Omaha people

“ NOW a city of 100,000 population, with prosperous suburbs that make it the business centre for 175,000 people, Omaha is the outgrowth of the Nebraska & Council Bluffs Ferry Company. This company was organized under the incorporation laws of Iowa, in 1853, to carry on the lucrative ferriage traffic for transcontinental pilgrims in quest of the gold-fields of California that had been begun two years previously by a halted gold-seeker, Brown by name, who saw more gold in paddling passengers across the murky Missouri than in washing the yellow sands near Sutter's mill. ”

“ They do not come often, but when they do, the land dies in a night. The green and fertile country shrivels and blackens before their breath, the cattle die, the fowls die, the things that creep and walk and fly die. The people—the people flee from the land or die upon it in pitiful collapse. Then it is that Omaha shrivels and withers too. Twice, twice within the memory of living man have come these devastating winds, and twice has Omaha suffered from their curse, and even now Omaha is but recovering her activity of the days before the plague, forgetful of a future that—well! ”

“ The people who settle here are mostly from the east, and are nearly all Americans; consequently we have an intelligent, well-ordered community. Omaha, the capital of Nebraska, is situated directly opposite, on the western bank of the Missouri, and in full view of this city. It now contains about four hundred inhabitants.
“A. B.”
[Pg 227]
The personal reminiscences of Mrs. Bloomer given above show very fully that, in removing to Council Bluffs, she did not give up any of her wonted zeal in behalf of those reforms to which so much of her life had been devoted. ”

“ The census of 1890 will place, in this territory, fifteen million of people, and in twenty years it will support forty million.
It is difficult, I doubt not, for you to comprehend the fact that the first time I crossed the Missouri River was on a raft, and at the point where stands the city of Omaha to-day. That night I slept in the teepee of an Omaha Indian.
When I crossed my party over to make the first explorations not one of us had any knowledge of Indians, of the Indian language, or of plains craft. The Indians surrounded our wagons, took what they wanted, and dubbed us squaws. ”

“ Three bridges cross the Missouri to Omaha, on the western shore, two for railways, one of them being the great steel bridge carrying over the Union Pacific, the pioneer railroad constructed to the Pacific Coast. Omaha is the chief city of Nebraska, the State receiving its name from the Nebraska river, meaning the "place of broad shallow waters." Omaha has over one hundred and fifty thousand people and is built on a wide plateau elevated about eighty feet above the river, from which it gradually slopes upward. ”

“ Like most other Western cities, Omaha grew so rapidly and was so preoccupied with business that its citizens, save for the group of the faithful who are to be found everywhere, left the matter of local government to the politicians. Bossism became intolerable, and with high hopes the people in 1912 adopted commission government; but the bosses, with their usual adaptability and resourcefulness, immediately captured the newly created offices. It is a fair consensus of local opinion that there has been little if any gain in economy or efficiency. ”

“ Omaha had already tapped the Colorado and Utah trade and travel, and has since mainly absorbed them, by the completion of the Union Pacific railroad. But Leavenworth still had a large trade and travel of her own, as a point of departure for New Mexico and the Plains, and seemed destined to maintain it. Only a decade or so before, she was without a house or inhabitant; but now she claimed thirty-thousand people, and was rapidly increasing. We found many handsome stores and elegant residences everywhere going up. ”

“ Some of their neighbors, the Ponca Indians, had been removed from their lands to the dreaded "hot country"—Indian Territory—and the Omaha people feared that the same thing might happen to them, for it was very easy for unprincipled white men to take advantage of the Indians who held their lands as a tribe, not as individuals. ”

“ The city to casual investigation seemed to be populated entirely by Germans, Poles, Slavs, Hungarians, Croats, Magyars, and all the scum of the Eastern European States, but it must have been laid out by Americans. No other people would cut the traffic of a main street with two streams of railway lines, each some eight or nine tracks wide, and cheerfully drive tram-cars across the metals. Every now and again they have horrible railway-crossing accidents at Omaha, but nobody seems to think of building an overhead-bridge. ”

