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niture Company, Lindell Hotel, Linstrum the Tailor, Frischholz Brothers and the Anderson Green House. In Platte Center, the Bruckner Mercantile Company was doing business and in Humphrey, the community was already patronizing the Duesman Furniture Company and Geer's Meat Market.

Always the Union Pacific played a key role in the growth of Columbus for it was this lifeline which enabled the town and the rest of the county to attain its position of dominance and the affairs of the railroad were naturally received with the utmost interest by the local citizens. In September, 1899, the Union Pacific began to lay double tracks between Omaha and Ogden, Utah. The same year the city council of Columbus passed an ordinance requiring the railroad to keep watchmen after eight A. M. at the Twenty-third, Twenty-fifth and Twenty-sixth Avenue crossings.

Bitter was the fight over closing Murray Street (now Twenty-fourth Avenue) for the purpose of building the Union Pacific freight depot. South side merchants engaged legal aid to contest this closing and council meetings became a battlefield of verbiage. Finally, the south side businessmen were voted down and the freight depot was erected where the railroad desired it.

An occupation tax was adopted by the city council about that time to meet the extra cost of all-night electric light service. The privately owned system, which turned off at midnight, had become inadequate to meet the needs of Columbus' growing civic pride, and business houses and other institutions went on a regular schedule of rates.

On July 15, 1899, the same day that William Jennings Bryan spoke in Humphrey, the Union Pacific Pioneer Association came to Columbus to hold a celebration in Frankfort Park. A special train, gaily decorated with flags and bunting, arrived with eight hundred people from Omaha and other Nebraska towns and Mayor Fitzpatrick welcomed the visitors at the station. The group then marched to the park where a program had been prepared for that afternoon. The picnickers were about to eat their basket dinners when a downpour of rain began and in fifteen minutes the city park was a lagoon. Stores, halls, churches and private homes were opened to shelter the guests and the downpour lasted until almost evening when the Pioneer Association finally entrained for home.

However, the biggest celebration ever given by Columbus was the formal reception tendered the returned Spanish-American War Veterans by Platte County. A special train had been paid for by Nebraska citizens to bring local soldiers to Omaha and Lincoln from San Francisco. Columbus contributed four hundred eighty-five dollars toward this project and a one-day-long program and parade, followed by a banquet replete with fireworks and a cakewalk, awaited the returning infantrymen.

These were the affairs, brief and transient though they may have been, which knit Columbus and the entire county into a unit, for if it is true that history is made by men, not by events, it is to such testimonials that we must look rather than to the reports and statistics for irrefutable proof that Platte County had grown out of its adolescence into the maturity of a full-grown town.

Paving did not become a problem for the community until 1914, when a bond issue of thirty thousand dollars was voted for the purpose of paving certain streets and a majority of the important intersections. A gas plant was installed in Columbus in 1905-1906, and the prepayment system was adopted by the company to save the cost of collections. Both the Bell Telephone and the Independent Telephone Companies had franchises to operate in the county and the latter was known for its outstanding

Columbus during the flood of 1881. At the left, the famous Grand Pacific Hotel.

operation as one of the most successful independent telephone plants in the state.

Columbus has always had responsible mayors who were literally elected by the people of the community and remained in close contact with the needs and the ambitions of their fellow townsmen. In the formulative years between the time the town was founded and the year 1900, which marked a new era for Platte County as well as the rest of the country, the following men served in the office of mayor:

William B. Dale, 1868-70; C. B. Stiliman, 1871; James E. North, 1872-74; R. H. Henry, 1875; Byrd Miller, 1876; Charles A. Speice, 1877-78; J. P. Becker, 1879-80; J. R. Meagher, 1881-82; John M. Macfarland, 1883-84; R. H. Henry, 1885; Carl Kramer, 1886; J. E. North, 1887-89; R. H. Henry, 1890; Henry Ragatz, 1891; David Schupbach, 1892-93; G. W. Phillips, 1894-95; G. B. Speice, 1896-97; E. D. Fitzpatrick, 1898-99; and Louis Held, 1900. Kramer was additionally honored when the new Columbus High School, dedicated in 1925, was named after him.

