. USO clubs sponsored a variety of activities for service personnel that included dances, sporting events, and dinners in the homes of local families.
The flag of the ... Read more
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For most Nebraskans, the first sign or the war’s impact was the unprecedented rationing of more than 20 essential items. The first item to be rationed nationwide was sugar, which was soon followed by coffee and shoes. Nebraskans lined up at their local schools, where teachers issued ration ... Read more
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The rationed item that produced the greatest inconvenience was probably gasoline. Each motorist was assigned a windshield sticker with the appropriate letter of priority ranging from "A" to "C". Trucks received a special "T" sticker. Most of the population received low priority "A" stickers, allowing only three to five gallons of gasoline a week.
Gasoline was rationed in an effort to save gas and tires, because supplies of vital rubber from the Far East had been cut off. Along with gasoline ... Read more
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Along with rationing, Nebraskans became well educated in the art of collecting scrap materials. These could be recycled into weapons and other equipment essential to the war effort. Scrap iron was the most obvious choice for collectors. Papers were the easiest to get and were reused for packaging weapons.
"Disposables" such as grease, were used to manufacture explosives and artificial rubber. Leftover food grease was used to manufacture ammunition.
Due to the shortage of metals during the war, major appliances were hard ... Read more
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Before Pearl Harbor, rumors were flying that Nebraska communities would be chosen as sites for government defense plants. Due to the efforts of Nebraska’s congressmen and senators, Mead, Hastings, Grand Island, and Sidney became the locations for ammunition manufacturing plants and storage facilities.
These defense industries created thousands of jobs for Nebraskans and brought additional workers to the state. But they also created severe housing shortages. Many farm families, whose lands were bought at seemingly unfair prices, were displaced.
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There was a shortage of housing in Hastings because of the number of people who were moving there for jobs. In November, 1942, the construction company brought in about 100 Chippewa and Sioux Indians to work at the construction site.
Hidden racism in Hastings caused residents to assume that different racial groups needed separate housing. Even the local newspaper printed insults about the Sioux workers. As a result, a group of Sioux lived at the plant in tents.
Reba ... Read more
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The first groups of German POWs to arrive in Nebraska were well-disciplined, regular soldiers. Many were fanatical Nazis, and that was a source of conflict in the camps. These Nazis were more thoroughly indoctrinated in Nazi ideology than most later-arriving POWs.
Initially, Americans had little interest in the politics of the German POWs. Most Americans were politically ignorant or naïve about Nazism. This naïvete is illustrated by a conversation between Fort Robinson commander, Colonel Arthur Blaine, and his interpreter, John Neumaier:
– ... Read more
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"The most important thing on your mind was trying to stay alive."
—Bill Gilgren, Dalton, NE
Third Infantry Division in Europe
"It’s just kind of hard to describe really. You are scared, jumpy, and you prayed. You knew when there was a [kamikaze] raid and the planes were coming in, that somebody was going to get hit because it was just a one-way trip for the pilot."
—John Zimola, Wahoo, NE
Fire Controlman First Class,USS Louisville
What is it like to be under enemy fire or ... Read more
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"Outside of the death of one’s own child, I think sending a boy to war would be the most difficult."
—Marialyse Hager Knobel
Fairbury High School Student
What happened to Corporal William E. Green is one of the many stories of a mother experiencing both the anxiety of sending her son to war, and then, the pain of losing him there. Bill Green was in Europe only a few months before he was killed at the Siegfried Line between Luxemburg and Germany on ... Read more
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During the Cold War, military planners assumed that the Soviet Union might start a nuclear war at any time. Initially, the attack would have come from bombers flying over the North Pole, which is the shortest route between Russia and the U.S. SAC built a string of radar stations across Alaska, Canada and Scotland to provide about one hour of warning. Then ICBMs — Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles that could fly from continent to continent in minutes — were developed, and ... Read more
