History of the Blue Springs Methodist Church

compiled by Henrietta (Tobyne) Smith &
presented at the Old Settlers Reunion
on December 9, 1909 - the 40th Anniversary of the Church

The first history we could get of the organization of a Methodist Class and Sunday School at Blue Springs, Nebr., dates back to the year 1858, when Rev. J. H. Johnson and a young man by the name of Foster organized the first Sunday School and Methodist Class [ J. W. Foster was assigned to Beatrice in 1859, being the first pastor ever sent to that place. His circuit included Blue Springs and perhaps some other points on the Big Blue. He reported at the Conference in 1860 fourteen members].

These meetings were kept up a regular intervals, the members meetings in the homes of the members in fall and winter and in the grove during the summer time, until the year of 1859 or 1860. In the year of 1860 a preacher by the name of Mason, who lived on Salt Creek in Lancaster County, came to Blue Springs on horse back and held services once each month.

In the year 1861 Rev. John B. Maxfield, who located up the Blue River a short distance north of Blue Springs held regular services. Rev. Maxfield's wife died and there was no cemetery so she was buried on their farm, but later moved into the present cemetery. [ Orpha (Summers) Maxfield 1839-9/26/1860 is buried in the Blue Springs Cemetery ] After the death of brother Maxfield's wife, he broke up housekeeping and lived among the members of the class, who were Rev. J. H. Johnson and family, Mr. & Mrs Parsons, Mr. & Mrs. William Tyler, Miss Mary Johnson, Dr. & Mrs. Levi Anthony.

In 1862 Rev. Davis, Presiding Elder, and King and Kendal, Pastors in charge. The members of this class were the same as the preceeding year with the addition of Miss Retta Anthony who became Mrs. Frank Graham, Lizzie Anthony who became Mrs. Porter and Mrs. R. A. Wilson. During this year prayer meetings were instituted and were held in the homes of the members of the class. The young people often went to Beatrice to attend the Quarterly Meetings. 

During this year a very successful Sunday School was carried on in a small log cabin down near Blue Springs with James (of Grandpa) Hollingworth as Superintendent and Dr. Anthony was assistant. Members of the young ladies class were Miss Rita Anthony, Miss Lizzie Anthony, Miss Gray, Miss Weltha Tinkham, Miss Mary Johnson, Miss Rosa  Hinenger, Miss Sarah and Miss Jane Cochran, Mrs. Viney and Miss Mira Shelley as teacher. Members of the young men's class were Frank Graham, James Thomas, Robert Shelly, Wm. Wilde, and Thaddeus Edward Armstrong. There were older people's classes, an intermediate and primary class. 

During the year 1863, Rev. McLaughlin was pastor in charge. During the years 1864 & 1865, Rev. Tinkham took charge of the work at Blue Springs. At this time, the Indian troubles in the West began, Civil War was going on the in the South and the grasshopper raids caused some to leave their homes. Others went to fight the Indians and some enlisted in the U. S. Army. So will all of these things going on there were but few left to keep up the church and Sunday school.

In 1874 the preacher in charge, Rev. Geo H. Wehn, wrote to a former pastor, Rev. H. P. Mann, to find out if there was some kind of a record of the Blue Springs Church and received this reply:

"Palmyra, Nebr., April 22, 1874 - Brother Wehn: I am glad to send you any assistance I can covering the Blue Springs circuit. I was sent to Beatrice circuit then consisting of the following appointments: Beatrice, Blue Springs, Mud Creek, Swan City and Swan Creek.

The Blue Springs charge had fallen in such a disorganized condition that the membership did not exceed six in number. They were: Mrs. J. H. Johnson, Ritta Graham, Wm. Tyler and wife, sister Amelia Wilson and Sister Viney. Brother Tyler and wife and Wilson were absent the first year leaving only three. Brother Mudge and wife moved their membership to Blue Springs and I appointed Brother Mudge as class leader. 

At the end of the second year the Beatrice circuit was divided and the Cub Creek appointment was cut off, making the Blue River the dividing line. Blue Springs was retained in Cub Creek circuit by the conference of March, 1863.  I was appointed to the Cub Creek circuit which was made up of the appointment at Blue Springs, Sicily Creek, Swan Creek and Turkey Creek on Plesant Hill.  In the third Quarterly meeting Plum Creek and Wolf Creek were sent over to the Cub Creek circuit by request of G. W. Elwood of Beatrice.

In the Conference of 1869, Cub Creek circuit was divided and Saline and Blue Springs were organized with T. B. Lemon as Presiding Elder and I was appointed pastor in charge. The Blue Springs class consisted of Thomas Harpster, class leader, the brothe H. Z. Mayne, leader of the second class, which often met a Brother Tobynes. Wm. Tyler was steward.  The stone part of the church was built to the roof that year. [ this church was located in the center of the block were the new fire station now stands]

Services were held in the stone church for more than a year with nothing between the congregation and the roof but overhead joists. The roof was finished in 1870, however it would be two more years before there were any seats except rough planks around the sides of the building.  

Ebenezer Evangelical Church, Zion Evangelical Church, United Brethren Church, United Methodist Church - Blue Springs, NE

Ebenezer Evangelical Church
Zion Evangelical Church
United Brethren Church
Today serving as the United Methodist Church

The Evangelical Association was first organized northwest of Blue Springs at Pleasant Prairie (sometimes known as Little Blue) School District 35. The first meeting was in March of 1870.  Sunday School began in a dug out school house a few years earlier. Services were held at Dist. 35 until 1875. 

Pleasant Prairie/Little Blue District 35 

In 1875, the Association moved to Blue Springs and services were held in the school house. At that time the school was a subscription school located at 2nd & A Street. 

Interior of the Ebenezer Evangelical Church - 1877-78
Rev. William Wonder pictured 

1886 Sanborn Map showing 32x50 church 

In August of 1877, Lots 11-12 Block 12 of Hollisters Addition were purchased and the original section of today's church was built. It was a rectangular structure 32' by 50' with a pulpit and altar in the north end, two stoves, one on either side 'just north of center' and a door in the south end where the double window is now. Later, a choir loft was built on the northeast corner. 

