Summer

During the Great Depression Nebraskans became accustomed to living under trying conditions. People had to cope not only with hard economic times but with the intense heat accompanied by a drought that plagued this state and much of the rest of the country.

Who wants ice cream? Photographer John Nelson of Ericson, Nebraska captured this little sweetie taking a turn cranking the handle of an ice cream maker in about 1910.

Location: Camp Norwesca Rd, Nebraska National Forest, Chadron, Dawes County, Nebraska; 42.708256, -103.0085.

Are you enjoying your summer as much as the boys in this photograph?

By David L. Bristow, Editor

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It's Memorial Day weekend and the official start of the summer season at the Nebraska State Historical Society's numerous state historic sites. So, pack up the car and hit the trail!

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Children on the ocean wave, an amusement ride in Jenner’s Park, in 1920. RG2543-4-11

From about 1900 to the early 1940s Jenner’s Zoological, Educational and Amusement Park in Loup City was a place for central Nebraska to gather, play, and learn. Brothers Henry and Robert Jenner, the founders of what was usually referred to as Jenner’s Park, were natives of England.

Readers of the Kearney Daily Hub on August 16, 1930, must have been startled to read that during the hot summer days, there was “Plenty of Beer to be Had in Kearney and Many Imbibe It.” State and federal prohibition then in effect should have made the claim unlikely. Yet a reporter for the Hub insisted: Advertisement from the Kearney Daily Hub of June 10, 1931 (below).

Chautauqua grounds near Big Blue River at Crete, ca. 1885. NSHS RG2491.PH2-91