Dorchester Times: NEWS ROUND-UP: Grandparents Crash Dorchester Elementary

Friday, September 30, 2022

NEWS ROUND-UP: Grandparents Crash Dorchester Elementary

(Photo: Sharon Axline)

Dozens of Grandparents Descend on DPS: Dozens of grandparents of Dorchester's kindergarten and first- through third-grade students took time to visit their favorite kiddos this week. According to school volunteer and town advocate Sharon Axline, the school celebrated Grandparents Day with cookie bars, juice and coffee prepared by DPS staff. Grandparents stopped by the classrooms and participated in reading books and taking part in word games.

Flu/COVID Shots for Students, Oct. 19: Public Health Solutions, the public health office that services Saline County, will be at Dorchester Public School Oct. 19, offering flu shots to DPS students with consent forms signed by parents or guardians. Updated COVID-19 boosters will also be offered. For questions, call 402-826-3880.

Flu Shots for Adults, Oct. 12: The Dorchester United Methodist Church will be hosting a flu shot clinic Wednesday, Oct. 12, from 5:30-6:30 p.m. The cost for non-Medicare patients will be $37. This clinic is open to the public.

Adopt-a-Door Program is in Effect: Dorchester Public School is re-instituting its Adopt-a-Door initiative in which local businesses (or organizations) greet students on their Monday morning arrival to school. This Monday, Oct. 3, the Dorchester American Legion organizations will be the first sponsor of this year-long tradition. Call the school at 402.946.2781 if your business or organization would like to participate.

Early November is School Lunch Weeks: Parents and grandparents are invited to each lunch with their Dorchester students at the school the first two weeks of November. More information will be forthcoming as that time approaches.

Online Institutions Offering Higher Savings Rates: Times are tough when it comes to making your dollars grow or last longer -- even as artificially low interest rates fade away. At our local bank, a 22-month CD, with a minimum $10,000 deposit, still only earns you 2.25%. Not enough to keep pace with Uncle Joe Biden's 8.5% inflation. We encourage readers to check out online institutions for more competitive savings rates -- as high as 4.25%. Just make sure they're FDIC insured, of course.

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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."