Kearney Stock Yards
A Request for Information
Answered a request for info on UP depot 1890
Found this item:
July 2, 1890 - [City Council meeting]
The matter of vacating First ave. for the new depot came up next.
[Discussion, motion, and proposed amendments followed. One to require the
depot be finished by Dec. 1, 1890 passed. The ordinance for vacating the
street passed.]
Johnson moved that the council on bended knee implore the U. P. to move its
stock yard.
A stock yards in Kearney??? Where??
Back to the beginning of the story
–
Why would there be a stock yards in Kearney?
Railroad construction
UP & B&MR both land grant railroads
US owned all the land west of the Missouri so they could give
alternating sections in 20-mile path with exception of military reservations
Those living there were squatters
Nutter hurried to GI to file on his
land when homesteaders started moving in
Railroads Finances
Raised money for construction from 2
sources
1. Sell land to settlers – encouraged
homesteaders
2. Sell Bonds
Financed operations by moving freight
3. Transport settlers’ crops and
livestock to eastern markets
Placed depots – include grain elevators and stock yards to
hold farm produce for shipment
Area Stock yards –
Others Mentioned in Buffalo County
Up the Kearney &Black Hills RR – Glenwood, Riverdale,
Amherst, Miller
On the Union Pacific –Shelton (sheep), Gibbon, Optic, Buda,
Odessa, Elm Creek
Others mentioned - Pool Siding, Grand Island, Darr
[No cattle trucks]
Kearney Stock Yards
Two or one? –
Union Pacific Stock yards
Burlington Stock yards
Referred to separately at first, then together
Maybe one combined or two side by
side??
Complaints about the Stock Yards
From as early as 1885 on
Lots of complaints to city council – every spring and summer
Action might be started, cold weather came, smell
disappeared, complaints stopped,
Action dropped to be started all over again the next spring
Moving the Stock Yards
Lot of talk of moving in Jan. 1890, mid-Boom Period.
(Jan 24, 1890)
A group of Kearney bankers went to Omaha
for a Bankers’ State association meeting
They went to the U. P. headquarters and, among other things,
stated that the stock yards were a nuisance and should be moved.
The UP agreed to do that.
Later the same request was made of the Burlington railroad
(Feb. 1890)
UP said a move was unreasonable,
both railroad companies promised to clean up their yards and keep them that
way.
1890s
Over the next 10 years bridge gangs for both companies would
periodically be in Kearney for a few days to make repairs at the stock
yards.
1900 – Definite plans to move
October
--The U. P. stock yards will undergo some
changes and improvements and will be moved to another location.
--The Union Pacific stock yards will be moved east of the freight depot.
Surveyors have mapped out the land for the stock yards. The yards will
be moved east of the freight depot and will be one of the largest this
side of Omaha.
November
--A petition asking the city council to
prohibit the Union Pacific railroad moving its stock yards east of the
U. P. passenger depot is being circulated by east side citizens.
Clues about New Location
(June 6, 1905)
[at City Council meeting] Mr. Shaw from the First Ward [southeast Kearney]
complained of a hole east of the U. P. stock yards, which has become a
nuisance. [The street &sidewalk committee were delegated to deal with both
railroads] “and instruct them that they must have their stock yards drained
and that they must clean no more stock yards in the city without hauling the
cleanings outside the city limits.”
(July 22, 1905)
Wood Olinger Injured
Wood Olinger suffered a rather severe and painful accident at the Burlington
stock yards Saturday morning. [He entered a shed and hit his head on the end
of a 2x4 giving himself a gash which bled profusely.] …and after the injured
man had been brought to town in an automobile, Dr. Basten took five stitches
in the cut.
(Dec. 5, 1905)
[At city council meeting they spent most of their time discussing the water
sanitation conditions] in the southeastern part of the city, [where there
was fear of a typhoid epidemic. One council member attributed a case of
typhoid to water contaminated by the Burlington stock yards and their lack
of drainage.]
(April 1908)
[A for rent ad ran during the month for potato land “near the stock yard;
east part of town.”]
Bums were a problem at the stock
yards
(July 1898)
[A gang of bums at the B & M stock yards made
a fire from a bunch of materials there, then drained the water tank putting
out the fire.]
(July 1904)
[A case of beer was stolen from the Storz
Brewing company beer vault.
The empty case was found near “the old stock yards in the western part of
the city.”
The Dawson Co. sheriff in Lexington called the Kearney Chief of Police to
see if any beer had been stolen.
He said 5 bums had been in town and who said “they had drank a case of beer,
just before leaving Kearney.”
When told there had, the Lex. Sheriff took the train for North Platte hoping
to find them and return them to Kearney to be charged with burglary.]
(July 1904)
A Bad Gang of Bums
A motley gang of bums and drunks was picked up by the police at the stock
yards. Complaint had been sent in, that a tough crowd was making its
headquarters there, so the officers went down with a dray and rounded the
fellows up. There were a half dozen of them and they were a
fierce looking outfit. All were drunk and dirty and two of them had
but one leg each. They were locked up until Saturday morning when they
were drilled out of town
Source: Kearney Daily Hub, June
1889 through April 1908 |