“ The Omaha have two sacred trees, the ash and the cedar. The ash is connected with the beneficent natural powers. Part of the sacred pole of the Omaha and Ponka is made of ash, the other part being of cottonwood. The stems of the niniba weawan, or “sacred pipes of [Pg 391] friendship,” are made of ash. But the cedar is linked with the destructive agencies, thunder, lightning, wars. [43]
When the seven old men took the pipes around the Omaha tribal circle, the bad Manȼiñka-gaxe people wore plumes in their hair and wrapped branches of cedar around their heads, being awful to behold. ”

“ Leaving Omaha, the Overland Limited passes through South Omaha, third place in the United States in the packing of meat products. Just beyond may be noted to advantage the block safety system, in operation on the Overland Route all the way to San Francisco.
Fremont, well situated at the junction of the Platte and Elkhorn 10 valleys, is a prosperous and beautiful city of ten thousand people. The next stop is Columbus, a place of four thousand people, junction point of the Norfolk branch. ”

“ Crook, in Omaha, to arrest the Indians and returrn them to Indian Territory.
But the chief of the Omahas, Iron Eye, went to meet the Poncas and offered them a haven of refuge on the Omaha reservation.
“We have all the land Standing Bear and his people wish for; we have corn and meat in plenty; come life with us,” said Iron Eye. ”

“ He was authorized “to assure them of the interest and efforts of humane people all over the country in their behalf, and to notify them that the Omaha Committee were ready to assist them in any practical way to return to their old homes, from which they had been unjustly and inhumanly ejected.” ”

“ Two Crows and Joseph La Flèche never heard of the miʞa skă and mazanhe [Pg 416] among their own people; but they said that when the Omaha traveled, some used to take with them their respective “makan” or medicines, evidently their personal fetiches, for they used to say, “Our medicines are wise; they can talk like men, and they tell us how many horses we are to receive from the people to whom we are going.”
When the Omaha went against the Pawnee during the boyhood of the present Big Elk, one of the captains, named Gi‘anhabi, had a war club of the kind called “weaqȼade.” ”

“ It was one of the first to breathe of the mighty progress of civilization in our great West; and, like all of our growing Western cities, is eminently an industrial center—meat packing, breweries, smelters, machine shops, brick yards,—and it is an important railway center. Because of all of this, it continually beckons through its portals a vast number of the army of the seekers after work. Omaha, too, boasts of its culture and humanity, and of a social distinction around which cluster names which in the years to come will be intimately connected with the history of the country. ”

“ Here nature intended, in the development of the country, a great city. Where the next one will be in the South-west is not likely to be determined until the Indian Territory is open to settlement. To the north, Omaha, with reference to Nebraska and the West, possesses many similar advantages, and is likewise growing with great vigor and solidity. Its situation on a slope rising from the river is commanding and beautiful, and its splendid business houses, handsome private residences, and fine public schools give ample evidence of the intelligent enterprise that is directing its rapid growth. ”

“ These two enterprises, the cattle killing and packing and ore-reducing, together with large railway shops, constitute the chief industrial interests of Omaha, and, for the rest, the city depends upon the extensive farming and grazing country lying for five hundred miles between her and the Rocky Mountains. As they prosper, so does Omaha; as they are depressed, so is she. And only one thing, one catastrophe does Omaha fear, far beyond words to tell—the fierce, hot winds that every few years come blowing across Nebraska from the furnace of the Rocky Mountains’ alkali deserts. ”

“ So you can imagine us, surrounded by all convenient appliances, hard at work in our new quarters a good part of every day for this last month before election. We can certainly not complain that we are not made welcome to the best the city affords by these kind citizens of Omaha. Why, we even had a special engine and car given us by the accommodating manager of the Burlington & Missouri railroad to run one of our speakers from Omaha to Lincoln to enable her to attend a meeting which would otherwise have lacked a speaker. ”

