Down the Blue

How Railways Subdue the Wilderness— The March of Two Decades—the Alpha and the Omega

How Towns Grow on These Western Prairies

One of the Bustling Places of Gage County

Its Natural Advantages and Rich Surroundings

Blue Springs, Gage County

October, 23, 1860, The town is located on the west side of  the big Blue river, in the second tier of townships north of the Kansas line.

It is twelve miles southeast of Beatrice, the county seat, and twenty-eight miles by rail north of Marysville, Kansas.

The Omaha and Republican Valley branch of the Union Pacific railroad connects it with those two places and the outside world in  both directions.  The main line of the B. & M. rail road corning in from the west touches it on the south and the Beatrice branch will soon form a junction with it at or near here.

A mile  and a half away is the Otoe reservation,  forty thousand acres of fine land as the Almighty ever fashioned.   It will soon be in the hands of the government and disposed of to actual settlers.  A magnificent region of country stretches away on every hand and a thrifty people are planting their homes on its fertile acres.   The climate is salubrious, timber and water abound and the soil is remarkably rich in the elements of productiveness. Hundreds of beautiful farms already dot the face of it and others are rounding into form. Domestic animals have taken the place of the wild beasts and civilization has transformed the primitive condition of things.

Twenty years  ago the writer bivouacked on these plains. Then countless buffalo impeded his progress, thieving redskins stole his bacon and howling coyotes disturbed his dreams. Now we ride in a palace at the speed of the wind drawn by a chariot of fire.  Gone are the stage coaches and the ox-trains, the buffalo and the antelope have departed and but a vestige of the wild tribes remain to chant   their requiem.

Blue Springs has a beginning more twenty years ago.  The town was platted in 1857, a post office was established a few year after a store was opened and in 1862 the first public school was taught.

Previous to 1868 but little improvement was made.  That year a saw mill was erected, S. M. Hazen opened a good store and in 1869-70 a flouring mill was erected. 

In 1870 S. H. Barnum built what was known for a number of years as the City Hotel, the river was spanned by an iron bridge in 1871, a church was erected in 1872, good school building the next year, and from that on the place began to assume some importance and grow in grace.

January 1,1880, the Omaha & Republic Valley Railroad reached here and now two lines of the B. & M. have shut it in as the base and perpendicular of a triangle.  Its name is derived from the Blue River, on whose banks it stands and the beautiful springs within its limits.  Its population is now estimated at a round thousand.  The various business enterprises common to a new country are represented, churches and schools are ample, the mecbauios branches and professions are not wanting and bustle and thrift provides all branches.  Many buildings have been completed this season.  Others are receiving their finishing touches and every day witnesses a new foundation.  The leading goods houses have a large trade, the hotels are all full, real estate is active, and the people are wide awake and enterprising. 

The town supports four or five well stocked general goods houses, two hardware stores, three hotels, two well patronized lumber yards, three livery stables, two good meat markets, two weekly newspapers, one jeweler, two barber shops, two or three millinery establishments, two harness shops, two bakeries and restaurants, two or three blacksmith shops, two real estate offices, a well established banking house, two lawyers, four doctors, several ministers and the usual complement of side issues.  Quarries of excellent building stone have been opened, a fine water power is being utilized, and other natural advantages surround.

The Blue Springs Bank was established in April, 1880, its officers are, J. E. Smith, president; C. Smith, vice-president; J. C. Williams, cashier; W. J. Gow is teller.  Directors, J. C. Williams, J. E. Smith, S. C. Smith, S. M. Hazen and Frank Graham.  The bank is doing handsomely, and it started just in time to get a food hold and grow up with the country.   It has ample capital and its officers are well known bankers, representative men and enterprising citizens.  The Smiths have banking houses, one at Beatrice and one at Red Cloud.  This house does business with the railway companies amounting to from $25,000 to $30,000 per month, deposits about an equal amount and other banking proportionately large.

