Dorchester Times: Up To 17 Inches Of New Snowfall In Dorchester; School Closed Tues.

Monday, December 7, 2009

Up To 17 Inches Of New Snowfall In Dorchester; School Closed Tues.

(UPDATED -- 10:15 p.m.) After examining several computer models, including that of the National Weather Service, the Dorchester Times predicts up to 17 inches of new snowfall could be on the ground in town by early Wednesday. Dorchester Public School is closed Tuesday. Click here for the latest Dorchester forecast or click on the Times' forecast icon in the left sidebar. Any new snowfall would be on top of the three inches that fell Sunday night.

Beginning mid-Tuesday, wind gusts of nearly 40 mph will bring blizzard conditions. Law enforcement and emergency management officials are urging area residents to stay home. For those who must be on the roads, they are advised to slow down and wait for roads to be cleared.

Saline County Emergency Management coordinator B.J. Fictum said in a news release that the county is working to prepare for the upcoming storm. “We are currently coordinating the county’s response to the larger winter storm Tuesday and Wednesday and are urging people not to travel on Tuesday or early Wednesday unless absolutely necessary."

6 comments:

cynical richardDecember 7, 2009 at 11:21 PM
ya, right ......................................... you dont know what a real snow is ..........................................my wifes hair will shed more flakes than this storm ............... and my horses rear end can predict weather better than you guys ................................
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AnonymousDecember 7, 2009 at 11:54 PM
We had 8' snowfall here in arizona.Our 2 major roads are closed for 48 hours.
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BobDecember 8, 2009 at 9:45 AM
Must be global warming. I hope and pray President Obama saves us all by listening to the rabid green Europeans in Copenhagen. He's the second coming, you know.
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90s GradDecember 8, 2009 at 12:05 PM
Be careful folks. You don't want to end up like my old Uncle Oldrich who perished in the Blizzard of 1888. He was training for NU's Old Gold Knights football team by hurdling snow drifts. He never made it back to the dugout.
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AnonymousDecember 8, 2009 at 3:37 PM
I like how everyone keeps putting ' as inches. Its actually " for inches and ' for feet. So the title suggests 17 feet of snow. Now that would be a monster snow storm.
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AnonymousDecember 9, 2009 at 11:06 AM
Yous so smart
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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."