The 1877 Class was composed of 23 members: Mr. & Mrs Soloman Harpster; Mr. & Mrs. Dan Harpster; Mr. & Mrs Jacob Smith; Sarah Warner; Michael Strawhecker; Mr. & Mrs. Ezra Wonder; Mr. & Mrs. Basore; Mr. & Mrs. Henry Sandritter and daughters-Mary, Julia and Lena; Elmer Wonder; Maggie Woolford; Mary Buskirk; William Egbert, Rev. William Wonder and wife. 

Earliest known photograph of the exterior - 1888-1902

1892 Sanborn map showing the belfry

During the Pastorate of T. W Serf, which began in 1888, the south center door was closed and a new entry and belfry was constructed at the southeast side of the building. 

1903-1926

1925 Sanborn Map showing class room and pulpit room
(before basement was installed)

 

During the Pastorate of Rev. A Lemkaw, the class room and pulpit room were built. Pews and Memorial Windows were placed (as they are now) in 1903.  Miss Sue Harpster collected money for the three pulpit chairs and the choir chairs were purchased by church members. A bible was given by Mr. Moody and $200 was left in the will of Dan & Lizzie Harpster for a Memorial Piano. 

In 1903, three double memorial windows were added and at least one of the double hung windows.  The Victorian era made stained glass all the rage and by the late 1800s mass production had made them very affordable.  I sent a photo of one of the double windows to OakBrook Esser Studios in Milwaukee.  Because of the year of the window and without a manufacturer’s signature, they said it would be very hard to determine where they were made, though most surely they were made in the United States.  By the late 1890s catalogs made it easy to pick from various shapes and glass compositions to build your own window.  These windows include opalescent, painted and stained glass pieces, as well as large jewels. Esser suggested these windows probably were midrange products costing about $3-5 a square foot; in comparison today prices run between $300 and $500 a square foot.  A newspaper article about a memorial window installed in the Auburn Methodist Church in 1904 stated its cost as $150.  A catalog is listed on ebay for $750, it is an 1899 Muscatine Sash & Door Co in Muscatine Iowa featuring leaded colored art glass for private homes as well as for church windows.

Perhaps just as interesting as the stained glass, are the people and organizations that donated the money for these eight beautiful Memorial Windows. 

Rev. William Wonder was pastor of the Evangelical Church in 1877-78.  He passed away in 1894 and his wife Margaret dedicated this memorial window in memory of their marriage before her death in 1913.

Mrs. S.M. Hazen was the wife of Solon Hazen.  He was born in New York in 1829 and came to the Blue Springs area in April 1857.  As newly elected Surveyor of Gage County, he surveyed and platted the town of Blue Springs in 1861 and went on to serve in the Nebraska Legislature in 1884.

William Tyler was a retired soldier who settled in BS in 1859. Affectingly known as "Pap" Tyler, he was one of the first postmasters of Blue Springs and kept his papers in a cigar box. His second wife, Rebecca Woodward, was “Miss Kitty” of Blue Springs and the wealthiest person in Gage County for several years. Several of the first instruments recorded in our county represent business transactions in her name. Together they bought the land that is now Riverside Farm and built the lofted center section of the existing house close to the River, it was later moved to its present location.  Rebecca died in 1870 and William married Sarah Warner (a widow) a few years later. She donated the money for this memorial window 14 years after Pap’s death in 1889.

Mrs. Susan Moody Schenberger was the wife of Rev. A W Schenberger who served as pastor in 1882. In the spring of 1887 he was elected presiding elder of the Blue Springs District of the Platte River Conference, serving in this capacity four years; in the spring of 1892 he was elected conference evangelist and re-elected in the spring of 1899.  He dedicated this memorial window to Susan, who was notable in her own right as organizer and first president of the Platte River Branch of the Woman’s Home and Foreign Missionary society in about 1885.

Solomon and Daniel Harpster were brothers. They were born in Pennsylvania and living in Ohio when the Civil War broke out. They served together as Union soldiers in the Ohio Infantry.  When the war was over, they joined thousands of pioneers traveling west on promise of free land.  They filled out Homestead applications in Brownsville in 1867, choosing 2 160-acre plots side by side, 1 mile west and 2 miles north of Blue Springs. 

All of these people are buried in the Blue Springs Cemetery.

The double windows in the Zion Room were funded by the Keystone League of Christian Endeavor (a church youth group) and the Ladies Aid.

In 1926-27 the building was raised and the basement added (it is interesting to think the structure was 50 years old when it was lifted off the ground). Earth was removed with the help of horse drawn skids. 

The Zion Room was dedicated in 1954 in memoriam to the Zion Evangelical Church, which was located one mile west of the Union Center School on the B-Line east of town. 

Zion Evangelical Church & parsonage
1899-1954

The Blue Springs churches county cousin; the Evangelical Union Hall congregation was organized in 1890 and built this church in 1899 on the crown of a hill one mile west of the Union Hall on land deeded to the church by Fannie Hardy.  Rev. Dillow was the pastor and the brethren Bangham, Darner and Harris, along with their wives were charter members. When Bishop Stanton visited the church for the dedication, the location inspired him to think of Mount Zion and the church and the hill were both named Zion. The Zion Evangelical church shared a pastor with the BS church until 1903 when Rev. Tool was assigned to Zion as full time pastor.  In 1907 a parsonage was built beside the church, sixty trees were set out and a fence built around the premises. 

By 1916, Zion had a membership of 108. A new furnace and gas light generation was installed that year, greatly improving the church. 

Interior Zion Church Christmas - 1916

This photograph was taken during a Christmas Eve service welcoming new members of the Church in 1916.  William and Tena Morris, my grandparents and two uncles, Arthur and Wilferd, were received into Church membership that evening and this photograph was a treasured part of my Dad’s collection. He and my aunt, Edith, are also in the photograph, however they were too young for membership that year.  My uncle, Arthur, was baptized in the Blue River near Blue Springs in the summer of 1917. My Dad was received into membership and baptized September 14, 1924 just shy of his 16^th birthday.

During the winter of 1918-19, the work of the church was difficult because of extremely bad roads and a severe flu epidemic.  In the early years of the 1920s, the community flourished.

Faced with the Dust Bowl and the Great Depression, by 1934 the Zion congregation was once again made part of the BS church and shared a pastor.  Tent revival meetings were held throughout the decade lead by traveling Evangelists. When the rains came in 1936, spirits were lifted and new song books purchased. In 1937 membership was 53.  In 1939 the youth staged a “chicken hunt” which brought in $68.06 towards paint and repairs for the church, and then went on to help with the painting. That year a decision was made to remove the steeple as it had become dangerous and it was replaced with a lower structure. My Dad’s signature appears along with other signatures making the recommendation.

