What impresses one immediately about the development of Kearney Junction in 1872 is how quickly it came about. The town site was an open plain as the year began, at year's end a village of frame buildings stood starkly, evidence of the wave of settlement moving across south central Nebraska in the Seventies. Surprising, too, was the range and diversity of business establishments and professional men present in the raw settlement. Some of those who came were men of substance in their middle years with money to invest in the future of the new community, while others were younger and putting themselves at risk in an uncertain venture. Even more striking, as we look back, is the number of individuals who came in 1872 and remained to be long term residents of Kearney. In this article and a second to follow, I shall attempt to identify the businesses and businessmen which changed a plat on a piece of paper into a village, part dream and part reality.
Kearney Junction's first attorney arrived well before the town took shape. Francis G. Hamer read law and passed the bar in Indiana before coming to Lincoln, Nebraska shortly after his marriage. In Lincoln, Hamer formed a partnership with A. H. Connor in April, 1872. The two men had first met in Indianapolis, Indiana. Soon after the partners decided to cast their lot with the town to arise at the junction of the Burlington and Missouri and Union Pacific railroads. Hamer came first, probably in May, 1872 and set up his office in one corner of Dart's small store building. When Connor joined him in September, they must have found better accommodations for the firm.
Francis G. Hamer
First attorney in Kearney Junction
Banks
No certain date can be affixed to the appearance of the first bank. Usually the private bank of Luman R. More is credited as the first to open and it is possible this occurred in the fall of 1872. One source dates that event in September, 1872 but no bank is listed among the businesses cited in the first issue of the Kearney Junction Times, October 12, 1872. Another source says the More bank opened in January of 1873. In either case L. R. More, Banker operated out of the office of the More & Sunderland lumber yard just south of the depot on Wyoming (Central) avenue. A building to house a bank was built in November and December of 1872. Henry V. Hoagland put up the structure on the second lot from the north west corner of Tenth (21st) and Wyoming (Central). He then sold the lot and building to W. P. P. St. Clair of Schuyler January 2, 1873. The latter established the firm of W. P. P. St. Clair & Company's Banking House.
All sources agree that the first blacksmith shop was that of John Mahon, who, with his family, were the first occupants of a residence on the original town site. The blacksmith shop was operating in January, 1872. It is possible that Mahon was located on the north west corner of Eighth (19th) street and Nebraska avenue (A street), a block south of the Union Pacific track. Mrs. H. H. Achey later recalled that Mahon also had a stock of groceries. In 1873 he was operating a coal yard and his biographies say that he was agent for the Union Pacific and B & M town lots for two years.
Because of the proximity of their shops and that Mahon is not listed as a blacksmith in 1873, there is a strong possibility that Samuel C. Wenzell took over Mahon's shop. Wenzell and his family came from Mt. Ayr, Iowa to Kearney Junction in September of 1872 and purchased the lot next to Mahon's. Subsequently he will advertise his shop as the oldest established blacksmith shop in the city locating it as south of the track or south of the depot, either of which could apply to the Nebraska avenue site.
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From the amount of construction activity underway in the fall of 1872, there had to be quite a number of individuals in the building trades present. Many, of course, were transients or local people temporarily working at these jobs. The only person receiving special mention as a builder and carpenter was H. H. Achey, who had come out from Lincoln in September to erect two store buildings and remained to put up many houses. The first issue of the Kearney Junction Times identified a J. B. Randall as a plasterer. Alexander E. Aitken, who was to have a long business career in the city, came in September and spent his first few months in town building houses. C. R. Stimpson, who will have a saloon and billiard hall, wrote in a biographical sketch that he was a carpenter for his five years in town, then turned to farming. David Webbert, carpenter and contractor, arrived in July and immediately found work. A Civil War veteran, he had learned his trade in Ohio. Webbert will also take up a soldier's homestead just east of town. A painter's shop is listed among the local businesses in the first issue of the Times in October. Nothing more is known about it, although J. W. Lalone, proprietor of a paint and paper shop in 1889, claimed he had arrived seventeen years earlier. There may be no connection between the two items, however.
John (or James) T. Murphy's status is open to question. With his brother, he was proprietor of the Harrold House Hotel. He is also identified as Dr. Murphy, although he is never listed among the doctors in town, nor is he known to have practiced medicine. If he were a physician, he was the first in Kearney Junction. Dr. Edward S. Perkins, M.D., Physician and Surgeon was present and practicing in October and will still be present in 1873. Another doctor is known to have been present. Dr. Lathrop R. Charter from Doddridge County, West Virginia was witness to a land sale in mid-September, 1872 and later that month purchased four lots in the Perkins & Harford addition. His name does not appear in 1873, however. These men may make up three of the four doctors mentioned in the first issue of the Times. The fourth was probably Dr. F. W. Wilms, a homeopathic physician. We know that Wilms was buying town lots in September and that he may have been the "Co." in Nichols, Hoagland and Co., the firm building the Metropolitan Hotel on lots owned by Wilms. The doctor is certainly a resident the following year.