Blue Springs Flouring Mills.  This excellent property was purchased by C. McNuit & Son about six years ago.  The mill was erected in 1870 and for a time there was a saw mill in connection.  It contains two run of burrs, one for wheat, the other for corn and feed.  Capacity about twenty bushels per hour.  It is one of the best water-powers on the Blue, rock bottom, with abrupt and permanent banks.  The fall is ample and but a very small fraction of the volume of water is utilized in driving the machinery.  A substantial iron bridge spans the river just above the dam, making the mill accessible from every direction.  Day and night it hums to the tune of a busy life and yet its capacity is quite inadequate to the demand.  Right here is a capital point for a first-class four or fie run mill.  It would pay like a bonanza.

Leading Mercantile Firms, Hazen & Brown;  S. M. Hazen and E. Brown are from Lewis County, New York.  Mr. Hazen came in April, 1858, took a claim about seven miles from town, and that he still possesses.  He has been absent a portion of time since but has claimed Nebraska as his home.  Few men have done more on these frontiers.  He came early, pitched his tent and lived down the hardships of the first settlers.  Better days are now here and the trials of the past are swallowed up in the realization of the present.  Mr. Hazen has been in trade here since 1869.  Four years ago Mr. Brown became associated with him.  They have done well and are doing better.  Their business is fifty per cent better this season than last.  They carry a general stock,. Command a handsome patronage and are enterprising and valuable citizens.

Warner ‘s & Company, C. A. Warner, J. W. Warner and John Ault, carry on the grocery and provisions business.  They opened the first of last April, coming form Wathens, Doniphan County, Kansas.  John Ault & Company have a branch house at Nemaha City also.  The Warner boys do the business here, and Mr. Ault holds forth at Nemaha.  They are driving a handsome trade and making it pay.  John Ault is known all over this western country, from his seven years conne3ction with the well known firm Smith, Frazer and Company, boot and shoe dealers.  The Warners are active young men, of sterling business habits and they are building up a trade that is highly commendable.  The writer knew the elder brother in the far west in the years that are gone and an vouch for the mettle he is made of.  Those were the haleyon days of big lodes and prospective millions.  They have fitted by, and you and I, Johnny Warner, have left golden dreams behind us.  The actual is now what concerns us most, let us make the best of it.

G. H. Castle come her about two years ago from Kewanee, Henry County, Illinois.  He is in the dry good and grocery business.  His stock is about trade and goods he is an enterprising and popular man.  In addition to his mercantile enterprise he is improving a section of land (last couple of sentences are not readable).  And the entire face of it is undergoing a complete transformation.  Mr. Castle is an active business man and has faith in himself and the place of his adoption.

Rice & Brother have been here four years in the hardware trade.  They started the first store in that line and they have been climbing ahead from the beginning.  Their building is two stories, 20 X 100 feet.  The upper floor contains the tin shop an din front are living apartments.  On the first floor are stoves and other heavy articles, shelf goods, cutlery, carpenters tools and everything demanded by the trade.  The brothers are stirring young men, and they have a foothold here that will make them a fortune, barring the laws of God and other unavoidable  accidents.  Their sales this year will reach if not exceed $20,000.  They own their building and debts do not weigh them down like a stone.  Badger boys as a rule are good timber for a new country, they seldom go backwards.

Lumber interest, J. M Rambaugh and Company established a lumber yard here last March.  They have has a first-class trade from the day they opened, and this fall their sales have far exceeded their brightest anticipations, running from $100 to $600 daily.  Mr. Rumbaugh was formerly in the dry goods business at Uran, Adams County, Illinois, but came to Nebraska to improve his physical powers and build up a constitution that had become shattered from too close applications in a climate not congenial to sedentary occupations.  He is thankful, that the change is restoring him, that he is in condition to take his rations regular and do a full day’s work.  In fact he believes in Nebraska and proposes to make this his permanent abiding place.  His family is here, and he has built an excellent home, and the blessings of health and prosperity have come to dwell with them.