With the dawn of a new decade and depression behind them, the people of Union Center had hopes for a brighter future, repairs were made to the church and preparations were made for the churches 50^th Anniversary in November of 1941.  The morning service had an attendance of 100 people who traveled over rain soaked graveled roads to the church.

In 1945 the vacant parsonage was furnished by the Ladies Aid for their monthly meetings.  An acre of crops known as “Gods Acre” culminated in an annual Harvest Home Celebration each fall in the late 1940s.  In 1949-50, the church was wired for electricity for the first time. During the summer of 1952, the church was painted and the young people raised money for it by placing banks in the congregation’s homes and collecting the money every month or so.  Lightning struck the church during the morning service that year and the insurance company replaced the chimney and electrical wiring. 

In 1953 the parsonage was sold for $1100 and moved 1 mile east and a mile south. The house still stands now vacant for several years.  When the school closed in 1952, the church struggled through the year; even so, a revival meeting in September was well attending thanks to support from the congregation of the Blue Springs church.  In 1954 the church was closed and the congregation moved to BS.  The church was later sold for materials and torn down.

My Dad, Robert Morris, appears on the board of trustees in the last years of Zion’s service to the community.  When it closed he joined the members of the Blue Springs church and his membership spanned 80 years.

1882-1942

The United Brethren Church was located on the corner north 
of the Johnson Cabin Museum  in the Blue Springs Park

The United Brethren in Christ was established in Nebraska in the 1870s.  In March of 1880 the Blue Springs Mission was designated as the west ½ of the Otoe Reservation, the name was later changed to the Otoe Reserve Mission.  The Zion United Brethren Church six miles south of Wymore was dedicated in January 1893.  This building was built in 1882 at a cost of $1500.  The church work was discontinued in 1942 and the properties were later sold. The Church of the United Brethren in Christ and the Evangelical Church merged in November of 1946 to become the Evangelical United Brethren Church.

The church records (births, marriages, baptisms and minutes) for both the Ebenezer Evangelical Church and Zion Evangelical Church are available to view at the Wymore Public Library in the Heritage Room (by request).  The EUB Blue Springs book dates only through the 1930s but the Zion book dates from 1900 until it closed in 1954.

In April of 1968, the Ebenezer Evangelical Church consolidated with the Methodist Church to form the United Methodist Church and its congregation honors the building’s historic past and continues its tireless work in our community. 

BLUE SPRINGS UNITED METHODIST CHURCH 

SAMUEL W. WYMORE - THE FAMILY BEHIND THE MAN

There is always more to a man’s story and what we think we know after a century of hearing it told may be quite different from the way it really was. 


When Patti Novotny handed me the abstract of her family home last June, she hadn't thought much about the name on the first page, after all most of Sam Wymore’s land was turned over to the Lincoln Land Company on July 21 of 1881 to plat the town of Wymore.  His name must appear on the first page of a lot of abstracts in town – right ?  Right. 

What was different about this abstract was the first entry:

United States to Samuel W. Wymore
Patent filed on April 28th 1876

On July 9, 1868, Sam was in Brownsville, NE filing an application for Homestead land.  He paid a $14 filing fee to secure his claim on 160 acres described as the South 1/2 of the NE 1/4 and the West 1/2 of the SE 1/4 of Section 20 in township 2 of Range 7E.   It took Wymore  7 years and on April 29, 1875, two witnesses; William Wymore (his brother) and Herbert Viney vouched for the Proof of Wymore's settlement and improvements made to his homestead whereby Wymore earned the right to the title of this land. The Patent was delivered to Samuel W. Wymore on April 28,1876 ... the same date as shown on Patti's abstract.  Patti's property is an undivided City Block #4, essentially at the center of Sam Wymore's original Homestead and a few paragraphs down the page, we'll tell you why we think this 1890 house is Sam Wymore's last standing residence in the town that bears his name. 

Block 4 of Wymore's Addition

Section 20 Township 3 North Range 7 East of the 6th P.M.

Gage County, Nebraska

In 1870, a young man held the patent to 160 acres of the land bordering Sam Wymore's Homestead. When he claimed his stake he was 23 years old and his wife, Louisa, was 17, their daughter, Margaret Jane, was 3 and son William was born on this land that year.  It seemed impressive that this young man would cut the limestone by hand for the small stone cottage that stands today in ruin (on a lot at the north end of 4th Street) but George Wymore and his wife and children were not alone in Southeast Nebraska.  The Wymore Family had siblings and cousins scattered across Gage & Pawnee Counties in the 1800s and his older brother’s homestead bordered George’s property to the south and east.  While Samuel Wymore was fulfilling his obligations for 160 acres of Homestead land, he was also buying up land in the area. In 1875 George sold his property to Samuel … which presents an interesting question: Did George build the old limestone cottage or did Samuel ?  For certain one of them did. 

George & Louisa moved on to a farm in Section 1 of Island Grove Township.  They welcomed three more children into their family, Peolya, Samuel, Sallie and Robert. Louisa died young at the age of 30, in November of 1881. George lies at rest near his daughter Margaret in the Odell American Cemetery. 

WYMORE FAMILY TREE
compiled by Carolyn Riemann

(scroll down to)

Children of JOHNSON WYMORE and SARAH MCMAINS (1816-1890) : 

Samuel W. Wymore 1835-1908 (family pictured below)
William L. Wymore 1837-1911  (family pictured below)
 Margaret Peggy Wymore 1839-1921

 Abraham Wymore 1841-1917
 Nancy Wymore 1843- ?
 Martin Wymore 1844- ?
 George Wymore 1846-1913
 Summerfield Wymore 1848-1927
 Jonathon Wymore 1853-1926
 Robert E. Wymore 1855-1903

Back (l-r): Dill and Alice  Front (l-r): Samuel, Nancy, William L, Willie (James William) Wymore

Samuel Porter, Matilda Mariah, Isabella, Mary Scott & Samuel

Children of SAMUEL WYMORE and ISABELLA SCOTT:

Nancy Ann Wymore 1857-1878
Sarah Wymore 1859-before 1868
James Hugh Wymore 1860-before 1868
Mary Scott Wymore 1861- ?
Margaret Summerfield Wymore 1866-1886
Matilda Mariah Wymore 1869-1943
Samuel Porter Wymore  1875-1941

Matilda Mariah & Samuel Porter were born in the log cabin on the Wymore Homestead. 