As the town grew and attracted more and more newcomers from other regions, the need for civic organizations to care for this added population had increased. In 1888, the Young Men's Christian Association of Columbus was established "for the social, spiritual, intellectual and physical development of young men." As the years passed, the "Y" broadened its program to include school boys and local youths who needed entertainment, instruction, shelter or simply the inter-social activities of a well-integrated recreational program. Today, local Columbus businessmen, realizing the moral and practical value of the institution, subscribe heavily to its annual fund and maintain through these donations the modern two-story brick Y.M.C.A. building located across from Frankfort Park.

Forerunner of the busy Columbus Chamber of Commerce was the Columbus Commercial Club which made its bow about 1900, and functioned actively for twenty years, reaching its zenith during the critical period of World War I.

However, the same spirit which led the early men of commerce to organize the Black Hills Mining Club prompted the businessmen of Platte County later to join together in the city's Chamber of Commerce, whose functions are divided into the following categories: advertising and publicity (this committee disseminates information about Columbus and territory designed to bring new business and industry to the region), agriculture, education, finance, historical, housing, industrial, legislative, membership, mercantile, national affairs, public safety and health, roads and highways, solicitations, transportation, and by-law revision committees. An office is maintained in the city hall by the group which employs two full-time paid employees --- a secretary manager of the Chamber of Commerce and an assistant.

Like a person, a city is slow to grow. Columbus, in spite of its fortuitous position on the transcontinental railroad and the earlier cross-country trails, was not a boomtown. It weathered the seasonal upsets, the economic ravages of man-made as well as natural catastrophes. An item on the society pages of the Columbus paper in the 1870's reports that a farce entitled "Grasshopper Supper" was presented at a local musicale. This proof of the fact that the early settlers could laugh at their own misfortune, view with perspective the plague and other tragedies of their everyday life, is reason enough why their victories became the milestones for later generations.

As the town grew up, standards of learning, of ethics and of community life rose correspondingly. Merchant families assumed the leadership and strengthened this position by intermarriage with the leading social groups of nearby communities until out of the frontier an elite arose, made up of men who had built and forged and dreamed a city where only a settlement was before.

This progress was achieved in small subtle ways.. . in the advent of the self-binder and the announcement of the first football team to be organized in Columbus by Jack Neumarker in 1899 ... the column of political truisms initiated by Edgar Howard, when he became editor of the Columbus Telegram in 1900: if greatness is measured by the survival value of a man's efforts, then the citizens of Platte County and Columbus may honor the men who created their first community as being truly great.

BUSINESS DIRECTORY OF COLUMBUS IN 1876

ATTORNEYS --- Gerrard & Whitmoyer, N. Millet & Son, S. McAllister, Higgins & Crites, C. A. Speice, A. C. Turner & Co., Guy C. Barnum, Jr.

AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS --- H. P. Coolidge, Henry Bros., T. Schudy & PohI.

BANKERS --- State Bank.

BAKERY --- Marshall Smith, Phillip Goodwin.

BLACKSMITHS --- L. M. Cook, Chas. Matthews, B. E. Rogers.

BRICK --- Orlando Rose, Thos. Flynn.

BARBER --- J. Gregorious, S. J. Mormey, John Hammond.

BREWERY --- C. Bremer.

CARPENTER --- J. M. Kelley, Loveland & Ellis, H. Hughs, Pearsall, Geo. W. Davis.

CONFECTIONERY AND NEWS --- Prescott & Hill.

DRY GOODS --- Bonesteel Bros., Schram Bros., W. H. Heidelburger, J. C. Morrissey, Galley Bros., I. Gluck.

DRUGGISTS --- C. B. Stiliman, E. C. Pinkney, A. Heintz, Doland & Smith.

DENTIST --- J. S. McAllister.

ELEVATORS --- E. J. Baker & Co., Columbus Elevator, J. P. Becker, Becker's Elevator, J. C. Morrissey,. Elevator.

FURNITURE --- H. L. Cole, M. Weaver.

FOUNDRY --- Chas. Schroeder.

FUEL --- Speice & North, coal and wood; J. G. Routson, wood; F. G. Becher, wood.

GROCERIES --- Wadsworth & Stauffer, Gross Bros., W. Lamb, M. Smith, John G. Compton, Henry Bros., Delsman, T. C. Ryan, Rasmussen & Schram, James McAllister.

GRAIN AND PRODUCE --- Wm. Becker, J. C. Morrissey, E. J. Baker.

HARDWARE AND STOVES --- Blair & Wiggins, S. H. Winterbotham, Lockner & Uhlig.

