History
Sorted by date Results 1 - 25 of 125
Special election in 1889 approved bond issue for construction of courthouse
Though not yet a town, Nelson was selected as the county seat of Nuckolls County by a vote of the people in October, 1872. Two other towns were in the running, Elkton and Vernon, both in Elk...
Pages rearranged for press testing
Before the COVID lockdown, this newspaper requested a visit from a webpress mechanic to perform maintenance on the 60 plus year old press used each week to print your newspaper. After the travel restrictions were lifted the mechanics had a long back...
New pastor for 3 Catholic parishes
The end of January saw changes for the three Catholic parishes in northern Nuckolls County and parts of Clay, Webster and Adams counties. Sacred Heart and St. Stephens, Lawrence, and Our Lady of the Assumption in Deweese. The change came about when...
Kansas Day – January 29th
Tuesday, Jan. 29, was Kansas Day. Kansas, having become a state on Jan. 29, 1861, was 162 years old. President Abraham Lincoln signed the law which made Kansas the 34th State in the Union. During all those years, Kansas has acquired many symbols....
Parcel didn't get better with age
Not everything improves with age and experience The Superior Express reported on Jan. 9, 1913, that “Parcel Post has made good.” The story continued as follows: “Great public service reforms usually require time for usage to oil the wheels of...
A vague memory of the Nuckolls County Poor Farm
They came from different places within Nuckolls County but they had things in common. Most were homeless, poor and often in declining health. Generally they were men, although an occasional woman was...
Sod and Stubble book comes to life in film
A nonfictional book, Sod and Stubble, written more than 90 years ago about a local family's pioneer history in Osborne County, Kansas, is being brought to life in a new film. The book was first...
An unconventional Christmas program in Oak
On the last Sunday before Christmas 1983, the members of Oak's First Community Church held a rather unconventional Christmas program. That was not unusual for the church under the leadership of...
Farmerʼs wife shot near Superior in December of 1933
Last week’s homicide was terrible but it not the first time a domestic dispute in the Superior area ended in a shooting and a sad Christmas season for those involved. The Superior Express reported on Dec. 21, 1933 that Mrs. T. B. Smith was...
1923 was an exciting year in Superior
It never changes, there always are folks who fail to recognize the good things happening in a community. That was the case in Superior in 1923 when the following store first appeard in The Express. We were surprised to read about all that was...
Gold found in Republican valley
Gold was found in the Republican River and in the Republican Valley from the Colorado Line along its flow through Nebraska. Tales from the old settlers claiming they had panned gold along the river years earlier had been taken with a grain of...
Reader wants to set the record straight
In the last issue we published a syndicated column distributed by the Prairie Doc organization which quoted President Teddy Roosevelt as having said Dec. 7, 1941, was a day that would live in infamy. Elsie Grummert made a special trip to the...
Life changed 82 years ago today
December 7, 2023, the publication date for this newspaper, marks the 82nd anniversary of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The Dec. 7 date was one that President Franklin Roosevelt said would live in infamy and it has. While there are few alive to...
The juryʼs finding was manslaughter
The two principals in this tale of early Jewell County, were homesteaders in Odessa Township. Their names are Patrick Carrigan and Benjamin F. Hall. Carrigan, an Irishman, was born somewhere in Ireland, perhaps Kilkenny, in about 1810. When he...
Veterans Day once Armistice Day is Saturday, Nov. 11
Memorial Day, Armed Forces Day and Veterans Day all have to do with honoring our military service personnel but they are not at all the same. The days celebrate those “who died wearing the uniform,” those “who are currently wearing the...
The mysterious Garley Post Office
“The first post office in the Jewell County was established here.” This fact was part of Mayor J. W. Berry’s speech at the Old Settlers gathering held in Jewell 1898. That first post office, according to the Sept. 9, 1910, Jewell County...
Local mansions still making stories
New history is being made in the mansions of Nuckolls and Thayer counties. Here in Nuckolls County the owners of the Lyon mansion near the western edge of Nelson have responded to the many requests...
Will honor last Civil War veteran Sunday
Area residents are invited to join with historians and descendants of Charles Watson, a Civil War veteran, at 2 p.m. Sunday in the eastern portion of Evergreen Cemetery for a special ceremony held in...
First white child born in JC, Jewel Bell
Jewell County was organized on July 14, 1870. Twenty- three days later, on Aug. 6, 1870, the first white child was born in the new county. The baby girl was appropriately named, Jewell Bell. Jewell Bell Thomas. She was born near White Rock, Kansas,...
Alumni group prepares memory book for Ruskin High School
Ruskin High School was forced to close in 1982 after enrollment dropped below the Nebraska minimum of 25 for three years in a row. However, a loyal group of Ruskin alumni have continued to hold a...
Jewell County has at least 58 named creeks
Jewell County has at least 58 named creeks. The 1884, 1908 and 1921 Jewell County Atlases were used to locate and identify named creeks. However, flowing water in Jewell County isn't confined to...
Superior City Jail was a busy place with 120 prisoners in 2 weeks
This issue of The Superior Express contains a public notice advising the City of Superior has scheduled a public hearing with regard to the possible closing of the jail . The current jail is located in the Public Safety Building. Is has seen little u...
John Deere A
The annual Jewell County Threshing Bee is upon us. One of the features of the event is a raffle to help fund activities. This year the prize is a 1947 John Deere AN model tractor. The John Deere A was a row crop tractor which was in head to head...
Janitor Fox and the Methodist Episcopal Church Bell
Linda Woerner, always one with a bit of Jewell history, tells of finding a news item about the Methodist Church Bell. Not the two-thousand-pound bell that exists today beside the Jewell Trinity Methodist Church, but its predecessor, a smaller,...
A site for the seat in Nuckolls County
One of the more interesting places to be listed on the National Register of Historic Places is the Nelson Cemetery "Walk" at Nelson. Although there are several places on the register in Nuckolls County, the bridge over a sort of gully on the edge of...