The Capital Ring: Power of the Platte

The Capital Ring: Power of the Platte

For thirteen years, two sides of the Platte River fought over the same prize: Nebraska's capital city. The stakes weren't just political — whoever held the capital held the federal payroll, the railroad route, and the future. Omaha had won every fight. Then statehood changed everything. In this episode, we follow the fight from its rigged beginnings in 1854, through legislative brawls, land schemes, and a midnight wagon heist, to the afternoon of July 29th, 1867 — when three men sat down in a private home in Lancaster, Nebraska, and changed the map forever. Along the way, we meet a land speculator who knew too much, two senators who tried to be clever and got outmaneuvered, and a group of ladies in Yankee Hill who produced ice cream on the open prairie and still didn't get what they wanted. This is Part Two of the Iron & Power series. If you missed Part One, start with The Cheyenne Ring: Cattle Country's Power. For photos, maps, and glimpses of the past, follow @rootedintheplains on Instagram. Want to learn more? * Berens, Charlyne, and Nancy Mitchell. "Parallel Tracks, Same Terminus: The Role of Nineteenth-Century Newspapers and Railroads in the Settlement of Nebraska." Great Plains Quarterly 29, no. 4 (2009): 287–300. * Crowe, Rebekah. "A Madman and a Visionary: George Francis Train, Speculation, and the Territorial Development of the Great Plains." Great Plains Quarterly 34, no. 1 (2014): 35–61. * Davies, Russ, and Robert E. Gallamore. "On the Spur to the Dome: How the Mile-Long Lincoln, Haitch Street & Capitol Railway Helped Build Nebraska's Monumental Tower on the Plains." Railroad History, no. 204 (2011): 52–63. * Hayes, A.B., and Samuel D. Cox. History of the City of Lincoln, Nebraska. Lincoln, NE: State Journal Company Printers, 1889. * Potts, James B. "The Nebraska Capital Controversy, 1854–59." Great Plains Quarterly 8, no. 3 (1988): 172–82.

The Cheyenne Ring: Cattle Country’s Power

The cowboy myth says it was all grit and open range: noble ranchers, hardworking cowhands, civilizing a wild frontier. The truth is messier. In this episode, we trace who actually ran Wyoming in the late 1800s, and the answer isn't "cowboys." It's a railroad, a small circle of cattle barons, and two senators, nicknamed "the Cheyenne Ring", who answered to both at once. We follow the Wyoming Stock Growers Association's reach across state lines, all the way to Custer County, Nebraska, where the same fight over land and power played out fourteen years earlier: a shooting, a revenge killing, and a conviction that didn't stick.  This is Part One of a two-part story. Part Two picks up later this month, where we find out how the location of Nebraska's capital city is connected to this same story.  For photos, maps, and glimpses of the past, follow @rootedintheplains on Instagram. Want to learn more? Butcher, S.D. Pioneer History of Custer County, Nebraska. Broken Bow, 1901. Hewitt, William L. “The ‘Cowboyification’ of Wyoming Agriculture.” Agricultural History 76, no. 2 (2002): 481–94. Miller, Michael M. “Cowboys and Capitalists: The XIT Ranch in Texas and Montana, 1885–1912.” Montana: The Magazine of Western History 65, no. 4 (2015): 3–28.  Hansen, Peter A. “Still Controversial: The Pacific Railroad at 150.” Railroad History, no. 208 (2013): 8–35.  "1884 Round-Ups of the Wyoming Stock Growers Association." Broadside, courtesy of Tom Berry, compliments of Armour's Livestock Bureau.

Fort Atkinson - The People Who Keep It Alive

The fort is still standing. And so are the people who keep its story alive.  In the final episode of our Fort Atkinson summer series, we go to the source: the volunteers who show up on the first weekend of every month, put on the uniforms, and bring the 1820s back to life for everyone who walks through the gates.  A soldier. A blacksmith. A tinsmith. A weaver. And Andrew, our guide through this whole series, is back on the bluff where it all began. I asked them all the same questions: What do people get wrong about life at this fort? What moment from a visitor has stayed with you? And why does this story still matter?  Enjoy.  Fort Atkinson Living History Weekend runs May through October, the first weekend of every month. Fort Atkinson State Historical Park, Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. Free with a Nebraska State Park entry permit.  For photos, maps, and glimpses of the past, follow @rootedintheplains on Instagram.

