Saline and Gage Counties, Nebraska. 50,000 Acres of Land For Sale…[recto] Map of Saline County, Neb. And Other Parts of Lancaster & Gage Counties…[verso]

An apparently unrecorded broadsheet advertising the sale of “good lands on Most Favorable Terms” in Saline and Gage Counties, Nebraska, with a map showing the available plots.

Text on the recto of the broadsheet describes Saline County’s “natural physical features,” “climate and rainfall as factors in crop-growing,” “population and material wealth,” and much else besides. The advantages touted here include extensive arable land, easy access to water, the growing population and economy, and the thriving flour mills and cheese factories. Saline county’s prosperity “in the middle of Southeastern Nebraska” is said to be “from the ground,” as its local “industry begins on the farm” and soil is therefore “the foundation of wealth.” In addition, lands in Gage County near Big Blue are advertised. Like Saline County, Gage also has a growing population and economy and has a thriving sheep-farming industry, with nearly “16,000 sheep in the county,” many of which are displayed at annual sheep-shearing festivals. In addition to the text, on the recto there is also an engraved view “looking down the Big Blue (west side) from Crete, Neb.” This shows a train on the Burlington & Missouri Rail Road passing through a landscape of rolling prairies, farms, and woods.

The checkerboard plat map on the verso shows southeastern Nebraska from DeWitt to Friend, and identifies lands currently available from the Burlington & Missouri Railroad, distinguishing them from lands sold and lands owned by the Government. Many of the sold lands are to be found east of the Big Blue River and run along its tributaries, bordering the North Fork Turkey Creek and Swan Creek. The available lands are predominantly found in between the creeks and along the West Blue River. Amid these lots are two railroads, the Omaha & Southwestern Railroad, which travels parallel to DeWitt and heads north towards the Burlington & Missouri Rail Road, which passes through Crete and continues west across the state.

The Burlington & Missouri River Railroad was founded in Burlington, Iowa in 1852 to construct a railroad across the state. In November of 1859 the Iowa section of the railroad was completed when it reached the Missouri River. A branch of the railroad was incorporated in Nebraska in 1869, and construction from Plattsmouth to Lincoln began in July of 1870. Congress granted the Railroad alternating sections (mile-square parcels) extending twenty miles north and south of the route, which the Railroad was then responsible for selling to settlers and investors. This was in keeping with the Federal strategy of providing western railroads with massive land grants, the sale of which funded construction and operations while engaging the railroads as the government’s de facto agents in encouraging western settlement. The railroad connected with the Union Pacific in 1872 and a vigorous advertising campaign was begun the same year.

The Omaha & Southwestern Rail Road was established in 1869. Its main line extended from Omaha to Cedar Island and from Crete to Beatrice. This railroad emerged out of a “combination of two railroad promotions; the Omaha, Lincoln and Fort Riley Railroad and the Bellevue, Ashland and Lincoln Railroad, the former promoted by Omaha men and the latter by Henry T. Clarke of Bellevue” (Burleigh). By the time this broadsheet was issued, the O & S.W. railroad lines would have been owned and operated by the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad for nearly a decade. 

REFERENCES: Burleigh, B.R. “The Burlington First Main Line,” Nebraska History, Vol. 18 (1937), p. 16; “Burlington and Missouri River Railroad. Railroad Structures” and “The Burlington and Missouri River Railroad” at Nebraska Historical Society online.