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Side by side with the cultural growth of the city has been the development of its present school system and the excellent educational record achieved by both the public and parochial schools in Platte County. It was the year 1860 when the leaders of the embryonic community met at the American Hotel in Columbus to elect John Rickly, Michael Weaver, and George W. Stevens to the school board. The enumeration of students, made a few months later, showed forty-six males and twenty females, of which thirty-five lived east of the meridian and thirty-one west of the meridian. The following December, the town board made a present of the famed Old Company House to the school district.

George W. Stevens was the first teacher in the early log house which stood on the Bremer Brewery Block. In the spring of the next year, Charles A. Speice bought the building, but not before it had housed the first public-taught classes in Columbus and numbered among its early students the Ricklys, Wolfels, Weavers, Barnums, Ernsts and Hayes. By 1866, when the railroad went through Columbus, two hundred and seven boys and girls were attending the County schools and a decade later the number had jumped to near 1,677.

The first school building built specifically for educational purposes was erected in 1861, and used for seven years before it was sold to the reorganized Latter Day Saints for a church.* It was also later used for a few years as the Jewish Synagogue. In 1868, a new building, thirty by fifty feet, was erected and termed "the finest structure in the Platte country." It stood west of Eighteenth Avenue, about numbers 1802-1806, on Eighth Street. However, the pioneers and the early settlers had large families and by 1874, a new schoolhouse was needed. The first brick school building in Columbus was two stories high and forty-seven by fifty-seven feet. It stood on the site of the present First Ward school between Sixteenth and Seventeenth Avenues on Ninth Street, and was in use until 1922.

The facilities expanded each successive year until 1880, when the First Congregational Church Building, just north of Ninth Street on the west side of Twenty-second Avenue, was purchased by the school system and converted into a high school for "advanced education." Among the members of the first graduating class, the 1885 records listed: Harry J. Arnold, a physician; Earnest Slattery, a judge; Addie Ransdale, and Mate Wadsworth. In 1887-88, the Columbus High School became accredited by the University of Nebraska.

From 1885-1898 the High School was in the Williams Building in the Second Ward.

The second brick high school, later junior high school, was erected in 1898, as the result of a bond issue, and the next school built was the Third Ward, which replaced the old District 13 school. The building of the Kramer High School took place in 1925, and the edifice was dedicated on December seventh of that year. It cost almost three hundred thousand dollars and occupied the Gerrard block.

PAROCHIAL SCHOOL

First of the three parochial schools in Columbus was St. Bonaventure's School, established in 1878, with an enrollment of eighty pupils. Among its first students were both Catholics and non-Catholics. The first boarding school in Nebraska, St. Francis Academy, was opened in 1882 by the Sisters of St. Francis from Lafayette, Indiana. In 1925, it became a parish school for day students only, and the name was again changed to St. Bonaventure's School. The parish school included the high school grades.

The Immanuel Lutheran Grade School, opened in 1893 under the direction of the Reverend Herman Miessler, was a one-room building. It later had grades one through eight, and employed two instructors. A new building was started in 1949.

A Catholic parochial grade school, St. Anthony's, was opened in September, 1913, with two lay teachers, Miss Helen Rodak and Miss Josephine Wass. The following year, the school was taken over by the Franciscan Sisters, who assigned Polish-speaking members of their order to the teaching duties. The parish now maintains it as a grade school.

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* 1868-1871 Court Room,

EARLY RECORDS

Some indication of the early interest in public education may be gained from Charles A. Speice's annual report of 1876, as County Superintendent of Schools. The highest wage paid to teachers in that year was seventy-five dollars for males and sixty dollars per month for female instructors. The lowest wages were twenty dollars and twenty-five dollars per month. In addition to the one brick schoolhouse in the First Ward in Columbus, there were twenty-eight frame buildings and three log, sod and dugout structures in Platte County in 1876. In the beginning, bi-lingual instruction was used in many of the rural schools. Sherman Precinct, for instance, held German classes four afternoons a week.

