Dorchester Times: Taking Time To Give Thanks

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Taking Time To Give Thanks

Every now and again, the Times receives an e-mail that we feel compelled to share with the all of our readers. Last year, we received the following message, reprinted here with the permission of the author. Happy Thanksgiving from the Times' staff.

Sweet home Dorchester! Oh sweet Nebraska! On thisThanksgiving we have so many thing to be grateful for.

You never really know how amazing something, or someplace,or someone is when you don't have it or them. I lived out of state for several years and during that time I reminded myself almost daily of the things Imissed back home and am thankful for.

On this Thanksgiving, I will once again take time to give thanks for those things that make life worth living. They are...

1.) The fall harvest

2.) My small town and the feeling of community

3.) A Main Street I can walk with no noise, litter or fear of violence

4.) Mom & pop businesses & no big box stores

5.) Dorchester sports

6.) Small town chatter, even the gossip

7.) Hunters, farmers and our community elders (the producers and providers)

8.) Not being honked at in your car when you don't run a (the one and only) red light

9.) The smell of a wood burning stove or fireplace

10.) Pumpkin pie, homemade jelly and all the great local baking

This is a good start. Oh yes, I am also thankful for my great-grand parents who came to Dorchester to start their families. It is because of them that Dorchester is my home.

Sincerely,

Name Withheld

Mother, Wife and Farmer

2 comments:

AnonymousNovember 26, 2009 at 2:42 PM
I am very thankful that my Bohemian ancestors took it upon themselves to leave the tyranny of the Austrian Hapsburgs, and come to the United States so that they could have some control over their own destinies with God's blessing. My dad's side came from persecuted Hussite believers, and my mom's side came over for land to work, and religious liberty as well.

My cousins who stayed over there, had to endure many more years of Austrian persecution and near slavery. Then they had to endure the occupations of the Nazi's and the Soviet Communists. Today, for a while they are free. With what is going on in Washington DC these days, I hope my grandchildren can have the same blessings of freedom FROM government that my ancestors had, but I am worried.

Maybe we should turn to that Providence that saw the American Revolution through to victory over the British.

Second Chronicles 7:14

JR
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Vested CzechNovember 26, 2009 at 4:07 PM
It sounds as if the author has no regrets about moving back to Dorchester.
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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."