When Samuel Wymore negotiated his historic deal with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, he signed over his homestead and the land George had sold to him along with other landholdings to the Lincoln Land Company, a company the railroad incorporated to manage the sale of the lands they held title to and built towns spaced about 10 miles apart along the track.  Wymore’s Homestead was in the Wymore Addition of town and George’s old patent was in the Summit Addition.  John Schock held land in the west 1/2 of Section 20 in 1869.  Jeremiah Scanlan purchased land to the south in 1860. All of Section 20 was sold to the Lincoln Land Company in 1881. In the hands of the Lincoln Land Company, between 1881-1908, the secluded stone house near the railroad tracks took on a notorious reputation, apparently rented out to shady characters who capitalized on its close proximity to the railroad.  

In 1871, James Hugh Scott, his wife Mary Emily and their twin sons, James & Levi, packed their belongings in a covered wagon and moved to Gage County, Nebraska.  Here they joined his twin sister Isabelle and her husband, Samuel Wymore.  Little Mary Emma was born on January 21, 1872. Life on the prairie held many hardships and Mary Emily died in June of 1872 leaving James with the 3 year old twins and baby Mary.  On September 16, 1872 he took over the claim to the homestead land of Owen Jones. This was in the Blue Springs Precinct, formerly the Otoe Indian Reservation. From his place there was not a house in sight. The nearest neighbor lived in the neighboring town of Blue Springs, which at that time consisted of only a store and a post office. A few months later in 1873, Mary Emma followed her mother to her eternal home.  In June of 1873, James married Mary Catherine Tisdell and together they worked to earn the rights to their Homestead.  They built a 12 x 20 foot house with a shingle roof, floors, 2  doors and windows 'all complete'. They built a corn crib and pig pen listed in their documented Final Homestead Proof submitted on 6 October 1877. 

When Samuel Wymore invested a good share of his land holdings into platting the town of Wymore in 1881, his brother-in-law James Scott sold his Homestead to Samuel.  This is the land now thought of as Wymore's Home Place.  The dugout dwelling on Indian Creek was most likely the work of the original Homesteader, Owen Jones.  James Scott stated he built a frame house on the property. The 1888 Gage County Biographical Album describes the limestone foundation house:  The residence of our subject overlooks the city, and is a very fine modern building erected as recently as 1883, one in every way worthy the founder of so beautiful and prosperous a place.  

Samuel Wymore Home Place (taken before 1981)
Limestone foundation with wood frame first floor

Limestone foundation summer 2013

Legendary Indian stone for grinding corn on the old Wymore land.
Section 29 of Gage County was once a part of the Otoe - Missouri Indian Reservation. 

When James Scott sold the rest of his land situated near the Original Town of Wymore, the land became what is still known as Scotts Addition to the town of Wymore. 

For some men the grass, it seems, is always greener over the next hill and Samuel Wymore spent most of his adult life pursuing an ever illusive dream.  Between 1835, the year of his birth and 1857, the year he married Isabella Scott in Mahaska, Iowa, Wymore lived in Indiana, Iowa, Kansas and Missouri.  As was customary at the time, Samuel left Isabella with her family when the children were small while he worked for his father in Atchinson County Kansas and drifted from Missouri to Pawnee County, Nebraska and back. In November of 1864 he held a Warrant for 120 acres in Section 9 of Pawnee County. In December of 1865 he held a Warrant for 120 acres of land in Section 3 of Pawnee County.  The Homestead Act successfully held him captive for nearly 8 years, since he had to build a dwelling and live on the land to fulfill his obligation to the rules of the Act.  It is possible that Wymore built the limetone cottage on North 4th street while living on the Homestead intending to live there for a time before he moved south of town in 1881. 

Even after enlarging the fine limestone & frame home in the country, Wymore built what is now Patti Novotny's house on Block 4 of Wymore's addition.  While it is true that Sam Wymore and William Ashby built numerous spec homes to sell with their lots, Block 4 was never divided into city lots and the large 1890 Four-Square home is seated on the portion of Wymore's original homestead where the old log cabin likely was situated.  It is logical to think that in 1890, when Wymore was on the backside of 50, he built that nice house in town for Isabella that most pioneers of his time promised their wives when they retired. 

Wymore's 1908 obituary states: In 1892 the population got too dense and he moved to Nevada and bought over 5000 acres of land with an irrigation ditch.  The fact that the town was closing in around Samuel is another reason to believe Samuel and Isabella lived in the 4th Street house from the time it was built until they moved to Nevada.  The Nevada move proved to be Wymore's most costly mistake ... both in Nevada and Wymore.

Charles M. Murdock was born in Pennsylvania in 1843 to Daniel and Prudence Murdock. Daniel was a Presbyterian Minister and son, Charles, was one of 9 children. The family followed the western movement in 1853 and settled for a time in Iowa.  In 1856, Daniel accepted the calling as missionary to the Oto-Missouri Indians and taught for a time at the limestone mission school just south into Kansas in Marshall County. When the Civil War broke out, Daniel served as chaplain of the Thirteenth Kansas Infantry.  On the 11th day of July, 1862, Charles enlisted as a member of the Ninth Kansas Calvary ... Charles turned 12 years old the next month.

After the war, Charles settled in Washington County Kansas and associated with the likes of William Hickock "Wild Bill."  After serving as sheriff of the county, Murdock moved to Blue Springs, NE in the late summer of 1874.  He founded the Blue Springs Reporter and was appointed right-of-way representative for the Burlington Railroad which lead to his appointment of agent to the Lincoln Land Company when the City of Wymore was organized. History remembers Charles Murdock as quite an outspoken character. 

Murdock and Sam Wymore had negotiated many property deals together, so when Wymore left for Nevada in 1892, he and Murdock wrote up a contract dated 3 December 1892, entrusting Murdock with selling Wymore's extensive land holdings in Gage County and various personal properties including a team of horses, paying any property debts and taxes incurred during the process and forwarding the proceeds to Wymore.  Samuel and Isabella actually deeded their property over to Charles and Arthur Murdock and Joseph Pasko.  The first thing Murdock did as Wymore's wagon disappeared over the horizon, was to mortgage Wymore's home place for $500, perhaps in payment for his services as he used the money personal expenses.

