Local History by
Omaha Exploration

Long before the VA Medical Center and the Field Club of Omaha, the area around 42nd & Center Street was home to the Douglas County Poor Farm. On its grounds stood the Douglas County Hospital, a unique medical facility designed to care for patients suffering from...

Well known as the birthplace of the Reuben sandwich, the TV dinner and butter brickle ice cream, Omaha is less known as the birthplace of the ski lift. The inventor, James Curran, worked as an ironworker for Paxton & Vierling Iron Works while taking night classes....

Preston Love once claimed that, “If New York, Chicago, and Kansas City were the major leagues of jazz, Omaha was the Triple-A. If you wanted to make the big leagues, you came and played in Omaha.” Much of the credit for that reputation belongs to the Jewell family....

Omaha doesn’t have an underground rail system, but it does have a subway. The Dodge Street Subway in Dundee—built in 1934 by the Public Works Administration—remains the city’s only pedestrian underpass and was the second tunnel constructed beneath what was once a...

The three-story-tall, hand-painted Baum Iron sign facing 13th Street in the Old Market has been a local fixture for more than a century. Constructed in 1880, the building it adorns has housed only three businesses in its 145 years. Located at 1221 Harney Street, the...

One of Omaha's most unique spaces is located in what was once an alleyway in the Old Market, flanked by the E. Meyer Building on the east and the Poppleton Block on the west. Constructed in 1912 for Ernest Meyer, a wholesale fruit dealer, the E. Meyer Building at 1016...

After it was built, the 22-story Flatiron Building in New York City inspired dozens of similar structures across the country with its distinctive three-sided design. Among them was the 4-story version built at the triangular intersection in downtown Omaha, where 17th...

Surrounded by the developing Edge District, the ever-growing University of Nebraska Medical Center and the expanded Child Saving Institute stands a turn-of-the-century building notable for its elaborate façade of patterned terracotta and brick. Built by John H. Harte,...

Just south of the Old Market, an ornate one-story brick building long surrounded by empty parking lots will soon find itself at the center of the city’s newest park. Located at 1213 Jones Street in the Rail and Commerce Historic District, the building originally...

In the heart of Little Bohemia stands the Prague Hotel, built by Gottlieb Storz to serve as the hub of the Czech community’s cultural and social life. At the time, it held the unique distinction of being the only hotel between Chicago and the Pacific Coast dedicated...