Dorchester Times: The 'Old Bell' Has Been Pride Of DPS Campus Since 1932

Thursday, August 5, 2021

The 'Old Bell' Has Been Pride Of DPS Campus Since 1932

The Dorchester Public School's bell monument, located prominently in front of the school building's main entrance, features the refurbished bell from the 1890 school building.

How many of you know the story behind the bell?

For those old enough to remember, the old school bell was showcased as part of a 1932 brick monument, which stood just east of the 1927 school building, which demolished in the summer of 2008. The old bell monument was razed a few years earlier due to its weakened structure and safety concerns.

Thanks to a loyal reader, the Dorchester Times was sent a May 1932 DHS alumni newsletter, which helped us uncover a little more history behind the old monument and the school bell itself.

According to an Dorchester High School Alumni Pep Bulletin article written by W.R. Freidell (DHS Class of 1907), the bell was salvaged from "the wreckage of the old red brick school house" after that building was demolished in 1930.

That's when the DHS Alumni Association asked DHS graduate Merion Mooberry (Class of 1916), a skilled architect, to design "an appropriate mounting for this bell." (Editor's note: The sketch below is from the May 1932 issue of the Bulletin.)

The original bell monument was unveiled at the fifth annual DHS alumni banquet May 21, 1932. The "historic landmark and "grandsire of the campus" was presented to alumni by its builder, DHS graduate and contractor Thomas Grey Jr.

The newsletter reports the bell was mounted in "a lovely designed, final resting place just east of the new high school."

Following the alumni banquet, toasts were made "around the traditional old bell."

Tickets for the 1932 alumni banquet were reduced to 65 cents a plate, due to "Old Man Oppression" -- the Great Depression, as we call it today. But attendees still received the "same big three-course dinner," per the orders of Mrs. Panter, chair of the banquet and wife of the town doctor.

Following the monument dedication and banquet dinner, alumni were invited to visit the historian's exhibit entitled, "See Yourselves as Others Saw You on Your Graduation Night Years Ago."

9 comments:

AnonymousMay 2, 2009 at 3:41 AM
If you look in our old annuals, you will see photos of many of us taken on, or in front of the old Bell Monument.

This is a good project!

JR Wolfe
York
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AnonymousMay 4, 2009 at 6:45 AM
What monument was demolished 20 years ago? The Bell monument was their just a few years ago.
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West SiderMay 4, 2009 at 9:09 AM
Check the books ... I think you'll find time has passed a little more quickly than you think.
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AnonymousMay 4, 2009 at 5:12 PM
The one in the picture was there when i was in school and it hasn't been twenty years since then.
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AnonymousMay 5, 2009 at 9:21 AM
I can remember climbing on that bell when I was in elementary and also having class pictures taken with it. I think it is a wonderful idea to do something with such a well known piece of history for our school.
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AnonymousMay 6, 2009 at 10:33 PM
Whatever happened to the ticket window that was supposed to be part of the new school. Has it been placed there?
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AnonymousMay 7, 2009 at 6:22 PM
i think it was sold at the auction
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AnonymousMay 8, 2009 at 8:22 PM
I think it was sold
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AnonymousMay 11, 2009 at 11:29 AM
The old bell was taken down in 2006 or 2007.
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Dorchester: A Good Little Family Town

Dorchester, Nebraska (est. population 630) is located in northern Saline county. Close in proximity to Interstate 80, Dorchester is only 25 minutes from the state capital of Lincoln (est. population 250,000) and about 55 minutes from Omaha (metro population 725,000).

Dorchester's median resident age is 37 years. In 2005, Dorchester had a median family income of approximately $35,600. The median house value was about $63,000. About 95 percent of Dorchester residents commute to work via Interstate and highways.

The village has a quality public school, which received a $4.1 million expansion and modernization in 2008; it offers a small classrooms and individualized attention. Total enrollment of grades K-12 is around 230-250 students.

Ancestries of the Dorchester area are primarily German (42.4%), Czech (24.9%), Irish (12.5%), English (5.4%), and Dutch (4.9%).

Dorchester Historical Facts

* On July 4, 1871, the railroad reached Dorchester.
* Incorporated in 1881, Dorchester's population grew from 200 to 500 by 1882.
* In 1882, Dorchester had 90 buildings, 35 of which were businesses or public facilities. Brick buildings lined both sides of Washington Avenue for two blocks.
* Dorchester's longest-running newspaper was The Dorchester Star, which was published until the late 1940s.
* By 1889, Dorchester's population is said to have reached 800, while the town housed an opera house, a two-story brick schoolhouse with a bell tower, and four churches.
* By the 1910s, Dorchester had electricity, a water tower and a fire department.
* Dorchester's main arteries, Highways 6 and 33, were graveled in the 1940s.
* Dorchester's first irrigation well was drilled on Chris Weber's farm and rural electrification was finished following WWII.

A Village with History

Dorchester is one of the "alphabet towns" on the Burlington & Missouri River Railroad line built west from Lincoln. The town site was selected for its pleasant location in the northern part of Saline County, about eight miles west of Crete. This situation is an attractive one, being on the level prairie land, midway between the West Blue River and Turkey Creek. The first named stream is three miles north, and the latter about the same distance south from the town. Dorchester was platted in 1870 and incorporated in 1881. The name "Dorchester" came from either for a suburb of Boston by that name or a town in England. No one is sure. Two of the very first settlers were James Seely and Edward McIntyre, who both made Dorchester their permanent home.

Dorchester: In The Beginning

Here is a look at Dorchester around 1890, less than a decade after its official incorporation, as documented by Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska:
* POPULATION: "About 300, and is made up of a substantial and progressive class of citizens, who are moral and industrious. ... The town grew but very little until the year 1879, for the reason that Pleasant Hill, on Turkey Creek, a short distance south, was the county seat and naturally drew a trade for quite a large scope of country."
* BUSINESS: "The business and professional interests of the town are represented by three general merchandise stores, two drug, one grocery, one furniture, two hardware, and two millinery stores, one bank, two restaurants, two hotels, three livery stables, a post office, one newspaper office, two elevators, two lumber yards, two coal yards, two blacksmith shops, two lawyers and four physicians."
* SCHOOL: "The schoolhouse is a good one. The schoolhouse was built in 1872, since which time the public schools have been continually kept up. The present schoolhouse is 24' x 40' in size, two stories high. The school is graded and consists of three departments. The house is found too small, and arrangements will soon be made to increase its size."
* CHURCHES: "There are three substantial churches."
* HOMES: "The residence portion of the village is made up of neat houses of different styles of architecture, but none of them very large."
* NEWSPAPER: "The Dorchester Star, which was established August 21, 1881, by H. C. Bittenbender, who edited it until January 19, 1882, when he sold it to Ryerson & Bullock, the present proprietors. The Star is a bright weekly paper, five-column quarto, in size, and is Republican in politics."