HOTELS --- C. D. & G. W. Clother, Clother Hotel; John Hammond, Hammond House; D. Ryan, Ryan's Hotel; Paul Hoppen, Columbus Exchange.

INSURANCE --- Speice & North, L. Gerrard, J. G. Routson, Gus Becher.

JEWELRY --- A. J. Arnold, F. Brodfeuhrer.

JUSTICES --- J. G. Higgins, Probate Judge; B. Millett, Police Judge; S. S. McAllister, J. P.

KALSOMINING --- Collins & Martin, George Brindley, E. C. Kavanaugh & Son.

LAND --- Taylor & Routson, S. C. Smith, Speice & North, Frank P. Burgess, Republican Office.

LUMBER --- Hunneman & Tolman, A. Henry & Sons.

LIVERY AND FEED STABLES --- C. D. & G. W. Clother, Morse & North, I. Johnson, J. Hammond, Routson & Tiffany.

LAUNDRY --- Mrs. Freston.

MASONS AND PLASTERERS --- O. Rose, Wm. Smith, Eugene Durr.

MILLINERY --- Miss S. A. Galley; Miss Welch, at Bonesteel Bros.; Miss Gentleman, at Schram Bros.

MEAT MARKETS --- H. H. Ames, John Rickly, C. Tschauner, D. Deidrick.

NEWSPAPERS --- Columbus Journal, M. K. Turner & Co.; Columbus Era, Hensley & Leach; Columbus Republican, F. P. Burgess.

NEWS DEPOT AND BOOKS --- Prescott & Hill.

NOTARIES PUBLIC --- L. Gerrard, B. Millett, H. J. Hudson, G. G. Becher, F. G. Becher, C. A. Speice.

ORGANS --- Prescott & Hill.

PAINTERS --- E. C. Kavanaugh & Son; Collins & Martin; Geo. Brindley.

PHOTOGRAPHERS --- H. C. Preston.

PHYSICIANS --- C. B. Stillman, S. A. Bonesteel, E. Hoehen, J. Polly, T. J. Murphy.

QUEENSWARE --- C. B. Stillman, M. Smith, John G.Compton, Wadsworth & Stauffer.

RESTAURANTS --- S. J. Marmoy, Ed. Sheehan.

SALOONS --- McNamara's Billiard Hall; I. Schmidt; T. D. DeLong, McMahon & Wolfel, Billiard Hall, Jos. Bucher.

SEWING MACHINES --- John N. Lawson, Robt. Compton, Geo. N. Derry.

SURVEYORS --- J. E. North, I. N. Taylor, J. G. Routson.

SADDLERY AND HARNESS --- D. Faucette, M. White.

SHOES AND BOOTS --- G. W. Phillips, W. Schilz, Greisen Bros.

TAILOR --- B. M. Lee.

UNDERTAKER --- Henry Gass.

WAGON MAKER --- Chas. Schroeder, H. L. Cole.

JANUARY 4, 1877--- Branches of Business in Alphabetical Order---The Parties Doing Business---Gross Amounts of Capital Employed and Average Stock Carried.

"No one needs to be reminded of the general depression of business over our whole country. No fair-minded person will fail to take this fact into account, especially with reference to such departments as manufactures, the sale or improvement of real estate and the building up of public institutions. In these respects we confess to a poor showing, which in times of general prosperity would be palpably inconsistent with the natural position and manifest destiny of the place. But we confidently believe that for a young city of one thousand inhabitants and of no more pretentious aspect to our own eyes or the eyes of strangers, the showing of actual business will be matter of just pride to our people and the publication of the facts, in this modest way, no more than a proper advertisement, throughout Central Nebraska, of her chief commercial centre.

AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS --- This extensive business is divided among the following parties: Schutte & Pohl, Twelfth Street, opposite City Hall. They sell the Wheeler No. 6 Reaper and Mower, the Kirby Ditto, the Marsh Harvester, the Springfield Thresher, the Monitor and Esterly Plows, Fanning Mills, Shelters, and the Schuttler and Whitewater Wagons. They do a large business and keep extras for all of their machinery.

Henry Bros., corner Eleventh and O, sell the Buckeye and the Wood Reaper and Mower, the Wood Harvester, the Moline Plow, the Bain Wagon, and the Altman & Taylor Thresher.

Gus Schroeder, Eleventh and N, sells the McCormick Implements.