Now ...  in Murdock's shaky defense, the Panic of 1893 sent the United States into the worst depression the county had experienced, fueled by overbuilding of the railroads and its shady financing.  As the 1890s wore on, Wymore's holdings in Gage County sat idle and property taxes accumulated ... unpaid. Charles worked up an agreement with his son, Glen, to buy the nice Four-Square house on 4th Street, but the paper was never formally filed with the county and essentially Glen lived there without paying anything for the convenience. Charles occupied a lovely piece of land just a few blocks to the northeast and built a nice house overlooking the Blue River Valley (it was torn down years ago but some will remember seeing it on the hill west of the River road). 

1906 Plat Map showing undivided Blk 4 & C.M. Murdock property

Weekly Wymorean - Feb. 23, 1895

Samuel Wymore arrived in this city last Monday, Feb. 11, 1895 from Wellington, in the Walker River Valley, Nevada, where he has a small farm of 5,920 acres or 37 quarter sections. He looks rugged and hearty and says that the country is good enough for him and that he has no desire to return to Nebraska to make his home. On his ranch he has over 400 acres of alfalfa meadow which they cut 2 or 3 times a year and get from 1 1/2 to 2 1/2 tons per acre at each cutting. He has over 50 milk cows and about 100 head of horses. He has the upper charter on the Walker River which not only gives him fine mill power, but affords an abundant supply of water to irrigate. They are sure of a crop every year, but without the water, the land would be useless for farming purposes.

As the 19th Century came to a close, the Wymore family found themselves back in Wymore after a disappointing sale of Sam's investment in Nevada with not much better prospects on the home front. Wymore renewed his agreement with Charles and Arthur Murdock in March of 1899 providing that from the sale of properties to credit Samuel Wymore $8,729.50 due in three notes and after said amount is paid the residue and balance of all property held in common or sold and proceeds divided equally.

1906 Plat map

A 1906 Plat map of the Blue Springs and Wymore Township shows Wymore's Home Place in the center of Section 29 in the name of A. L. Wachtel.  One can only assume that when Samuel Wymore returned to his Home Place in 1899, he was allowed to live on the property but never again in his lifetime would he hold title to it.  Stories around town flourished with tales of poverty the Wymore family struggled through. 

Beyond Wymore's control, the properties he once held title to, began to sell at tax sales.  On July 25, 1907, Blk 4 on 4th Street was auctioned for taxes due from 1893 to 1904 ... a total of $124.91 and James H. Ellis was the high bidder. 

On September 19, 1907 Samuel Wymore filed suit against Charles, Arthur Murdock and their wives in Gage County District Court. As the highly publicized trial wore on into 1908, Wymore's health began to deteriorate and in June of that year the family made George T. Stephenson Trustee for Samuel Wymore.  Samuel would not live to see the verdict handed down in his favor in May of 1909.  Murdock filed an appeal and took the case to the Nebraska Supreme Court who upheld the District Courts decree in January of 1911

Over 100 years have passed since Samuel Wymore was laid to rest in Blue Springs Cemetery next to his daughter Nancy.  Isabella joined them there in 1914.  Wymore's weaknesses were laid to rest with him. His strengths and the town who bears his name lives on to celebrate, each June during Sam Wymore Days, the legacy he placed in their care. 

Weekly Wymorean-Dec. 31, 1908
Funeral of Sam Wymore

The funeral of the late Sam Wymore, was held last Saturday morning, at 10:30 am at the Baptist Church. Services being conducted by Rev. Taylor of Blue Springs. In respect to the deceased, all the business houses in the city of Wymore, were closed during the funeral. The funeral offerings were beautiful, the casket being literally buried with flowers. The services were largely attended by old friends, who had come to pay their respects to one with whom the history of Wymore is so closely connected. The pall bearers were all old friends of the deceased. Interment was made in the Blue Springs Cemetery. 

WYMORE - the Gay Nineties, Roaring Twenties & Dirty Thirties

Through the early years of the 1880s, Wymore quickly became the Darling of the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad and with that notoriety came the naughty along with the nice.  The city was built, block-by-block, with the railroad in mind.  Within a few blocks of the train depot, hotels popped up almost overnight. The first hotel, The Potter House, was completed in 1882 and shortly after came The Palmer House and the Cottage Hotel.  In the summer of 1887, Wymore’s crown jewel, The Touzalin, opened its doors.  

Imagine for a moment, stepping down from the station in 1890 to the sight of a fine Victorian hotel with a glimpse of a bustling city all around.  Just north on Nebraska Street past the hotel was the Livsey Opera House and across the street east awaited a livery stable offering the finest teams of horses and buggies in Southern Gage County.  If you were only in town for the day, a ticket on the Wymore Blue Springs Railway offered a ride past the town churches and on to the Blue Springs bridge and back.  The restaurants and saloons catered to the men of the Railroad as well as its customers.  Then, as now, the noon whistle announced lunch hour once intended for the men working in the railroad shops.

LADIES OF THE EVENING

During what may have seemed to be an ideal time to have lived, the railroad towns of the prairie were a world apart from ours.  Boredom came quickly to the single young men who were pushing westward in search of their fortune and with the coming of the railroad, the saloons and brothels were quite obliged to accommodate.  In deed, in the 1880s brothels were no more outrageous than saloons.  The madams and inmates of houses of ill repute were fined when too much of a fuss about them stirred the town and proceeds were placed into a town’s school fund.

In Kansas City around the train depot, whole neighborhoods of brothels opened their doors.  The train brakemen carried red lanterns as part of their job and took them along where ever they went. They paid extra for the madams to watch for their next train while they were otherwise occupied and set the lighted lanterns in the hallways or near the windows so they could be easily found before the train whistle blew. It seems there were enough brakemen lanterns to light the neighborhoods in the dead of night with an eerie red glow.   Hence – RED LIGHT DISTRICTS came to be.

Wymore, in those days, was no different from other railroad towns. Well, the difference was the houses of ill repute, three of them that we know of, weren’t near the Depot but on the outskirts of town, yet all within a block of the tracks.

