Omaha

Omaha was shocked when the wife of a Florence real estate man was brutally murdered in 1917. A suspect was soon in custody, but was he the right man?

The South Omaha butchers conceived the idea that it would be fun to stay away and play a practical joke on their Council Bluffs brethren, . . . They sent a defiant challenge to the Missouri Valley boys [near the picnic site at Loveland] to be on hand with all of their best fighters for South Omaha was coming up there to clean out all western Iowa.

In 1962 Nebraskans organized the largest mass vaccination campaign in the state’s history. An estimated 1 million Nebraskans drank polio vaccine at a series of “Sabin Oral Sunday” events that year.

Why is this young man all shook up? Elvis Presley performed at the University of Nebraska Coliseum on May 19, 1956, and at the Omaha Civic Auditorium the next day. This photo from the Omaha show appeared on the World-Herald's front page.

Ten percent of Nebraskans are Latino, part of a statewide community that is more than a century old. At first it was specifically a Mexican and Mexican-American community. The Spring 2019 issue of Nebraska History tells the story of the early decades.

What was it like to live as a hobo? And what did hobos experience in Nebraska?

Omaha police officer James MacDonald spent a decade with one leg literally in the grave.

Everything has a historical context, even the roads you drive on. Omaha's Military Avenue has a history that stretches back to the 1847 Mormon road to Utah.

When world famous stage actress Sarah Bernhardt came to Omaha in 1901, it was a big deal. Over 2000 people were overjoyed to watch her perform. But many couldn't understand a single word.

Historians long believed that in 1541, Francisco Vázquez de Coronado became the first European explorer to reach the Platte River in Nebraska. By the 1890s, historical and archeological evidence pointed toward central Kansas as Coronado’s farthest north, but the story lived on in popular culture.