Dorchester Times: Here They Are: 10 Great Ideas For Dorchester

Sunday, November 5, 2023

Here They Are: 10 Great Ideas For Dorchester

Earlier this year, the Dorchester Times asked readers to send us their ideas to improve Dorchester.

Under the banner of our "Great Ideas for Dorchester" project, we asked readers to send ideas (via our email, Facebook, or blog comments) to enhance and grow Dorchester and secure its future.

As 2023 begins to close its curtains, we are rerunning the 10 best ideas for Dorchester submitted by Times' readers. In no particular order, they are as follows:

Establish an "adopt a building" program to work with the owners of main street buildings. Focus for one or two years to improve a particular building. Raise funds. Volunteer labor and/or supplies. Hold open houses to show off progress. Get everyone involved.
Have Dorchester's FBLA run student-run businesses from a main street building. Maybe a current owner could donate use of one of the vacant buildings.
Create a matching fund, that is funded by donations, to offer matching grants to individuals wanting to start in-demand businesses, like a convenience store, grocery, new car wash, or workout facility.
Paint a huge mural on the east Farmers Cooperative elevator where the emblem is completely worn down. The mural would be of a longhorn breaking through the cement, with the words “We ❤️ our Longhorns."
The paving of the streets, a gym, a grocery store, new paint on buildings to give color and life to our small town.
Do more to spotlight local businesses, business owners, and employees.
An annual food truck festival with live music on main street.
Work with the school to start an online weekly newspaper.
Flower pots full of flowers on main street, possibly with benches with sponsors' names on the backrests.

Create a new housing development with a real developer. Model it after the Oliva project in west Wilber, but make it even more desirable than that, with trees and ponds and walking trails.

Thanks to our readers for their engagement.

We encourage community members to get involved with Dorchester activities and volunteer organizations, and work to make these great ideas a reality.

13 comments:

AnonymousJanuary 9, 2023 at 8:54 PM
PAVE THE STREETS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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AnonymousJanuary 9, 2023 at 9:45 PM
How about an "adopt a building" program to work with the owners of main street buildings. Focus for 1 or 2 years on one particular building. Raise funds. Volunteer labor and/or supplies. Hold open houses to show off progress. Get everyone involved.
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AnonymousJanuary 10, 2023 at 2:51 PM
Fix-up and/or add some more sidewalks around town! And if there isn’t already one, a take-one leave-one book box near the library could get more kids reading!
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AnonymousJanuary 11, 2023 at 1:12 PM
Main street needs some TLC.
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Old No. 64January 12, 2023 at 6:56 PM
Apply for some grants and historical tax credits to fix up downtown buildings.
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AnonymousJanuary 12, 2023 at 9:16 PM
New Leadership.
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AnonymousJanuary 15, 2023 at 7:22 AM
Get more communication among members of the community through avenues like this blog! Also, what about targeted missions for the town volunteer organizations like the Foundation or Renew Dorchester? What are their long-term goals?
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ChiefJanuary 15, 2023 at 9:38 AM
Establish some community standards by ordinance for houses and commercial buildings
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AnonymousJanuary 31, 2023 at 9:11 PM
Maybe have a community clean-up day. As a former resident who passes through occasionally, it seems some of the homes would benefit by getting rid of unwanted clutter. And definitely pave the streets.
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AnonymousNovember 11, 2023 at 9:23 AM
Create and enforce a new fee for neglected properties.
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AnonymousNovember 11, 2023 at 3:50 PM
Julie Holly has been filling pots with flowers for three years now. Renew Dorchester just purchased big pots spring 2023, which Julie filled with flowers at her own expense. Thank you Julie.
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AnonymousNovember 15, 2023 at 7:15 AM
Thank you Renew Dorchester for meeting one of these goals by adding the flower pots on main. Thank you Julie for the flowers you have donated for the last three years.
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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."