Last August, 2024, more than 150 descendants of fourteen Pennsylvania Dutch families gathered for a three-day picnic in Dawson, Nebraska. The event marked 150 years since the first of those families settled in Dawson, a town in Richardson County in Nebraska’s southeast corner.
Henry Heim House. Photo by Dan Pleiss
Jacob G. Heim had looked in vain for land in Pennsylvania where his growing family could live, prosper, and raise their families. He came to see the West as a land of opportunity. Arriving at Dawson with his wife and eight children on July 3, 1874, he bought land just north of the fledgling town and commenced farming. Unfortunately the Heims arrived just in time to experience the hordes of grasshoppers that stripped the fields of all vegetation! Undaunted, Heim was instrumental in bringing thirteen more families to the Dawson area in the next decade-and-a-half. Families with names such as Heim, Ulmer, Wuster, Wagner, Kerr, Eckard, Stoltz, Burr, and Sippley settled on farms north of town and became known as the Pennsylvania Colony in Nebraska.
Penn Colony Chapel. Photo by Shirley Heim
United by ties of blood and Christian faith, they established a Protestant church and worked together with friends and neighbors, some of whom had arrived nearly two decades earlier, in establishing a school system and other civic projects. This vibrant community flourished well into the next century.
Like many small towns, over the years Dawson has suffered economic decline and loss of population. The Penn Colony has also diminished as later generations have scattered to almost every state in the Union. The 150 people who attended the recent celebration came from twenty states and one foreign country. Only ten reside in Richardson County.
The Dining Room of the Henry Heim House. Photo by Kerry Dowdell
However, a strong desire to preserve a rich heritage that dates back to the forests of southwest Germany has led to the formation of the Pennsylvania Colony Historical Society. It binds the distant families together through the publication of a newsletter, The Colony Penn, reaching out to nearly 400 addresses twice a year. The Society has restored an original family house at the edge of Dawson and built two large museum buildings to house historical items, and a chapel featuring stained glass windows, the church bell, pews, and items taken from the local church building when it closed a few years ago. Annual colony picnics and various community events have ample facilities for meetings. Next August, 2025, summer ‘picnic will be the 104th such event. A tract of native prairie grass and flowers has also been established on the grounds.
Visitors are welcome. The museum, located just off Hwy 75 north of Dawson, is open to the public on request. Telephone 402-855-2544. You can find the Pennsylvania Colony Historical Society of Nebraska website here.
– Keith M. Heim, Pennsylvania Colony Historical Society of Nebraska Newsletter Editor, December 2024
