Going through old photo albums recently. Here is another fun short article about the Fairview Store.
For more history, visit www.diggingdeeper.net/history
Fairview Grocery & Cafe
Lost Native American Map
Is this map in our History Books?
The following group believes that it has been left out, but we first noticed that our very own Lakota Sioux aren’t even listed in South Dakota. Maybe this map is not accurate enough to include in the books.
Take a look at this map and tell us what you think.
From Native American History & Culture
By the age of 10, most children in the United States have been taught all 50 states that make up the country. But centuries ago, the land that is now the United States was a very different place. Over 20 million Native Americans dispersed across over 1,000 distinct tribes, bands, and ethnic groups populated the territory.…
April 25; Horseracing History Comes Alive
(SCOTTSBLUFF, Neb.) — Nebraska is a history-rich state and not shy of great storytellers. Minatare High School standout Jody (Price) Lamp has become one of those valuable historians, preserving western culture through documentary film-making with her partner Melanie Dobson.
The two of them will join Author Jennifer S. Kelly on tour in Scottsbluff and Crawford on April 25th, 2024.
From Northwest Nebraska
For the 150th anniversary of the Kentucky Derby, national horse racing historian and author Jennifer S. Kelly and “Born to Rein” documentary film co-producers Jody L. Lamp and Melody Dobson will tour Nebraska, highlighting the state’s historical links to the thoroughbred horse racing industry as part of a Humanities Nebraska program. The tour will include a stop at Fort Robinson State Park.
Kelly’s first book, “Sir Barton and the Making of the Triple Crown,” focused on America’s First Triple Crown Winner, Sir Barton, who served as an U.S. Army Remount stallion at Fort Robinson after retiring from racing. Lamp and Dobson’s “Born to Rein” tracks Nebraska’s Hall of Fame horsemen and Sir Barton.
Event is free, but a Park Entry Permit is required.
Women’s History Month
Did You Know?
Women’s History Month started as Women’s History Week . . .
Click here for the full article from the Women’s History website.
Women’s History Month began as a local celebration in Santa Rosa, California. The Education Task Force of the Sonoma County (California) Commission on the Status of Women planned and executed a “Women’s History Week” celebration in 1978. The organizers selected the week of March 8 to correspond with International Women’s Day. The movement spread across the country as other communities initiated their own Women’s History Week celebrations the following year.
In 1980, a consortium of women’s groups and historians—led by the National Women’s History Project (now the National Women’s History Alliance)—successfully lobbied for national recognition.
In February 1980, President Jimmy Carter issued the first Presidential Proclamation declaring the Week of March 8th 1980 as National Women’s History Week.
Join us in celebrating Women’s accomplishments everywhere, this month and every month!
Why March is National Women’s History Month
As recently as the 1970s, women’s history was virtually an unknown topic in the K-12 curriculum or in general public consciousness. To address this situation, the Education Task Force of the Sonoma County (California) Commission on the Status of Women initiated a “Women’s History Week” celebration for 1978.
Old Banner County Newspapers
Preserving True History
True history is oftentimes best preserved through the printed word. We are grateful to learn that the Banner County Museum has recently announced the completion of an enormous task toward that goal.
From Banner County Museum
DIGITIZED NEWSPAPERS
Banner County Museum now has digitized all of the old newspapers that were on the microfiche. These include: the Banner County News, The Journal, The Star of Empire, Ashford Advocate, the Daily Bumble Bee and many others. There are even 16 pages of Katholisches Wochenblatt Und Der Landmann for anyone who can translate. You can view all of these records here. You can search several different ways-names, dates, papers, and words. We are sorry that some of the images are hard to read.
Thank a Mail Carrier Day
By Scotts Bluff National Monument
This #NationalThankAMailCarrierDay we thought we would thank the original mail carriers in the Scotts Bluff area: the Pony Express Riders!
For its short, 18-month long existence (April 3, 1860, to October 26, 1861), Pony Express Riders would pass through Mitchell Pass in what is now Scotts Bluff National Monument.
It took the relay of riders about 10 days to deliver messages from St. Joseph, MO to Sacramento, CA.
When the transcontinental telegraph was completed on October 24, 1861, messages could be sent nearly instantaneously, thus rendering the Pony Express obsolete.
#MidwestNPS #PonyExpress
📸 National Parks Service
America’s First EMTs
Celebrating Black History Month: Breaking Barriers in Healthcare
By NREMT
This Black History Month, let’s shine a spotlight on the remarkable story of the first paramedics, whose courage and resilience transformed the landscape of emergency medical services.
Check out this inspiring article by TIME, highlighting the incredible journey of these trailblazing Black men who paved the way for diversity in emergency medical services.
Read the full article here: https://brnw.ch/21wGECD
The First Speeding Ticket
On January 28, 1896, the first speeding ticket was issued in East Peckham, England.
Walter Arnold owed one shilling plus court costs for speeding through the village in an Arnold Benz Motor Carriage.
He was stopped by a policeman on a bicycle. Arnold’s reckless speed was 8 miles per hour, a whopping 6 miles over the speed limit.
Exactly 42 years later, the World Land Speed Record on a public road would be broken by Rudolph Caracciola, driving his Mercedes-Benz 268.9 mes per hour.
Monumental Namesake
By Scotts Bluff National Monument
“Hey, Mister Scott, what ‘cha gotta do? What ‘cha gotta do to have a bluff named for you?”
Hiram Scott was a fur trader and, later, a Rocky Mountain Fur Company clerk.