There was the small frame house west on Fouts Street across the tracks over in Blue Springs where its been said the Prairie Doves would cool themselves on the front porch in the hot summer evenings while the town drove by close enough to try not to notice. 

And in the Roaring Twenties the large new foursquare just east of the Arbor State Park on  7^th Street was rumored to house Painted Angels right through the midst of the Dirty Thirties.  By the end of the Depression, the house changed ownership and it became a respectable dance hall where the upstairs balcony overlooked the dance floor and the mill work was painted black.

Middy Gillhouse, a native of Concordia, Kansas purchased the old stone house on North 4^th Street in 1909 for $1100. Middy’s marriage to Theodore Gillhouse had ended the year before but she was quite self-sufficient having made handsome investments in properties in Grand Island, McCook, Fremont … and Wymore. The rumor was she was quite wealthy from renting the properties for an outrageous sum of $5 a day.

On August 10, 1910, the Gage County sheriff made an early morning raid on the house arresting Middy and one Ollie Clark and took them to a hotel in Beatrice for safekeeping. The front-page story in the Weekly Wymorean on August 18 titled the story:  STONE HOUSE CLOSED …”The blinds are down at the House on the Hill  and there is rejoicing and sorrow that it should be thus.”  Gillhouse was charged with leasing the property for immoral purposes and Clark was charged with being an inmate of a disorderly house. Middy bonded out for $400 and the Clark woman $100.

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When court convened on August 30, twenty subpoenaed witnesses were present along with Middy's defense attorney, Alfred Hazlett, who filed a mortgage claim on the house for $500 on August 16 so the ladies could make bail.  The ladies in question, it seemed, had other obligations on the court date and failed to appear.  Their hefty bonds were forfeited in lieu of probable lesser fines and that was that.

Perhaps more interesting was the statement in the newspaper article of how the old house had the reputation as a house of ill repute for nearly 20 years.  So just who owned the property before Middy came along ?  The Gage County Deed’s Office shows Samuel Wymore signing it over to The Lincoln Land Company in 1881 and it was the Lincoln Land Company who sold it to Gillhouse in 1909. 

The limestone house, sometimes known as 4 chimneys, long since covered in stucco and now standing in ruin, was built sometime during the 1870s. It was probably built around the same time Robert Wilson was building his limestone house on the road to the Blue Springs Cemetery between 1869-71.  The stone was most likely cut by hand from the same hill  – Mathew Hill just east of the river road out of Blue Springs.

In 1870, George Wymore held the patent to 160 acres of the land where the house stands. When he claimed his stake he was 23 years old and his wife, Louisa, was 17, their daughter, Margaret Jane, was 3 and son William was born that year.  It seemed impressive that this young man would cut the stone by hand for the small stone cottage but he, his wife and children were not alone in Southeast Nebraska.  The Wymore family had siblings and cousins scattered across Gage & Pawnee Counties and his older brother’s homestead bordered George’s property to the south.  While Samuel Wymore was fulfilling his obligations for 160 acres of homestead land, he was also buying up land in the area and in 1875 George sold his property to Samuel … which presents an interesting question: did George build the old stone house or did Samuel ?  For certain one of them did.

When Samuel Wymore negotiated his historic deal with the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railroad, he signed over his homestead and the land George had sold to him along with other landholdings to the Lincoln Land Company, a company the railroad incorporated to manage the sale of the lands they held title too and build towns spaced about 10 miles apart along the track.  Wymore’s homestead was in the Wymore Addition of town and George’s old patent was in the Summit Addition. Passing into the hands of the Lincoln Land Company in 1881, the secluded stone house near the railroad tracks took on its notorious reputation, apparently rented out to shady characters who capitalized on its close proximity to the railroad while the LLC and the City looked the other way.  That is until from time to time, the local Women’s Christian Temperance Union or some other local concerned citizen forced the sheriff to do something about the disgraceful goings on .. and that strung things along for about 20 years.  At one point, Charles Murdock, who worked as the agent for Lincoln Land Company and lived just down the hill, took his complaints to the governor of Nebraska, accusing the mayor and city police of allowing the operation of these businesses within the city limits … the governor refused to have them fired but suggested they rid the town of the houses … after which life went on much the same as before.  It seems odd that Murdock raised his voice at all seeing how he was agent for the company who owned the property and had control over what happened there.

THE VENDOME

Meanwhile downtown, The Touzalin Hotel opened its doors in late 1887.  Samuel Wymore invested a lot of money into the building, but he would never see a profit.  Elisha P. Reynolds & Company built the hotel and the final cost escalated to $62,000. In 1887, no less than 14 mechanic liens were filled by the contractors before the doors were even open.  With a Saloon, a fine Dining Hall and 65 well appointed rooms, the grand Victorian structure struggled to make ends meet and went through a succession of managers and owners.  In 1914, it was sold at a sheriff’s sale and the new owner changed the name to The Vendome. 

Since before the 1900s, the Nation had struggled with the effects of alcoholism on family life. Saloons as well as houses of ill repute were targeted by societies such as the Women’s Christian Temperance Union for the flow of liquor and its drain on family finances.  In the 1910, William Jennings Bryan took the side of the “Dry” track:  "The fight against evil is always an uphill one, and the hill is never steeper than when you fight the liquor interests.” 

The citizens of Nebraska were deeply divided over the liquor issue; Lincoln for example considered itself leaning “Dry” while Omaha was most definitely at “Wet” town.  Times were changing and in 1916 Nebraska voters approved a statewide prohibition amendment. Prohibition passed in Nebraska almost simultaneously with limited woman suffrage, and with the full support of the Nebraska Woman Suffrage Association. By law, there would be no more booze when the law formally went into effect in 1917.  National Prohibition would not come to pass until two years later in 1919.  Looking back, perhaps Nebraska’s timing wasn’t so grand as bootleggers from other states poured into Nebraska to supply the large number of people who firmly believed the consumption of alcohol was not a crime. This went on until Prohibition was repealed in 1933.

In 1915, a tunnel was dug from the City steam plant (City Hall) to pipe steam to the Vendome Hotel, which kept the building warm and toasty.  The tunnel was large enough to walk through and encased in bricks. The tunnels were expanded beneath the streets to service other downtown businesses.  Legend has it as the decade wore on and Prohibition became the law of the land, the tunnels were used to access saloons and restaurants making it convenient for people who didn’t want to be seen on the streets to move about the City.  The Vendome, it was rumored, housed a Speakeasy in the basement and when word came that the law was headed to the hotel; gambling tables, booze and probably a gangster or two were hidden behind a cellar door in the tunnels. How they thought that was a good idea when the City obviously knew about the tunnel .. is a question worth pondering. By the mid 20s the steam plant was closed down and the tunnels began to collapse under the weight of the newly bricked streets in the downtown.