Kramer High School, named for Carl Kramer, who served for more than thirty years on the Columbus Board of Education, is a modern building capable of accommodating six hundred students in its three-story structure. Fifty classrooms, a seven hundred-seat auditorium, and a gymnasium for boys and girls are among the facilities. Members of the Board of Education responsible for the beautiful structure for the city were: John L. Pittman, president; H. A. Viergutz, vice-president; Edward W. North, Mrs. Gustav R. Prieb, Carl F. Ewert and Edward M. Ragatz. The growth in enrollment during the next twenty-five-years, 1925-1950, showed the need for additional high school space.

Besides Columbus, other districts in the county with high schools in 1949 included Duncan, Platte Center, Lindsay, Creston, Humphrey, Monroe, and seven rural districts. Platte Center, Humphrey, Lindsay and Duncan also had parochial high schools. Regular institutes or educational meetings for Columbus and Platte County school teachers were held each year, featuring forums on current teaching trends and addresses by prominent educators throughout the country.

From the beginning, the students who gained their education in the Platte County schools have added to their academic training a practical knowledge of the hardships endured by their forebears in carving out a new land.

"Pioneers in any human enterprise," wrote Clarence Gerrard in his high school oration essay of May, 1887, "are always met at the beginning of their undertakings by the settled opposition of their neighbors." He went on to draw an analogy of the inventive pioneering being undertaken at that time, which was the introduction to the machine age.

The University of Nebraska has long been a favorite of Platte County youths who desire a higher education. The medical college of the state university at Omaha attracts many who are entering that profession. While Duchesne, and Creighton University, also in Omaha, draw many students from the Columbus area. The latter institution is one of the few coeducational Jesuit universities in the United States, and has a very high scholastic rating both in arts and the professions of law and medicine.

Other colleges attended by the sons and daughters of Platte County families include: Doane College at Crete, originally established by the Congregational Church; Midland College, a Lutheran institution at Fremont, Nebraska; Wayne College, northeast of Columbus in the state; Peru College, in southeastern Nebraska, both State Teachers' Colleges; Dana College, at Blair; Luther College, in Wahoo; Chadron State Teachers' College, in the northwestern part of the state, and Kearney State Teachers' College at Kearney, Nebraska. Each year several local students also are enrolled at colleges and universities outside of Nebraska.

A number of students annually are enrolled in business schools in nearby cities after graduating from high school.

TRAVEL

As the community grew and the interests and activities of its citizens widened, a sharp increase was seen in the cosmopolitan flavor of the town. Foreign travel mounted, and the sons and daughters of settlers who had confined their wanderings to buggy rides about the countryside now visited far flung continents and mingled with the inhabitants of other lands.

Among the travelers in 1923 were: Doctor and Mrs. Christian A. Allenburger and their son, Christian, Jr., who journeyed to South America for the Clinical Congress of the American College of Surgeons. Mr. and Mrs. William A. Curry and their son William, Jr., and Mr. and Mrs. Charles Segelke embarked upon an extended, tour which included Europe, Egypt and Palestine and terminated in Rome. Miss Marie Kyle also visited Europe during the 1920's. Albert Brugger, the son of Mr. and Mrs. M. Brugger, spent several years in Africa developing diamond mine properties. His brother, Melvin, also spent a number of years in the Belgian Congo and was later in Italy.

Miss Helen Schroeder and Eugene O'Grady were married in Buenos Aires; the Albert Gigers revisited their homeland of Switzerland. George

The Kramer High School Bond, 1948.

Rambour and his son, Louis, spent several months in Germany and on the Continent, where they were joined by Mrs. George Rambour and Erna Rambour. The year 1931 found Alfred O. and Mary Stenger returning to Columbus after fifteen months in Russia where Alfred served as an agricultural specialist under contract to the government of the Soviet Union. In 1936 the George Rambour family and Josephine Kramer were abroad. In 1938, Otto and Gertrude Walter and their daughter, Virginia Jane, spent many months traveling in the European countries. In 1947, Mr. and Mrs. E. T. Miessler, their daughter, Clara Ruth, and Mr. and Mrs. Otto F. Walter visited the entire continent of South America by air transportation.

