Celebrating Labor Day in 1890, The Butchers’ Picnic
Labor Day in 1890 was celebrated on Monday, September 1, although some events associated with the day were celebrated several days before. One-a butchers' picnic held at ...
John Nelson
What We Found
Timeline Tuesday: April Fools in Omaha in 1886
One Omaha barber was the victim of an elaborate April Fool's prank in 1886. John Nelson's photograph depicts a barber shaving a customer with a straight razor during an ...
Timeline Tuesday: Human Nature at the Marriage License Bureau
"No other department in the court house offers such an excellent field for the study of human nature as the marriage license bureau," wrote an observant Omaha Daily Bee ...
Beating the Heat in 1906
John Nelson’s photograph of two couples seated in front of their tents was taken sometime between 1907 and 1917.
NSHS RG3542-98-4
In the days before air conditioning, ...
Free Auto Camps
John Nelson’s photograph depicted a homemade auto camper (left). NSHS RG3542-124-01
Long distance travel in the early days of the automobile was difficult, and ...
Pests on the Plains: The Potato Bug
Solomon D. Butcher’s photograph from about 1905 depicted boys working in a sweet potato field at the State Industrial School in Kearney. NSHS RG2608-749 (at ...
Will Pigs Help Win the War?
After the United States entered World War I in April of 1917, President Woodrow Wilson appointed Herbert Hoover head of the U.S. Food Administration. Hoover believed ...
Omaha Bankers Asked: Does Money Spread the Flu?
Interior of a bank by photographer John Nelson
Nebraska’s last great epidemic was the 1918 Flu epidemic, but the earlier flu pandemic of 1889-90 also affected the ...
John Nelson Collection
John Nelson was born in Harestad, Sweden, in 1864. He came to Wheeler County with his parents at the age of seventeen. From there he traveled to the gold fields of ...
Ice Cream with the Nelsons
The Nelson family of Ericson, Nebraska enjoy dishes of ice cream in about 1910. This photograph is part of the John Nelson Collection.
John Nelson was born in ...
Too Much Beef, a complaint about football
The football schedules of early Nebraska teams sometimes matched or mismatched-high school and college teams and paired both with teams organized by other groups such ...
Flashback Friday: A Surprising Foot Race
Foot racing was a popular sport in 1890s Nebraska. Sometimes things could get a little shady, like when a local favorite beat a supposedly famous competitor and walked ...
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