Blue Springs is beautifully located on the west bank of the Big Blue, about twelve miles southeast of Beatrice, and derives its name from springs on the north side of the town.

It is a thriving town of about eighteen hundred, and the second in importance in the county.

The first settlement at this place was commenced in 1857, shortly after the settlement at Beatrice, by:

James H. Johnston

Jacob Poff

And a family by the name of Elliott

These parties, in conjunction with the surveyors who were then engaged in surveying the public land in that vicinity, formed a town company, with the ambitious design, evidently, of building up quite a city, as they laid out 320 acres in town lots.

But it was altogether too early in the settlement of the State to accomplish such an undertaking, and consequently, becoming discouraged, they sold out to two miners returning from Pike's Peak—Ruel Noyes and Joseph Chambers.

These, however, meeting with no better success than their predecessors, abandoned the enterprise to Robert A. Wilson, who is still a resident of the place, and is, in fact, the original town proprietor of Blue Springs.

"Pap" Tyler—as the genial pioneer, William Tyler, is generally called—and C. C. Coffinberry—both of whom, as already stated, occupied official positions in the county at an early day, settled not far from Blue Springs.

S. M. Hazen, one of our County Commissioners, and F. H. Dobbs, settled on Mud Creek contemporaneously with the persons already mentioned.

The growth of the place was very slow until 1868, the year that Mr. Tichnor, one of the early County Commissioners, built the mill here.

 But the greatest impetus was given when the branch of the Union Pacific Railway came in, in 1879, and the Burlington & Missouri Railway, in 1881— which, however, has ignored Blue Springs as a station, al­though it passes through the corporation.

The St. Joe & Western Union Pacific Branch passes up the east side of the river.

The situation of Blue Springs is beautiful.   Built on a hill, enclosed on three sides by forest trees, like a beautiful villa in a sylvan bower, through one belt of which flow the waters of the Blue, and on the other side stretches the rolling prairie, it has a setting of picturesque scenery, and commands a perspective of landscape beauty equal to any in the State.

Two years ago, it was a small hamlet, with a small population and a smaller reputation; but within that time, it has grown from a population of about four hundred to 1,600, and the improvements of 1881 are estimated at $50,000.

It now contains four church organizations in a flourishing condition, three good, commodious church edifices, two schoolhouses, a bank, a flouring mill, a good public library, a new hall, a Board of Trade, and almost thirty-five firms engaged in the different branches of mercantile business.

It made a bid for a station on the Burlington & Missouri, but the location of towns on the new lines of that road belongs to a company within a company, and so they have been ignoring established towns, locating on wild tracts of land and speculating in town lots.

Consequently, they went a mile and a half below Blue Springs and established Wymore.

The History of Nebraska, 1882