COUNTRY CLUB

Much of the culture of any community grows out of the leisure time activities of its members. In Columbus, the present day nucleus of this phase of social life is the Wayside Country Club. The origin of the club is typical of the natural development of the area and its residents. In 1917, Harrison Elliott, a traveling salesman who lived in Columbus and later became secretary of the Chamber of Commerce, organized a group of friends for the purpose of playing golf. The first golf group rented Gottschalk's pasture north of town, and later transferred to Paul Mueller's pasture, southwest of the old Loup River Bridge.

This was the permanent beginning of golf in Columbus, and it was also the birth of the Wayside Country Club, for a small clubhouse was soon built on this site under the direction of Ralph Coolidge. The first stock was bought by one hundred sixty Columbus citizens,, and the tract finally purchased was originally the land of the Monroe sisters used by Stires as a pasture, and marked by loose sand and a small grouping of cottonwood trees near the river. The old Highway 30 formerly passed through the grounds of the club.

The first president of the organization was Edward H. Chambers. Herman Kersenbrock, with the aid of Henry Hunter, John Bosserman and several others, landscaped the acres by transplanting trees from the land of local farmers. So attractive were the grounds that the city of Columbus, under the administration of Mayor Dietrich Becher, opened negotiations to build a city park in the same section. The eastern half of the eighty-acre tract was purchased from the Country Club and converted into beautiful Pawnee Park, one of the outstanding recreational grounds in the State of Nebraska.

A new and larger clubhouse was later built on the foundations of the former old Black Ice House, which stood by the pond on the club grounds.

Each summer, more than two hundred families converge upon the Wayside Country Club as the outstanding social center of Platte County. The Mid-Nebraska golf championship tournaments are played there and numerous social and civic organizations meet at the clubhouse, which was enlarged and modernized in 1948.

The following men have served as presidents of the Club since 1917: E. H. Chambers, Fred Sawyer, A. R. Miller, C. N. McElfresh, Doctor F. H. Morrow, H. J. Kersenbrock, Doctor F. G. Rohde, Doctor E. E. Koebbe, Jesse L. Doughtery, Lowell L. Walker, C. E. Pearse, M. M. Taylor, R. H. Heynen, Doctor D. E. Maxwell, Marvin G. Schmid, Arden Wolf, Howard Burdick, Lovell Burley, J. W. Anderson, C. A. Pittman, and Raymond Reed. Secretaries included: Harrison Elliott, Charles L. Dickey, James L. Rich, Leonard S. Miller and James F. Gregorius. Harrison Elliott moved to Bakersfield, California, where he started a country club along the lines of the Wayside Club in Columbus. There Mr. Elliott also became active in both the Bakersfield and the Kern County Chambers of Commerce.

Many other organizations have contributed to the growth of Columbus as a community of socially conscious and culturally alert citizens.

PIONEER GATHERINGS

Thirteen years after its founding, the first settlers of Columbus met to celebrate their annual anniversary. That year, on May 29, 1869, the feast was held in a hall in an exact duplication of the momentous event marked by the first meal in the community on May 29, 1856. "The table... was constructed of rough planks, set off with huge bunches of wild prairie flowers in oyster and fruit cans . . . the plates were made of shingles. Into the empty necks of Catawba bottles, tallow-dip candles were placed and they stood as pickets along the outer edge of the table." Only ten of the original thirteen were present and at this meeting they asked H. Hudson and C. A. Speice, two settlers before 1860, to address their group.

Thus did these people pay homage to the pioneers who created civilization where there had been only wilderness and savages. The Platte County Pioneers' Association, meeting in Columbus, has continued the observance of occasions memorable in the history of its founders.

The first Pioneer Association included only the Founders of Columbus in its membership. The meetings were held annually for thirteen years on the birthday of Columbus, May 29. This was also the birthday of John Peter Becker.

Although this group always met to celebrate the event, a second Platte County Pioneer Association was organized in the early 1870's. This group included in its membership the pioneers who came from 1856 to 1860.

The third organization of the Platte County Pioneers' Association took place in the early 1890's. This time the membership included all the settlers who came before 1870.

The fourth organization of the Platte County Pioneers' Association took place in 1922.

