Dorchester Times: Looking Back: Threats of Violence Met Those Who Moved Methodist Church

Sunday, December 4, 2022

Looking Back: Threats of Violence Met Those Who Moved Methodist Church

Most of us from Saline County know about the messy conflict that occurred when Wilber residents traveled to Pleasant Hill in the mid-1870s to physically retrieve the courthouse following a countywide vote that made Wilber the new county seat.

According to the story -- which has been told often over the generations -- it took roughly 160 wagon teams and 300 Wilber residents using force, including the threat of firearms, before the task could be completed.

But many are unaware of the conflict and threats of violence that occurred when the Methodist Church was moved to Dorchester from Pleasant Hill in 1880.

According to "Andreas' History of the State of Nebraska," after Pleasant Hill was no longer the county seat, the Methodist Church Society dropped in numbers so rapidly that only a few dozen remained a short time after Wilber became the county seat. The pastor of the church organization, who resided in Dorchester, conceived the idea of securing the church building for his own community. Pleasant Hill, however, would not give it up.

An attorney was consulted. He told the Dorchester Methodists to go to Pleasant Hill, tear down the church, and bring it back to Dorchester. So a party was organized and traveled to Pleasant Hill with wagons to haul the lumber away. The Dorchester residents were met with threats of violence, but they kept on until the roof was torn off and nearly all of one side, as well. The floors were also torn up and some of the lumber loaded on the wagons.

That's when an officer arrived and served an injunction on the Dorchester residents, who were ordered to leave Pleasant Hill at once. As the Dorchester wagons traveled north,the citizens of Pleasant Hill started to rebuild the church.

Meanwhile, the district court was in session, but it sat hours away in Falls City. The attorney for the Dorchester parishioners hurried there -- by horse, of course. After securing a hearing, the injunction was dissolved and the court ruled in favor of the Dorchester Methodists.

The attorney telegraphed the decision to Dorchester -- and the group immediately returned to Pleasant Hill, again tore down the church, moved it to Dorchester, and rebuilt it with an addition.

The rest, as they say, is history.

1 comment:

AnonymousDecember 6, 2022 at 10:19 PM
Those darn Wilber wienies.
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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."