Lochner & Uhlig, Twelfth, between O and P, sell

the Elward Harvester, the Triumph Combination Reaper, and Mower, Nichols, Shepard & Co. Thresher, and the Emmerson & Co. Seeder, and all minor implements.

The usual amount of stock carried by these four houses was together about $30,000, and the amount of the sales for the year $71,350

ARMY --- The city has its representatives in the Army, as their families reside here. Major Frank J. North, Capt. Luther J. North, and Capt. S. A. Cushing have command of the Pawnee scouts in the Indian war in the Black Hills. Of course, Uncle Sam hands out to the brave boys, for their self-denials, exposures and fatigues, to the tune of about five thousand dollars per annum, for the three.

BOARDING HOUSES --- Mrs. H. L. Cole, corner Eleventh and Q, near Gross Bros. In a new house, and now opens under the head of hotel.

Mrs. Robinson, N, between Tenth and Eleventh, opposite Era office, has her house full of quiet, promptly paying boarders.

To these should be added others who do an occasional and partial boarding house business; but because our hotels engross the patronage, the incomes of this department amount to only about three thousand dollars.

BANK --- The Columbus State Bank, while they had no time just now to give us the exact figures, report that their business has increased about thirty percent, on last year --- the increase having been caused mainly by the increased business of the town in the grain and pork departments, which are assuming an importance not realized by the citizens generally. Deposits have increased, and the demand for money has not been so great as last year. Farmers are generally paying up on machine collections better than ever before.

BAKERY --- Marshall Smith does the principal business, but the avails are incorporated in his general business.

Phillip Goodwin, corner Eleventh and M is just sailing out, and is doing a moderate business.

BARBER --- The tonsorial art is daily practiced by Jacob Gregorius on Twelfth Street, next to Schram Bros. An old hand at the business.

J. W. Lawrence in the Hammond House, commenced Sept. 15.

The loss of successive crops of hair on the part of the shaven was answered during the year in the pockets of the tonsors in the sum of $1,240.

BOOKS AND STATIONERY --- Prescott & Hill, who did a mixed business of books and music, dissolved in November, and Hill engrosses the book and news trade. His sales in December indicate an annual trade of ten thousand dollars.

BLACKSMITH --- L. M. Cook, on Thirteenth, near post office, Mathews & Lentz, same street, opposite town hall, and B. E. Rogers, same street, next to Rouston & Tiffany's stable, carried this business with an average capital of twelve hundred dollars, and the anvil and hammer brought in a gross income of fifty-four hundred dollars. Other parties do blacksmithing in connection with the wagon and carriage business.

BOOTS AND SHOES --- This department is represented as follows:

Greisen Bros., corner of Eleventh and N, who carry an ample stock of leather and findings, as well as ready made boots and shoes. They do also a respectable manufacturing business.

W. Schilz, corner Twelfth and O, opposite Hammond House, carries a moderate stock, but, from some cause, sells to an extent that surprises us.

W. T. Kinney, near the post office, just starting anew in Columbus after a long absence, did a fine business in the last five weeks of the year.

J. G. Compton, P.M., on O, sold much more during the year than the average amount of stock which he carries. He also keeps groceries.

W. Phillips, on Nebraska Avenue, near the bank, carries a small stock, chiefly for his own manufacture; does a steady paying business.

The stock in trade in this department carried through the year averaged about one hundred thousand dollars, and the sales reported amount to forty-five thousand dollars.

BREWERY --- Joseph Henggeler & Co., successors to Chas. Bremer, conduct his establishment on corner Seventh and E. During the year the beverage brought them several thousand dollars.

CARPENTRY --- This branch of industry is carried by Messrs. Davis, Pearsall, Hughes, Eastman and Loveland & Ellis. The last named party have their shop in connection with their lumber yard and Longshore's windmill, and expect to run some machinery by the wind power. No full report.

CONFECTIONERY --- No party attending to this business exclusively, but the groceries and restaurants have all these things.

DENTISTRY --- Dr. J. S. McAllister is master of the situation. These hard times the people think they can chew all they can pay for with the old teeth. However, they have re-toothed to the amount of four hundred dollars.

DRY GOODS AND CLOTHING --- The parties reporting to us in this department are ---

I. Gluck, near corner of Eleventh and N, deals largely in clothing.

Galley Bros., on Eleventh, between M and N. Millinery of Miss Galley connected.

