Garden County Nebraska

GardenCoNe.com

Oshkosh, Lewellen, Lisco

Most history documents about Garden County begin with the cattlemen who settled the area, but Garden County was home to others before that. The museum at Ash Hollow State Park contains remains of prehistoric animals, and the Indian settlements in the area. The Cheyenne, Comanche, Arapaho, Arikara, Appache, Omaha, Pawnee, and many more lived in and traversed the area before the cowboys ever thought of herding cattle here.

1682 French explorer Robert Cavelier de La Salle claimed "Louisiana for Louis XIV

1714 French Governor-General sent Etienne Veniard de Bourgmont to explore the Missouri River. He returned with an excellent map of the river from what is now central South Dakota to the Mississippi River.

Hunters and trappers found the buffalo of the plains and the wildlife along the North Platte River, Blue Creek, Lost Creek, the many lakes in what is now Crescent Lake National Wildlife Refuge a bounty for harvest in the early 1800's.

1804 Lewis & Clark Expedition began

1812 Oregon Trail originated along the Platte River by Robert Stuart and a group of fur traders from Astoria, Washington southeast near the South Pass of the Rocky Mountains

1830 Several Plains Indian Nations ceded their claims to western Iowa at the Treaty of Prarie du Chein First permanent ferry across the Missouri River north of the Kansas City area was established between Bellevue, Nebraska and the Point-aux-poules.

1834 Federal government declared Nebraska Indian country

1836 U S Government made the Platte Purchase which provided access to the area northward to Iowa to be reached by river. Prior access to western Iowa was overland from earlier settlements in Missouri. Marcus Whiteman and his new wife, Narcissa, along with Henry and Eliza Spalding, headed for Oregon as missionaries. The letters they sent home publicized the opportunities and advantages of Oregon.

1837-1841 Economic depressions frustrated farmers and businessmen; collapse of the international fur trade in 1839 intensified the hard times. At the same time, eastern churches saw the American Indians of the Oregon Country as ready candidates for European ideas of civilizations.

1840 Only three states (Louisiana, Missouri and Arkansas) existed west of the Mississippi River; Maine's boundary with Canada was undefined; the western boundaries of the nation lay roughly along the Continental Divide.

1841 Many people for many reasons had become interested in Oregon and the first group with serious intent to emigrate left the banks of the Missouri River at Independence Landing and headed west. In 1843, nearly 1,000 completed the trip an omen of the multitudes to

1846 Start of the Mormon Trail -- Mormons arrived at the Missouri River (Kanesville/Council Bluffs) and established numerous settlements while preparing for their journey to Utah.

29 Dec 1846 Iowa became first state created from the Louisiana Purchase here slavery was illegal. From 1805 thru 1838 Iowa was a part of the territories of Louisiana, Missouri, Michigan and Wisconsin.

1848 Fort Kearny, the "first military station on the route to Oregon", was built along the Platte River near the Grand Isle (Nebraska Territory) Discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill started the California Gold Rush. The emigrants sufferings from 'gold fever' boomed overnight. Some of the '49ers' traveled by sea, either around the tip of South America or across the Panama isthmus but many of theme headed west by wagon following the Oregon Trail as far as they could. Most of them bought their supplies in 'Jump Off' town along the Missouri River, like Leavenworth or Saint Francis. The California Trail followed the Platte River west through Nebraska but split off from the Oregon Trail either at Fort Bridger in southwestern Wyoming or near Soda Springs in Idaho.

1852 Beginning this year more overland traffic would cross the Missouri River at Kanesville/Council Bluffs that any other "jump-off" point. Emigration was so heavy this year there was often a six-week wait at the ferry crossings.

Willard P. Hall, of Missouri, on December 13, 1852, offered a bill in the House of Representatives organizing the Territory of "Platte," which included in its area what is now a greater portion of this State. The bill did not pass.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act was an Act of Congress in 1854 organizing the remaining territory within the Louisiana Purchase for settlement before its admission to the Union

The act divided the region into the Kansas Territory (south of the 40th parallel) and the Nebraska Territory (north of the 40th parallel). The most controversial provision was the stipulation that each territory would separately decide whether to allow slavery within its borders.

The Nebraska Territory was a historic, organized territory of the United States from May 30, 1854 until March 1, 1867 when Nebraska became the 37th U.S. state. It was established by the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854.

1854 The Kansas-Nebraska Act created two new territories west of the Missouri River and reopened the slavery controversy between the North and South A dispute between the US Army and the Sioux over the killing of a half-dead cow touched off the Plains Indian Wars. It cost a nickel for each head of sheep to cross the Missouri at the Bethlehem Ferry, south of Council Bluffs.

The Battle of Blue Water in 1855

1856 Mormon Handcart Trail from the railhead at Iowa City to Utah crossed the Missouri River between Council Bluffs and Florence, Nebraska.

1857 A nation-wide financial "Panic" drove several local "wild-cat" banks out of business and real estate/railroad speculators into bankruptcy. With no money in circulation most people had to barter for food and goods.

1859 Abraham Lincoln, Illinois lawyer and potential presidential candidate, visited Council Bluffs where he talked to railroad surveyor Grenville Dodge. Three years later Lincoln selected Council Bluffs as the eastern terminus for the transcontinental railroad.

1860-1861 Pony Express crossed from St Joseph, MO to Sacramento, CA

As a result, in the early 1860s, at the time of the Pony Express, the territory resembled present-day Nebraska but with the panhandle extended westward across southern Wyoming to the present-day Utah-Wyoming border (including Cheyenne and Laramie, and the route of the transcontinetal railroad then under construction).

In 1861 The newly-organized Dakota Territory took everything north of the 43rd parallel west of the Missouri (the present-day Nebraska-South Dakota border).

1861-1865 Civil War divided the area

The Indian Wars 1866-1890

1863 In August, President Lincoln appointed Newton Edmunds as Governor of Dakota Territory.

In 1863 and 1864, two Indian campaigns disturbed settlements

The portion of the territory in present-day Wyoming became part of the Idaho Territory upon the 1867 admission Nebraska to the Union within in present borders.

1867 Emigrant route of about 2,000 miles crossed Nebraska from Council Bluffs, Iowa and Independence, Missouri to Oregon and California Union Pacific was first railroad in Nebraska

1 Mar 1867 Nebraska Statehood - 37th State. In 1834, the Federal government declared Nebraska Indian country; 20 May 1854 became a Territory of the United states (previously a part of Territory of Indiana, Louisiana and Missouri and in 1862 identified as Free Homestead. http://www.ukans.edu/carrie/kancoll/andreas_ne/territory/territory-pl.html http://www.ukans.edu/carrie/kancoll/andreas_ne/hon_tabl.htm

The Oregon Trail was used from as early as 1836, but the "waves" began in 1843. Mormon's with their handcart, beginning in 1846, followed closely to the same route through Nebraska. The California Gold Rush, in 1849, increased traffic. All left their traces and tracks here before towns and settlements were even considered. Relief from hot dusty trails was met with a refreshing drink from the sparkling, clean, North Platte River and shade from the trees at Ash Hollow before continuing along the river to points west. Tears and graves dotted the trails. The Trails were heavily traveled until 1869, when the Trans-Continental Railroad was completed.

The south table was the first part of the county to receive much attention, the settlers working north from the main line of the Union Pacific railroad.

The earliest settlers had few neigbors, hostile and friendly Indians, few options for supplies, .....Cattlemen formed settlements at Lewellen and Oshkosh in 1885, Lisco in 1909, the communities of Racket and Kowanda....Antelope Valley, etc.

The Union Pacific Railroad arrived in Oshkosh in 1908.