Dorchester Times: What Happened To Dorchester's Missing Streets?

Friday, January 9, 2015

What Happened To Dorchester's Missing Streets?

What happened to Dorchester's missing streets? Did they ever really exist?

Those are the questions we are asking after examining an 1885 plot of Dorchester.

According to the 130-year-old map, the village had several streets on its south section that do not exist today.

The 1885 map, published by mapmaker Everts and Kirk, showed that Sumner, Stephens, Jefferson, Lincoln and Fulton streets once extended well south beyond the railroad, Depot Street and what is now state Highway 33.

Today, in 2015, only Washington Avenue extends from the heart of the village into its southern reaches.

The Everts and Kirk map also shows that the town's southern section had a Third Street and Fourth Street, both running east

and west.

Fourth Street would have been located approximately where the Saline County Museum's east entrance is today. Third Street would be present-day Whitmar St. If there were ever a First Street, it would be today's County Road E.

In Dorchester 2015, the only other street besides Washington in the southern portion of town is Whitmar Street.

We can confirm that Third Street did exist. According to a 1914-1920 map published in the Dorchester centennial history book, Third Street ran east of Washington Avenue, beginning approximately where Whitmar Street begins today and continuing east until it met Depot St. near the railroad tracks. Situated at the eastern end of Third Street was Malek Slaughter Yards.

According to the 1914-1920 map, it appears that a very small portion of Lincoln Avenue also extended into the south side.

We welcome any information that our readers can pass along regarding Dorchester's missing streets.

10 comments:

West SiderJanuary 25, 2010 at 7:47 PM
Don't know what happened to the streets but I always thought that area (near Bolton's) would be a great place to build a new baseball/softball diamond with adequate parking.
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West SiderJanuary 25, 2010 at 7:48 PM
Call it the 4th St. Ballpark.
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AnonymousJanuary 26, 2010 at 9:58 AM
What happened to Dorchester's existing streets? Lots of potholes.
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West SiderJanuary 28, 2010 at 4:22 PM
8th street, west of the post office, is perhaps the worst I've ever seen. I am pretty certain that German streets looked better after being carpet bombed by American B-52s in WWII.
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AnonymousJanuary 31, 2010 at 2:18 PM
After driving on our "streets" I don't know how anyone could possibly be against paving.
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AnonymousJanuary 31, 2010 at 10:06 PM
I hear there are pockets of Al Queda fighters hiding in some of the potholes on Dorchester's streets. Don't tell anyone; CIA information.
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AnonymousFebruary 3, 2010 at 3:43 PM
I hate to be picky, but to West Sider, the B-52 did not become operational until after the Korean War. Maybe they meant B-17, 0r B-24's???????

The B-52 did carpet bomb Vietnam though!
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AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 12:39 PM
We are currently looking into the one that was behind our house. SOmehow it was claimed by a land owner with some extra ground that would have been the alley. FInding out this was not done properly to claim the ground and that it was not filed with the village of Dorchester through the Saline COunty. Will keep you posted on out comes of this.
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AnonymousJanuary 9, 2015 at 11:22 PM
Here is an idea to fix the streets without paving them......How about using the maintainer and cut out the potholes and washboards, then put gravel down!! Wow, wonder why nobody ever thought about that?
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diane velderJanuary 10, 2015 at 2:26 PM
I moved to Dorchester a long time ago. The reason I remained is because I had family here, loved the town. I didn't matter if it was paved. People live here because they want to. Sure paving would be nice, but I not going to move just because they don't have it, or if they would ever get it. The town, is my home. People can say what they want about Dorchester, but will never change my mind that its a great place to live and raise a family, My family remains here, and wouldn't want to live anywhere else, no matter who says things about the town. Its HOME.
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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."