Schram Bros., on Twelfth, do a large business. Millinery of Miss Gentleman in the establishment. Average stock carried, thirty thousand dollars; sales one hundred one thousand dollars.

J. C. Morrissey on Eleventh near O, carries a fine stock and sells largely. Millinery of Miss Langhoff in the establishment.

DRUGS --- Dr. C. B. Stillman, the Old Reliable, still deals out all the materials of a fully furnished Drug Store, on Eleventh, south of depot.

E. A. Pinkney in the fine room northwest corner of the brick bank building, does a good business.

Dr. Heintz, on Eleventh, between N and O, reports a prosperous year.

Doland and Smith, Nebraska Avenue, opposite Frankfort Square, have been in business only five months. Their room is very neat and beautiful, and their figures promise well.

The average stock in trade in this department is some ten thousand dollars and the gross sales of the year are reported at $25,825.92.

FURNITURE --- M. Weaver, corner Thirteenth and O complains that people do without new furniture these hard times. So does H. L. Cole, corner Thirteenth and Q.

Still, these gentlemen together carry along an average of twenty-seven hundred dollars, and their sales amounted to twenty-three hundred dollars.

FOUNDRY --- Charles Schroeder is sole foundryman, and his business report is included in the wagon and carriage department.

FUEL --- Speice & North, corner Eleventh and N, monopolize the coal trade, but do an evenhanded business --- Sales eighteen thousand dollars.

M. Heintz, J. Rickly and J. Haney furnish wood, and they sold in 1876 one thousand six hundred forty dollars.

GROCERY --- The reports from this heavy department are from:

Marshall Smith, Nebraska Avenue, between Eleventh and Twelfth. His business including bakery is unique, extensive, closely followed and prosperous.

Henry Bros., corner Eleventh and O, have a large trade whose successful results they know to a dot.

Rasmussen and Schram, corner Thirteenth and Nebraska Avenue, active young men opened during the year. The showing is good.

William Lamb, Nebraska Avenue, does a moderate careful business and makes some money.

J. McAllister on O, opposite Morse and North's livery, has the same truthful story to tell.

Delsman on Eleventh south of depot reports his sales from book to a cent. The cents are seventy-five and the dollars show a larger trade than one would guess.

The capital employed by all these parties aggregates fifty thousand dollars and the centennial sales $155,063.21.

GRAIN --- This is our great business. It is carried by Baker, Becker, Briggs, Gross, Morrissey and Webber, as all Central Nebraska knows. The shipments show a total of 1,485 cars or 550,000 bushels, and which brought the people about four hundred thousand dollars.

HA RDWARE --- Blair & Wiggins, corner Eleventh and O, a new firm, keep a full line of stoves, tinware, cutlery and wagon and broom stock. Their sales compared with the stock carried, make an excellent exhibit.

Lochner & Uhlig, Twelfth, next the bank, a new firm, can show an inventory and a cash book of which they are not ashamed.

At the office of Becher and Price, now Becher, Hockenberger, and Chambers. Token in 1882.

The stock in trade reported by the town is thirteen thousand dollars and the sales $32,650.

HOTELS --- The Clother House still leads.

The Hammond House is slowly but surely gaining.

Farmers Hotel, corner Eleventh and L, makes its proprietor, Mr. Illger, a good living.

The gross earnings of these establishments including livery, is given at the sum of $24,950

INSURANCE --- All the great companies of the United States are represented, and divided among Becher & Compton, Gerrard & Whitmoyer, Speice & North, J. Lawson, S. C. Smith, and J. G. Routson. No reports.

IMPROVEMENTS --- The principal of them are the Opera House, the Wind-Power Feed Mill of Mr. Longshore, the saloon of Mr. Bucher, and the residences of Hon. J. P. Becker, Mr. Lenz, and Mr. Schram. Morrissey's elevator and the Era office; but many additions and valuable outbuildings have also been completed. Total value, $17,800.

JEWELRY --- A. J. Arnold and F. Brodfeuhrer, one on Nebraska Avenue, and the other on O, and each between Twelfth and Thirteenth, have done the fair business of nine thousand dollars, on an average stock in trade of twenty-five hundred dollars.

LAND --- Columbus is, in truth, a great land mart, but of all branches of business this droops most in a time of general depression. No report.

LUMBER --- A. Henry and Hunneman & Tolman, on Depot ground, are everywhere known.

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