Fort Atkinson - We Are Still Here...

Summer Season Episode 2 Last week, we left you on a bluff above the Missouri River. November 1819. A Nebraska winter is closing in. Something about to go very, very wrong.  In Part 2 of our Fort Atkinson series, we hear the story from the inside. Through the journal entries of our soldier stationed at the fort in the winter of 1819–1820, we follow the crisis as it unfolds and what would take 157 men before spring arrived.  The details are real. They come straight from the historical record.  We also look at what came next, how the soldiers who survived that winter went on to become the first large-scale farmers west of the Missouri River, and why Fort Atkinson is a place worth standing on. For photos, maps, and a behind the scenes look at what we’re getting into this summer, follow @rootedintheplains on Instagram. Plan Your Visit Fort Atkinson's next living history weekend is June 6th and 7th, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Fort Atkinson State Historical Park, Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. Free with a Nebraska State Park entry permit. Fort Atkinson State Historical Park — Nebraska Game & Parks [https://outdoornebraska.gov/location/fort-atkinson/] Friends of Fort Atkinson — fortatkinsononline.org [https://www.fortatkinsononline.org/] Want to Learn More Diary of James Kennerly, 1823–1826. Missouri Historical Society Collections Vol. VI, No. 1 (1928). Johnson, Sally A. “The Sixth’s Elysian Fields: Fort Atkinson on the Council Bluffs.” Nebraska History 40 (1959): 1–38. Levine, Victor E. “Scurvy in Nebraska: The Epidemic of Scurvy at Cantonment Missouri, Nebraska, 1819–1820.” Journal of Nutrition, January 1955. Nichols, Roger L. “Soldiers as Farmers: Army Agriculture in the Missouri Valley, 1818–1827.” Reals, William J. “Scurvy at Fort Atkinson, 1819–1820.” Nebraska History. Wesley, Edgar Bruce. “Life at a Frontier Post: Fort Atkinson, 1823–1826.” Journal of the American Military Institute Vol. 3, No. 4 (Winter 1939): 202–209.

Fort Atkinson - The Fort at the Edge of the World

Summer Season Episode 1 On a bluff above the Missouri River, 200 miles from the nearest American settlement, the United States built its largest military post in 1819. Nearly a thousand people called it home: soldiers, officers, families. They were sent to project American power into the frontier, hold back British fur traders, and keep the peace with the surrounding nations: the Pawnee, the Omaha, the Sioux, the Arikara.  In this episode, we step inside the walls with Andrew, a living history re-enactor and Friend of Fort Atkinson, to get a feel for what daily life actually looked like. The rations. The whiskey. The discipline, the isolation, and the particular strangeness of being a soldier at the edge of the known American world. And we leave you with a question. It was November 1819. A Nebraska winter is closing in. Something was about to go very, very wrong. Find out next week (May 27, 2026) in Part 2.  For photos, maps, and glimpses of the past, and a behind the scenes look at what we’re getting into this summer, follow @rootedintheplains on Instagram. Plan Your Visit Fort Atkinson's next living history weekend is June 6th and 7th, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Fort Atkinson State Historical Park, Fort Calhoun, Nebraska. Free with a Nebraska State Park entry permit. Fort Atkinson State Historical Park — Nebraska Game & Parks [https://outdoornebraska.gov/location/fort-atkinson/] Friends of Fort Atkinson — fortatkinsononline.org [https://www.fortatkinsononline.org/] Want to Learn More Johnson, Sally A. “The Sixth’s Elysian Fields: Fort Atkinson on the Council Bluffs.” Nebraska History 40 (1959): 1–38. Wesley, Edgar Bruce. “Life at a Frontier Post: Fort Atkinson, 1823–1826.” Journal of the American Military Institute Vol. 3, No. 4 (Winter 1939): 202–209. Diary of James Kennerly, 1823–1826. Missouri Historical Society Collections Vol. VI, No. 1 (1928).