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Thomas S. Nightengale and Francis G. Keens were the proprietors of the first and, perhaps, the only drug store opened in 1872. Evidently neither man was a pharmacist, a not unusual circumstance when doctors usually compounded their own drugs. It is probable the two men met in Lincoln where Keens had been making a living as a painter for two years. H. H. Achey came out from Lincoln with lumber to build their store in September. Keens said he came to Kearney Junction in July and we know Nightengale was there when Achey arrived in September. It is possible they carried other goods than drugs as a part of the inventory of their store, but the first issue of the Times calls it a drug store. The store itself was presumably located on lot 19, block 57 of the Perkins & Harford addition, that is on Smith (24th) avenue a few doors from its intersection with Dakota (Second). An otherwise unsubstantiated reference locates a drug store to the east of Smith and Dakota.
With all the new homes springing up in Kearney Junction, it is somewhat surprising that only one furniture store was established, this by Norton H. Hemiup and Philip Allison. The store was included among those in town in the first issue of the Times. The location of the store is not given, but in March, 1873 it was situated between Wyoming and Nebraska avenues on Eleventh (22nd) street. Allison's origins and fate are not known. His connection with the furniture store until about February, 1873 and his frequent appearance as a witness for land sales by Perkins & Harford is all that is now known of him. Hemiup also appears in the land records in the same manner as Allison, but his will be a long term relationship with Perkins & Harford. Norton Hemiup came to Kearney Junction in August and immediately became involved in the real estate and investment business. He was also admitted to the bar in 1873.
It is not known if John Mahon indeed carried a small stock of groceries at his home and blacksmith shop or, if he did, that he did so before Franklin W. Dart built his store; nor can we give a date for the opening of Dart's store. We do know that he was thinking of it in January and that the fourteen by twenty frame building was open for business in May. It was located on Smith (24th) near Dakota (Second) and may have overlapped the boundaries of the original town site and School Section 36.
Edwin Williams of Lincoln will open a grocery store in Kearney Junction, probably in October. His was the second building H.H. Achey had contracted to erect. The store was on Smith avenue, probably the eighth lot from the north west corner of Smith and Dakota. Williams apparently returns to Lincoln in 1873 as reference to the store disappears and the lot and building is purchased by F. G. Hamer in May. A grocery with a difference appears to have opened in late October or early November. Peter W. Wilson and his son came from Mt. Ayr, Iowa with the Wenzells in September. The two Wilsons put up the store building themselves with rooms in the rear for the family. They had not quite completed the job when the rest of the family arrived in early November. The store was probably located on the third lot from the south west corner of Tenth (21st) and Wyoming. The difference was that from the beginning the Wilsons seem to have accepted day boarders.
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Only one store identified itself as a dry goods store in 1872, that of J. S. Chandler built in September or early October on the north west corner of 12th (23rd) and Colorado (lst Ave.). One may suspect that some dry goods were to be found in any of the grocery stores and certainly in Dart's general merchandise stock. Chandler apparently came to Kearney Junction from St. Joseph, Missouri, but remained only a few months. He will play a prominent role in the town while there. His store is mentioned in the first issue of the Times and was last advertised as having dry goods and groceries in the Central Nebraska Press in March of 1873. Chandler appears to have sold out to R. R. Greer.
The probable location of Reverend Lebbens B. Fifield's Walworth Hall, erected in the fall of 1872, was the south half of the 50' x 130' lot on the north east corner of Colorado and 12th. The Congregational Church, with Fifield its pastor, held its meetings there, but it was also used for general purposes. In November of 1872 Thanksgiving services for the town were held in the hall. In January, 1873 Fifield offered it as a meeting place for the town council, but lost out.
Vandon B. Clark will live twenty years in Kearney, but his background prior to 1872 is unknown. What evidence we have indicates he had started his store building in August and that it was far enough along that the first "public divine service" in Kearney Junction was held there that month. Another source has the Presbyterians using Clark's unheated, unfurnished, but operating store late in the fall. The store was cited in the first issue of the Times. The Clarks are credited with another first as well, the first child born in Kearney Junction, Frank Kearney Clark in October. The Clark hardware store was probably located on the south west corner of Smith and Dakota.
Wallace A. Downing and his wife Susan came to Kearney Junction in 1872 from Wisconsin, seemingly to find a better climate. They purchased the fifth lot from the north west corner of Wyoming and 10th and there Downing opened the harness and saddlery shop he would operate until 1910.
Proofread 2-8-2004
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Edited 3/10/2003/2:45 p.m.