BATHTUBS OF HOOTCH

Charles Fulton bought his property on North 5th Street in 1915. He built and paid for the house the same year. Most likely the 1000 square foot block garage with the easily spotted corner door was built soon after.  You might remember him as “Nig.”  Charles came from a large family, sometimes notorious, sometimes fondly regarded by the townspeople.  Through prohibition and beyond, Nig and Earl “Whitey” Fulton famously regarded the placement of alcohol beverages at their sole discretion whether or not that was how the law regarded it.

Nig grew up in a large family of 9 children including his famous heavy weight boxing brother Fred, the Rochester Pasterer.  Stories endure that Nig’s wife Edna had once been a Prairie Dove who liked to dress up in fine clothing and ride through town in a fancy carriage edged in fringe and a parasol shielding her from the sun. She died in her early 40s and Nig mourned her loss the rest of his life. The Census of 1900 listed the whole family in Wymore: Henry F. Fulton 35, Lulu 34, Charles ‘Nig’ 12, John A. 10, George 9, Fred ‘Rochester Plasterer’ 8, Roy ’Dub’ 5, Verna M. 3, Earl Maxwell ‘Whitey’ b. 1889, and Pearl E. b. 1904. 

It was a hot Saturday night in August of 1925 when State and Local Authorities staged a raid on Nig's alleged gambling house in Wymore.  The next day the headline in the Beatrice Daily Sun read "THIRTY-ONE TAKEN IN BIG ROUNDUPS."  Staging one of the most sensational law enforcement roundups in the history of Southern Nebraska, state and local officers last night threw out a dragnet at Wymore in which nineteen alleged gamblers were caught. (click headline to read the entire story) 

Nig was arrested numerous times through the 1920s, oblivious to the thought that bootlegging liquor was a bad idea.  In 1926, authorities raided his haunts and found nothing until they came to his house and discovered 3 hidden containers and enough hootch in the bathroom drain to provide jags for a small army.  Edna was arrested along with him that day.

Fulton often used his garage for gambling, cockfights and bootlegging.  Through the gangster years he was known to rent the garage out to notorious types as there was a lift in the garage and one car could be hidden on the lift, another beneath it.  It was rumored that Chicago gangsters parked their cars and used the tunnels to move around townd. This garage is also on the way to the Kinney area where gangsters were known to have hideouts around Kinney and Rawley hills.

FINK'S PARK

Lewis Fink's son was an architect who designed his parents lovely country home in Sicily Township. Lewis had raised two families and planned to live out his days on the farm but his health started failing and he was forced to put it out to rent in 1913.  Things didn't go well from the start, the elderly Fink was showing signs of dementia and he was troubled by the way his tenants let chickens and stock run at large over the land. He didn't believe other provisions of his lease were being carried out.  Things got out of hand when the tenants, armed with a pitchfork and clubs, refused to let him come on the premises.  On November 6, 1913, Fink's son-in-law arrived at the house with his father, who was armed with a shotgun, threatened the tenants. In February of 1914, a Jury found the elderly Fink guilty on the charge of assault and he was fined $50 and court costs.  His health deteriorated quickly that year and he passed away in October 1914. 

With so many children and a substantial estate, the siblings protested the will stating it was uncertain and indefinite and owing to disease and infirmities Fink had been incompetent to make a will.  The will was eventually settled  and in June of 1918, wife Hattie and Alvin, a son from Fink's 2nd family, bought the Sicily property from several of his siblings and moved from his home in South Dakota.  The fine country home just north of the railroad tracks once again occupied by the Fink family.

Indian Creek wound its way through the farm and artesian springs feed clear, cool pools in the low lands. The family arrived home one summer from visiting parks in Colorado. Their home,  they decided, was the perfect place for an amusement park.  Fink's Park opened in June of 1921 with a spring fed swimming pool, a small dance hall, a small store stocked with grocery items, candy and tobacco products and a counter where hamburgers and ice cream was served.  Tourist cabins were popular in those days and several cabins were offered for rent on a weekly basis furnished with cots, mattresses, table, chairs and a kerosene stove for cooking. Row boats were available for use on the lake and on Indian Creek which had been dammed.  A fond memory for many who spent the day there was the swinging bridge over Indian Creek that connected amusements on both sides of the creek.  The open air dance hall featured weekly bands booked out of Omaha and Kansas City, Lawrence Welk was among the artists who performed there. There are wonderful stories of Church picnics, sweethearts meeting for the first time, fireworks over the lake on the 4th of July, and Model T's arriving on a late Spring evening then struggling to leave the grounds when a rolling thunderstorm turned the dust to mud.   

Alvin amused himself with imported pheasants who were kept in pens on the grounds and the flocks were replenished from time to time when mischievous lads opened the gate and let them fly the coupe. Hattie amused herself with travel and entertaining the local lady's societies with afternoon tea.  In 1934, Hattie regaled her friends with tales and treasures brought home from a trip of see the Chicago World's Fair.

As the Depression and the Dust Bowl closed in around them, Alvin was known to travel to Omaha frequently on business and darker more troubled summer nights at the park forced parents to keep their kids away.  Strangers drifted through, keeping to themselves at the cabins and raising eyebrows when their high powered cars rumbled by. The Dirty Thirties dried up the Springs and the park was forced to close in the mid 1930s, about the same time as when Prohibition was repealed.  Alvin & Hattie moved back to South Dakota.  The old Victorian was rented out again over the years, stood empty for many atop the hill overlooking the countryside and when the descendants of the Fink family sold the property at the turn of the century, the old house came down.

HEADED OUT OF TOWN IN A HAIL OF BULLETS

On Saturday May 26^th 1928, the Farmer’s & Merchants Bank of Wymore was robbed. Bandits entered the bank about 9:35 am and forced officials, employees and customers (including 4 school teachers) to lie on the floor.  They left the bank with $54,000 in cash and bonds and opened fire with at least one machine gun outside the bank, a barber in a nearby shop was grazed in the arm by one of the bullets.  They fled north out of town in a red Nash with stolen license plates and deterred pursuers by throwing nails on the streets to flatten tires. Suspects were later apprehended but witnesses could not identify any of the men and the real bandits were never found.  The troubled bank on the corner of 7th and F Street was finally forced to close in January of 1930, when the depositors made a run on the bank.

