Dorchester Times: NEWS ROUNDUP: DHS Football Is Coming Back After Monday School Board Vote

Wednesday, October 11, 2017

NEWS ROUNDUP: DHS Football Is Coming Back After Monday School Board Vote

Sources Say DHS Football Will Return In 2018: Next football season will bring the return of high school football to Dorchester on Friday nights. That's according to sources who attended Monday night's Dorchester Public School board meeting. The board vote was unanimous, we are told. As we reported last month, Dorchester leaders have been exploring six-man football as an option for the past several months. A meeting of DPS parents and students was held in late September to discuss the options and requirements to go forward with the plan. An online survey of Times readers, conducted in late September, showed nearly three-quarters of readers said they do want DHS football to return. Dorchester has been without a football team of its own since 2013, as fewer enrolled boys in grades 9-12 and decreased participation rates raised questions whether a viable 8-man team could be fielded. However, it seems six-man football is gaining popular support and more teams in our corner of the state, and the revival of Longhorn football is a real possibility next season. There are reports that more than 40 Nebraska high schools will be playing the game next season, including Friend and other nearby schools.

Last Night's Volleyball Game Featured 'Pink Out': Tuesday night's Dorchester High School volleyball games featured a lot of pink. The school and its fan base conducted a "pink out" to support a cure to breast cancer. The Lady 'Horns took on BDS and McCool Junction with games starting at 5:30 and 7:30 p.m. DHS fell in both matches, dropping to 7-17 on the season. The volleyball squad is off for the rest of the week until Saturday's CRC tournament in York.

Effort To Get Dorchester's Vacant Homes Filled By Spring 2018?: We received an e-mail from a town resident who wishes to remain anonymous, but says she wants this blog to explore ways to fill Dorchester's vacant homes within the next six months. That would be a heavy lift and we're not exactly sure what a blog could do to instigate such a movement, but we do agree some kind of formal effort needs to be undertaken. At one point within the past year, more than 20 homes in Dorchester were sitting vacant. That is harmful in a community that needs more family housing, especially when the community sits just 8 minutes from Crete, 15 minutes from Seward, and 25 minutes from Lincoln. If you have ideas to combat the issue of homes sitting vacant, please leave them in the "comments" section below.

8 comments:

People for pavingOctober 10, 2017 at 2:40 PM
Implement a monthly fee for any house not being occupied. That money would then go into a fund towards paving.. a win win if you ask me
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People for pavingOctober 10, 2017 at 2:41 PM
Implement a monthly fee for any house not being occupied. That money would then go into a fund towards paving.. a win win if you ask me
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AnonymousOctober 11, 2017 at 9:56 AM
Really? Friend playing 6 man football? A town of 1100 people?? I remember when Friend was bucking the state athletic agency a while back refusing to play 11 man illegally despite having sufficient numbers and instead choosing to play 8 man so they could win more games. Now they want to play 6 man ball??? C'mon Man!
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AnonymousOctober 12, 2017 at 4:56 AM
I think the Town board should force every house hold to have at least children, If not they should be fined and the money should go towards paving, then its a win win for Dorchester ,,, paving and eleven man football,,, maskes about as much sense as the first post !!
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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."