“ I have not much to tell about Omaha, for I did not make any long stay in the place, being anxious to get on and finish my journey. It was now my fifth day in the train, having come a distance of 1912 miles from San Francisco; and I had still another twenty-four hours' travel before me to Chicago. There was nothing to detain me in Omaha. It is like all places suddenly made by railway, full of bustle and business, but by no means picturesque. How can it be? The city is only seventeen years old. Its principal buildings are manufactories, breweries, warehouses, and hotels. ”

“ Kountze, who had invited us to stay with her in her town house, but fearing that three of us might be embarrassing, we decided to go to the hotel.
Omaha is a lovely city, with avenues of trees on either side of wide boulevards, and within easy reach of stretches of wild and beautiful country. As our hostess had been obliged to go to New York, her kind relations conducted us to see the wonderful views surrounding the town.
After speaking in the afternoon to an encouraging audience, with Mr. Hall, the British Consul, as my chairman, I dined with Mr. and Mrs. Ward Burgess. ”

“ Omaha is built in part upon the low bottom lands which border the river, and which may at any time be menaced by the swollen and angry stream, unless precautions are taken, in the building of high and substantial stone levees along the river front. The town lies also in part upon the table lands beyond, and is extending to the bluffs which rise still further away. Its business is chiefly confined to the lower portion, where magnificent blocks attest the prosperity of the city. ”

“ We left Cheyenne on Friday morning at 10.30, and after a continuous run of 516 miles, we "stopped off" at Omaha for a few hours at 10.30 on Saturday morning. Omaha is a great rambling city of 60,000 inhabitants 198on the western bank of the Missouri. Council Bluffs is an equally flourishing city on the eastern bank.
My chief recollection of Omaha is the barber's shop whither I went to get shaved. I had tried to shave myself in the train, but had contrived instead to gash my cheek sufficiently to cause much bloodshed. ”

“ It is probable, therefore, that before many years have passed, big though Omaha may now be—and it already contains 20,000 inhabitants—the advantages of its position will tend greatly to swell its population, and perhaps to render it in course of time one of the biggest cities of the West. ”

“ We should most naturally expect that certain conceptions, certain cultural possessions, belong to a large body of Omaha. If, then, we find them in a certain society, it is most natural to assume that they have not been obtained by reason of membership therein, but that this society will reflect general Omaha ideas. This or that society may emphasize certain ideas, and may develop them along certain lines, but it certainly does not originate them. They have no relation of cause and effect to any particular society. ”

“ Lissa returned.
They noted the pretty villages along the shore, which had looked so near to them from the bluffs, before they crossed to the Nebraska side and found themselves in the flourishing city of Omaha. There was little to distinguish it from other cities in the East, except the regularity of its streets and the newer style of architecture which uniformly met their gaze. An hour later they were out upon the broad, balsam-scented prairie. ”

“ Omaha cannot claim you. There is Scotch blood in your veins, Maisrie—the oldest in the land; and you must see Dunfermline town, where the King sate 'drinking the blood-red wine'; and you must see Stirling Castle, and Edinburgh, and Holyrood, and Melrose Abbey. ”

“ We will not stop to tell you of the sufferings of widows and orphans on Omaha lands, while their husbands and fathers were traversing the burning plains of the South, to fight the battles of a country which had banished them from civilization, for they secured the land on which we dwell, from our nation's foe, exposed the gold of California, and turned the world upside down. ”

“ A bridge, the erection of which cost $1,500,000, spans the Missouri and connects Omaha with Council Bluffs.
I found Omaha not only fair to look upon, but also interesting in many ways. It is the key to the Rocky Mountains and the gold mines of California. Its wholesale trade amounts to about $15,000,000 annually and is constantly increasing. Its industries include smelting, brewing, distilling, brick making, machine and engine building and meat packing. The trade in the latter branch being only excelled by that of Chicago and Kansas City.
Its manufactures are constantly increasing. ”