African American Cowboy Biography: Nat Love

 Nat Love not only had a distinctive name, his nickname was Deadwood Dick, but also a distinctive look with long hair, a hat pulled back and a white neckerchief.  He was born in Tennessee.  He won a raffle and used the prize money to travel west.  He first worked o a ranch in Texas and learned to shoot, rope and wrestle cattle.  He would later win a competition in Deadwood, South Dakota.  He won the shooting, roping, bronco riding, bridling and almost every prize.  He lived in Arizona and was contemporary with Pat Garret, Bat Masterson and Billy the Kid.  He married andf decided to settle down and from there lived in Los Angeles and worked for the train company.  He wrote his own autobiography.

Information from the book, The True West by Mifflin Lowe.

Magazine Article Review: Dash of the Decade: The Race, and Race in Lincoln

Dash of the Decade: The Race, and Race n Lincoln, Nebraska History Magazine, Lincoln Nebraska, Fall 2026.

The AAU National Champions were held in 1935 at Lincoln Memorial Stadium.  Six of the fastest sprinters in the world faced each other.  Jesse Owens was expected to win, with Ralph Metcalfe close behind.  However the day turned out differently.  Eulace Peacock won the 100 meter dash with Owens close behind.  Owens also lost to Peacock in the broad jump, eveen though both cleared 26 feet.  Owens had three very good jumps, and would have broken the world record had not Peacock already done so.  It appeared at that time Peacock was the better athlete.  However a pulled thigh muscle kept Peacock from qualifying for the Olympics where Owens ran and jumped to fame.  

Book Review: Spotlight on Native Americans: Cheyenne

 Spotlight on Native Americans: Cheyenne by Terra Rose Maron, Power Kids Press, Rosen Publishing Group, New York, 2016.

The Cheyenne are a people from the great plains area.  Their creation story says the creator mae three types of people, white, red and hairy.  The red people followed the hairy south.  The hairy people disappeared.  When the red people returned north the wite people were gone, so the red peope made their homes there.  The creator gavre them corn and buffalo.  At this time they lived in th Great Lakes area.  However their enemies (the Ojibwes and  Assiniboine drove them west.  There the became nomadic buffalo hunters.  By the 1830s the Cheyenne had become two groups, one in the north, Montana area and the other in the south, Arkansas area.  

War came to the Cheyenne on the Plains after an incident with a wagon train.  The soldiers from Fort Kearney countered by killing eight Cheyenne.  This lead to a war that lasted 30 years.  As part of this war Colonel John Chivington with a militia attacked a peaceful village under Black Kettle.  Many women and children were killed.  This is known as the Sand Creek Massacre.  Over 230 Native Americans were killed.  In 1867 Black Kettle's camp was attacked again by Colonel George Armstrong Custer.  Black Kettle was killed.  The southern Cheyenne were forced onto a reservation in Oklahoma.  In the 1860s the northern Cheyenne joined Red Cloud and the Sioux in the war over the Bozeman Trail.  They forced the abandonment of forts along the trail.  In the 1870s was broke out again as gold miners were taking Indian land with the support of the army.  The army was defeated at the battle of Rosebud and the Little Big Horn.  However these victories only made the army fight harder and bring more and more men.  They too were forced onto the reservation in Oklahoma, with the promise they could return if they did not like it.  They did not.  It was a sickly place with malaria.  Even though originally denied, a group returned to Montana and were finally granted a reservation.  

The Cheyenne were famous for their horse riding skills.  Young people learn to ride from a young age.  Cheyenne were famous for their governing council of 44, four chiefs from eleven different bands.  There are less bands today.  Cheyenne also had different societies.  The most famous of these is the dog soldiers.  

There are two sacred relics for the Cheyenne.  The first is the sacred arrows which are replenished each year in a cremony.  The other is the sacred medicine or buffalo hat.  The northern Cheyenne guard the sacred medicine hat and the northern Cheyenne the sacred arrows.  The southern Cheyenne share their reservation with the Arapaho.  They deal with environmental issues.  The southern Cheyenne support a wind farm.  The northern Cheyenne fight against strip coal mining.