J. Baringer bought out a lumber firm her last July, and opened out with a full line of building material.  He is having an excellent trade, and has been selling quite as fast as he could get it shipped to him.  Mr. Baringer has been eight or ten years in the business and knows how to handle it.  He came here from Iowa where he dealt in lumber, coal, lime and other articles.  In the years gone by he did lumbering in the mountains of Colorado, and shared the hardships of the gold hunters, and the mountain climbers, and the bridge builders, and the road makers, in the days when bone and muscle counted more than gold, and bread and meat was above price.  He has seen the inside of the diamond in the rough, and knows that some of the hardest heads have the tenderest hearts.

Real Estate, A. V. S. Saunders, is the leading real estate dealer here.  He has a large amount of improved and unimproved lands for sale, town property and other valuable interests, in various locations, and at prices to suit all parties.  On his list are many improved farms, both in this and adjoining counties, that are offered at great bargains.  Then there are unimproved pieces, choice lands, and among the finest in the world.  Mr. Saunders located here last May and he has already established a real estate business that may well be proud of.  He has made himself familiar with all the surrounding country, is clerk of the district court, notary public and  conveyance, money loaner and collecting agent, and all together is one of the most active and reliable business man in Gage County.  Parties seeking information as to lands in southwestern Nebraska will do well to confer with him.  He is prompt, thoroughly posted and can be depended upon under all circumstances.  Immigration is rapidly filling up the country and these choice acres are fast dropping into the hand of thrifty husbandmen.

Miscellaneous, T. S. Richards purchased the City Hotel property and took possession the first of last month.  He cam here from Grant County, Wisconsin, and immediat4ely stepped into a business that is not boy’s play.  His house is full all the time and more room is demanded.  It is a new and well constructed building, properly furnished, and kept as a snug little house should be.  The proprietor is an attentive landlord, courteous at all times and popular with his guests.  In most of these towns more hotel room is required.  As a general thing there is a lack of capacity.  Towns are growing, the country is filling up, travel is increasing and the hotels should expand to keep pace with the growing demand.  Mr. Richards will either enlarge his house or dispose of it to some one who will.  It is good property, well located, and is doing a handsome business as it is, but it would do as much more if the room was there

.

H. S. Barnum, came to Nebraska in the spring of 1859, from Trumbull  County, Ohio, and on the 24th day of May settled on a piece of land two and a half miles above Blue Springs, with $3.75 in his pocket.  For four years he bached, improved his place, blocked out a home on a prairie, and in April 1863, married a sterling English girl and began to live like a white man.  He borrowed money, paid for his land, freighted and farmed, paid his debts and came out of the wilderness like a hero.  Mr. Barnum built the first hotel in Blue Springs, hauled the lumber from Brownville, a distance of sixty-five miles, improved his farm in the meantime, and eventually began to prosper and lay by something for a rainy day.  Next to his family his farm is his solace and his pride.  It is a well improved place, with groves and orchards, and hedges and building and other ornaments, the result of his own industry and good management.  In addition he owns valuable property in town and is proprietor of a first class livery business.

Dr. J. H. Quinn began the practice of medicine her last April.  He cam from Sycamore, Illinois, and is a graduate of Rush Medical College, Chicago.  His practice is much better than he anticipated and his skill as a physician and surgeon is in demand over a wide scope of this section of country.  The doctor is not a talking member of the fraternity, but he knows his business, and performs it with a steady nerve and a knowledge that comes of a well trained will and a disposition to alleviate human suffering.

E. O. Kretainger, came here last spring from Illinois, hung out his shingle and began the practice of law.  He was admitted in that state and soon after struck out to try his fortune on the high seas of modern jurisprudence.  Mr. Kretsinger has already established an excellent practice, he is a man of steady habits, but 23 years of age and the field are broad before him.

Hall

Omaha Herald – October 27, 1880