In 1828, on the return trip to St. Louis from that year’s fur trading rendezvous at Bear Lake, Hiram was unable to travel under his own power. Some say he was injured in an attack; others say he was sick. Either way, he became such a burden to those he was traveling with that he was abandoned somewhere along the North Platte River near a group of prominent bluffs.
The following year, as his former companions made their way west to the 1829 rendezvous, they found Hiram’s skeleton at the base of the bluffs on the North Platte.
In his honor, they renamed those bluffs “Scott’s Bluffs.” No word on whether a wife or any tots survived Mister Scott.
From NPS
THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF HIRAM SCOTT
One of the most commonly asked questions posed by visitors to Scotts Bluff National Monument is, “How did the bluff get its name?”
The answer to that question is shrouded in mystery and has intrigued travelers through the North Platte River Valley for almost two centuries.
WHO WAS HE?
Hiram Scott was born about 1805 in St. Charles County, Missouri, and was an employee of William Ashley’s Rocky Mountain Fur Company. He is described as unusually tall and muscular. In 1826, Hiram Scott is believed to have taken part in the first fur trader rendezvous held near the Great Salt Lake, and it has been assumed that he attended those held in 1827 and 1828.
We do know that there was a man by the name of Hiram Scott who was employed by the American Fur Company. His name appears on the pay lists of that company in 1827, where he is listed as a clerk. We also know that his name does not appear in any of the company’s papers after 1828.
Beyond this – little else is known with any certainty. In the early days of the fur trade, it was the practice of the various fur companies to send trappers into the Far West to gather pelts which would then be brought back to St. Louis and sold to eastern buyers.
THE FUR TRADE
Beaver furs were especially popular for making men’s hats and collars for fancy coats. Muskrat, rabbit, and otter pelts were also marketable, but it was the beaver’s fur which brought top dollar. It was the seemingly endless supply of beaver pelts which drew young men such as Hiram Scott out into the frontier. As the business evolved, the fur companies realized that rather than send trappers out to catch and skin the beavers, it would be more efficient to obtain the pelts from the various Native American tribes in the West.
In exchange for the furs, the companies would offer manufactured items such as pots and pans, bolts of cloth, knives, axes, and firearms.
Each spring caravans of traders ventured into the frontier loaded with trade goods. They would meet with the tribesmen and independent fur trappers at pre-arranged sites to conduct their business. Each of these annual events came to be known as a fur trading “rendezvous.”
Clerks such as Hiram Scott were necessary to keep track of the many transactions which were made at a rendezvous. Many different accounts had to be maintained, payrolls met and accurate inventories of the trade goods had to be kept. The responsibilities of a fur company clerk would have required a reliable, well-organized, and above all – a literate person.
It is believed that Hiram Scott was returning to St. Louis from the 1828 rendezvous when he died near the bluff which now bears his name. Unfortunately, the details surrounding his death have been lost to history.
SCOTT’S DEATH
The basic story of Scott’s death was first recorded by Warren A. Ferris, who traveled through the area in 1830. He related that during Scott’s eastward journey, Scott had contracted a severe illness. Two comrades placed him in a boat and attempted to transport him downstream. However, for some unknown reason, the two men abandoned Scott on the north bank of the Platte River. The next spring, Scott’s skeleton was found on the other side of the river, implying that he had somehow managed to cross to the opposite bank before he died.
A subtle variation on this story was recorded two years later by Washington Irving. Instead of being abandoned by just two men, the ailing Scott was supposedly left behind at the Laramie Fork by a larger party who feared for their lives due to starvation. The next summer, Scott’s bones were found near the bluffs – 60 miles from where he had been left to die.
In 1834, missionary Jason Lee recorded a story about Hirman Scott that was very similar to those earlier versions, except that the pathetic Scott had traversed 100 miles before dying near the bluffs on the North Platte River.
THE STORY GROWS
The story of what happened near Scott’s Bluffs was told and retold. With each telling the story took on new perspectives. Some stories included dramatic attacks by Indian warriors while other suggest murder and foul play. Some stories include the noble theme of the doomed Scott insisting that his comrades leave him behind so they might save themselves from his fate.
There has been some speculation that Hiram Scott was actually injured in an encounter with some Blackfeet Indians that took place at the 1828 rendezvous at Bear Lake, Utah. This has been used to explain why Scott became incapacitated on his journey back east, but as with most of the information about Hiram Scott, very little is known for certain.
SCOTT’S BLUFFS
Almost immediately after his death, the bluffs along the North Platte River came to be known as Scott’s Bluffs. In 1830, the first wagons made the overland trip on the same route used by early fur traders like Hiram Scott, and the bluffs that bear his name served as a landmark for people making their way west.
The fur trade continued for a decade after Hiram Scott’s death in 1828, but by 1840, the beaver had been trapped out and fashions changed. When men began wearing hats made of silk instead of beaver fur, the value of furs dropped. Twenty years later a demand for buffalo hides briefly rekindled fur trading on the high plains.
Hiram Scott’s final resting place is not known. His remains were almost certainly found near the North Platte River, but the site has never been located. Today, a plaque dedicated to his memory is located along the North Overlook Trail on the summit of the bluff that bears his name.
Over the years, the geological features known as “Scotts Bluff’s” have taken on their own individual names. They are now known as Dome Rock, Crown Rock, Sentinel Rock, Eagle Rock, and Saddle Rock. However, the largest and most prominent is known as Scotts Bluff, and still stands as a landmark for travelers and a reminder of the tragic incident that took place nearly two centuries ago.
For more information about Hiram Scott, check out the website : https://www.nps.gov/people/hiram-scott.htm