The group of pioneers who met at the city hail to make plans for the organization in 1922

included: Mrs. W. M. Hensley, Edward W. North, John M. Curry, Albert J. Galley, G. W. Phillips and William Becker.

Several weeks later at a meeting at the Platte County Court House Mrs. W. N. Hensley was elected the first president of the association and Albert J. Galley secretary.

The association in 1949 celebrated its twenty-seventh year. Mr. and Mrs. A. J. Galley have served continuously in office since 1922. For twenty-seven years, 1922 to 1949, at the annual meetings papers of an historical nature have been read and addresses given commemorating the events which led to the present development of Platte County. For many years at the annual meeting Otto F. Walter has led the group singing.

At the 1948 annual meeting Harold Kramer gave an informal talk on the part that the Platte County Pioneers' Association should take in the Centennial Celebration of Columbus in 1956.

The officers of the association for 1946-1947 included: President, Albert D. Becker, son of a founder; vice-president, Miss Margaret Curry; historian, Harold Kramer; memorialist, Mrs. C. C. Sheldon; secretary-treasurer, Mrs. A. J. Galley; and assistant secretary, Mrs. Harold Kramer. Group singing and memorial services are a regular part of the program of this group. The president for 1947-1948 was Margaret Curry; 1948-1949, Edd Kelly. The other 1948 officers included Zela Loomis, Historian; Mrs. W. S. Evans, Memorialist; Mrs. A. J. Galley, Secretary-Treasurer; Assistant Secretary, Mrs. Harry Lohr.

OTHER ORGANIZATIONS

Columbus has always been rich in social organizations. In 1876, the Sons of Temperance had a unit in town. The Maennerchor and Orpheus Societies were a direct outgrowth of the concentration of the German and Swiss-German residents in the locality. This singing society* frequently joined with the Maennerchor groups from other Nebraska communities to give concerts at the Opera House.

In 1903, the German-Austrian Society formed a unit with rooms in the old armory building on the south side of Columbus and announced that "its principal object was to promote sociability."

The Columbus Music Hall Association met regularly in the early years of the town under directors. The first board included: V. Kummer, W. Hunneman, A. N. Briggs, R. H. Henry and James E. North.

Later a Columbus Social Club was incorporated, with an initiation fee of fifty cents and a fifty cent yearly subscription charge, "to form a suitable place for the enjoyment and intellectual entertainment of the members."

It is not surprising that the culture of the community was later affected by the strong influence of these early singing groups. German songs and social conversation were the lifeblood of the organizations and every active member was expected to be "master of the German language." The famous singing societies remained active until World War One.

Although the Woman's Suffrage Association of Columbus was organized October 17, 1881, to assist in the agitation for a constitutional amendment, women were not given the right to vote until more than thirty years had passed. Columbus had its Woman's Club, affiliated with the Nebraska Federation of Woman's Clubs. Creston and Platte Center also maintained their own units of this organization as part of the Platte County Federation of Woman's Clubs.** Another active body sprang into existence in 1877, in the form of a local unit of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union.

The Daughters of the American Revolution have played a signal role in the building of the community, as witnessed in the dedication of a pioneer marker in Buffalo Park and of the Oregon Trail Marker in Pawnee Park. An historical marker was also placed at the foot of Twenty-sixth Avenue on the approximate site of the north side of the Loup River ferry, the first manmade means of transport across the Loup to Columbus.

Columbus had its Business and Professional Women's Club*** to keep alive the memory of those women who took part in the building of the community. From Mrs. John C. Wolfe!, the town's first woman resident, who cooked and kept house for the little band of pioneers, to Miss Louise Weaver, Columbus' first woman teacher, the list is filled with courageous personalities.

WOMEN OF COLUMBUS

Among the women selected by Metta Hensley Neumarker for a paper entitled Women of Columbus, were: Doctor Mary B. Clark, who practiced medicine in Columbus in the 1860's; the Sisters of St. Francis, who have maintained the nursing staff in St. Mary Hospital through the years, and have done an outstanding humani-

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* The Maennerchor incorporated August 3, 1877.
** In 1949.
***In the 1930's.

© 2005 for the NEGenWeb Project by Ted & Carole Miller