The First National Bank of Fairbury was robbed April 4, 1933 by the infamous Ma Barker/Alvin Karpis Gang.  Six gangsters terrorized employees and customers during the robbery, and made off with nearly $28000.  During the most violent robbery in this area, Sheriffs hit the streets quickly from the Court House across the street and opened fire as the robbers tried to escape using two bank employees and two women as human shields. The deputy sheriff was wounded in the leg and a man standing with him from Des Moines was shot in the shoulder. The bank employee who was being held as a shield was caught in the line of fire and wounded five times, he died a short time later. The black sedan with Iowa plates left Fairbury headed north and the two women were released unharmed two miles outside of town. On the run, one of the gang named Earl Christman took a bullet from the bank security guard and was taken to a Kansas City safe house where he died the next day. The gang buried him in an unmarked grave. The Barker/Karpis gang’s rein of terror far exceeded other well known gangsters of their day. Ma Barker and her son were gunned down in Florida in 1935 and Karpis was apprehended in 1936. Alvin (Kreepy) Karpis was the last "Public Enemy #1" to be taken. He also spent the longest time as a federal prisoner in Alcatraz Prison, serving twenty-six years. He died after his release in 1979. 

Rumors have it that John Dillinger spent several weeks in an unknown location in Wymore, it seems the only credible link to Dillinger in Wymore is one of the Barker gang, who was known to have made arrangements for a safe house in Chicago for Dillinger while he was on the lam and the Barker gang was certainly familiar with this area.  Stories go that early in their career the Dillinger gang was also known to ride the trains, and Wymore was well known from Omaha to Chicago in the 20’s and 30s as SIN CITY. 

In Sept of 1934, 4 bandits known as the Denning-Limerick Gang rented a two story house in the little town of Kinney from Hugh Berry, an Odell man who had been running a dice game in the house. They paid him $6 a day for rent, which was a hefty sum.  Folks in the area reported the suspicious characters to the Sheriff. The group was described as several expensively dressed men and just as many women who spent their days target shooting in the fields and spending money without worry at the local markets. 

The gang had a history of burglaries and robbery’s before they robbed the Security National Bank of Superior on November 22. They used revolvers and a sub machine gun to force all of the employees and customers into the back room while they waited for the timed vault to unlock itself.  They went out the door with $7900 in cash, forcing the cashier and bookkeeper to ride the running boards of the getaway car, acting as human shields until they were out of the city limits. Gage county authorities were quick to set up a raid on the suspects living in the house at Kinney.  

On a chilly night in November, 18 lawmen closed in on a property in Kinney .. trouble is they targeted the wrong house at first which tipped off the gang that they were being raided.  When the officers turned their guns on the two story house the Sheriff gave the bandits 15 minutes to surrender.  Two men walked about 50 feet from the house with their hands up and then made a dash for the hills. One of the men, named Keeling caught a bullet in his side and collapsed in a ditch about a half mile away, he died in a Beatrice hospital the next morning. Harper made his way to Beatrice where he hijacked a trucker and was later seen in Kentucky.  

The two bosses of the gang, Denning and Limerick, arrived back at Kinney around midnight to find authorities waiting for them and ignored sheriff’s orders to halt, speeding away through a flurry of gunfire. Their stolen car was found abandoned in a barn near Odell but there was no trace of the bandits. Limerick was arrested in St. Joseph MO in May of 1935, he confessed to bank robbery’s and was sentenced to life in prison, in Leavenworth Kansas and was later transferred to Alcatraz.  Denning was never seen nor heard from again. On July 20, 1936 after the death of Dillinger associate John (Red) Hamilton, the FBI named Maurice (Blondie) Denning Public Enemy #1 and he stayed on FBI radar until the 1960s.  He was never apprehended, making him the most illusive Public Enemy.

When authorities searched the house, they found money stashed in a radio and inside pocket doors between the rooms, there were piles of fancy clothes and other luxuries seldom seen in those days.  When word got round about the loot in the house, treasure hunters tore the house apart over the next decade looking for money left behind.

Bonnie and Clyde were rumored to have toured through the area before they were killed in May of 1934, but if they were here they wouldn’t have been seen driving through town or robbing banks.  Clyde was predominately a petty thief, stealing cash from gas stations or robbing grocery stores.  They stayed in rural tourist cabins, like those at Fink’s Park and traveled 100s of miles a day at high speeds, Clyde’s stolen car of choice was a 1932 Ford V8.  They circled state lines wherever they went and preferred the borders that ran north and south from Texas to Minnesota.  State officials couldn't cross their state line to pursue a gangster, but in the early 30s Hoover’s FBI made it a priority to pursue them when they did cross state lines and fell under Federal jurisdiction.  

The Blue Springs State Bank was robbed on June 24, 1936. Staff and customers were told to lie on the floor while the bandits scooped up $788.80 and sped away in a Ford V-8. The night before, J. E. Chalmer’s of El Paso, Texas stopped at a filling station in Wymore for gas and asked if he could sleep in his car for a while before heading on to meet up with his wife in Minnesota.  After the filling station closed for the night, a man tapped on his car window and demanded he open the door, 3 men took over his car and forced him to ride along with them through the countryside all night. They stopped at Union Center School and went through all of his personal belongings looking for a gun and took $89 dollars of his traveling money.  They stopped at the Union Center store and woke up the owner for gas.  Chalmers was finally released near at a hideout on Rawley Hill (which is a mile west of the town site of Kinney). The leader of the bandits told Chalmers “When you get back to Wymore, tell them that you have had a ride with Maurice Denning and that he is not as bad a fellow as some people believe.”  A ploy to divert attention from his own identity, he tried to hang the heist on Denning, the man who escaped the Kinney Raid a year and ½ before. Chalmer’s car was found a week later abandoned in Des Moines, Iowa.   The real robbers were later apprehended and did time in prison. 

Somehow, through the all of the revelry, the hootch, the dust and the gunfire Wymore survived to face another decade .. World War II.