Union Pacific Memorial, Omaha

 The Union Pacific extended from Omaha to the west.  The site at the corner of 10th and Cuming is where the original shops were located where the built the items and tools needed for the railroad.

Eberle-Walden Crime Victims Memorial

  Inside the Sarpy County administrative building is a memorial to two youth who were kidnapped and murdered in 1983.  You enter the administrative building from the east side.  The memorial is established to honor all victims of crime.  There is a video that goes with the memorial.  

Book Review: This Land Called America: Nebraska

 Nebraska: This Land Called America by Rachael Hanel, Creative Education, Mankota, Minnesota, 2010.

This book seems to be more a picture book than a history book, but it does include some history.  Native tribes living in the area were the Pawnee, Sioux, Omaha, Oto, Ponca and Arapaho.  Spain climed the area, and then the French, and after the Louisiana Purchase the United States.  In 1804-1806 The Lewis and Clark Corp of Discovery explored the area and made contact with Native Americans on their adventure to the Pacific.  They did not find a water course to the Pacific.  

Gradually the Native Americans were pushed off of their native lands, and were confined to reservations.  Some fought against the encroachment, but eventually all were confined, the Omaha and Ponca and Santee Sioux have reservations in Nebraska.  

Over time more and more settlers stayed in Nebraska.  Nebraska had been a travel through area on the Mormon and Oregon and California Trails.  The Homestead Act encouraged people to use the land and slowly Nebraska became populated.  Nebraska became a territory in 1854 and a state in 1867.  It became a railroad area with the completion of the transcontinental rail in 1869.  This also lead to the area becoming a cattle area.  The stockyards in South Omaha established the area as the major cow processing area in the nation.

Some famous Nebraskans include author Willa Cather and comedian Johnny Carson.  Lincoln was established as the state capital.  University of Nevada Lincoln prides themselves for their football tradition.  The Offutt Air base in Bellevue Nebraska has often been the hub of the strategic air defense since after WWII.   

Booklet Review: A Wandering Walk Guidebook: Kingman, AZ

 A Wnadering Walk Guidebook: Kingman, AZ by Tom Alyea, Wandering Walks of Wonder, Las Vegas, NV, 2019.

This a very quick description of a three mile hike through downtown Kingman.  It starts with a brief history of the town, from Captain Beale who laid out an east to west trail across the United States in 1857, to Lewis Kingman who planned a rail terminal in late 1870s.  The town was officially founded in 1882.  It became the county seat in 1887.  

Kingman received rapid expansion during WWII when the Kingman Army Air Field provided training the machine gun operators for the B-17 bomber, the flying fortress.  35,000 airmen were trained during the war.  After the war the same area was used as a storage and recycling facility for thousands of planes which were no longer needed.  

The hike starts at the power house on Route 66/Andy Devine.  The power house was built 1907 and supplied power not only for Kingman but many nearby communities and mines.  When Hoover Dam was completed in 1938 it soon became obsolete to the hydroelectric capability of the dam. 

Other highlights on the hike include the Santa Fe depot, Beale Hotel where Andy Devine wandered as a child, the Brunswick Hotel where Clark Gable and Carole Lombard stayed when they were married.  The Mohave Union High School gymnasium with its unique ceiling.  It is all that is left of the old Kingman High School which moved to Bank Street and has now been replaced by Lee Williams High School.  The Kingman Grammar (now Palo Christi) School is behind the courthouse, The courthouse and old jail, St. Mary's Church, AT&T offices.  The Bonelli House is now a museum.  The Elks Lodge built in 1904 is the oldest freternal organization, The I.O.O.F.  was the second built in 1912.  The Little Red School House was replaced by the Grammar School.  The Masonic Temple is on Fourth Street, as is the Central Commercial Building, an early store.