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The
growth of the town, however,
was slow, though constant.
The county itself,
in 1860, contained but four
hundred and twenty-one white
inhabitants, according
to the federal census of
that year. Of this number
probably twenty per
cent could properly be credited
to Beatrice.
During
the decades which closed
in 1870, though still a
pioneer village, Beatrice
increased
in population to six hundred
and twenty-four habitants.
The state of Nebraska
itself had come into the
Union on March 1, 1867,
with a population of
123,993, and the old territorial
organization had passed
away.
The
Union Pacific Railroad was
completed from Council Bluffs,
Iowa, via Omaha,
to the Pacific. This first
great continental railway
line traversed the entire
length of Nebraska from
east to west. Its
construction, together with
the
conferring of statehood
upon Nebraska, was a tremendous
uplift to every
interest of the state. Population
flowed in, capital sought
investment, towns
and villages sprang into
existence, institutions
of learning were founded,
roads,
established, and all those
elements of progress as
well as of convenience and
necessity, which a high
degree of civilization and
refinement implies, had
received
a mighty impetus throughout
the entire state.
The
construction of the Burlington
system, which was ultimately
to gridiron a large
portion of Nebraska, was
under way across the state
to Omaha to Denver, via
Lincoln, to be followed
early in the 70'S by the
building of the line of
railway known
to the early settlers as
the Atchison & Nebraska.
Not only Beatrice
and
Gage County, but also all
Nebraska east of the one
hundredth meridian, was
pulsating with the energy
and enthusiasm which a rapidly
increasing population
and a tremendous accession
of wealth are apt to excite
in a body
politic
at any time and under all
circumstances. Before
the close of 1870, steps
were
inaugurated for the extension
of the Burlington Railroad
system to Beatrice.
During
this decade living conditions
greatly improved in Beatrice
and Gage County.
As early as 1862,
the first school building
was erected in the county.
By
1870, the hardships of pioneer
conditions were rapidly
passing away. As a
member
of the first state legislature
in 1868, Hon. Nathan Blakely
had procured the
passage of an act appropriating
one thousand acres of land
in Gage County, the
proceeds of which, were
to be used in erecting a
bridge across the Big Blue
River
at Beatrice.
On
May 22, 1869, the county
commissioner, Ticknor, Wickham
and Pettygrew, ordered
an advertisement in the
Clarion, a newspaper which
was printed in Beatrice
and which had just came
into existence, call for
bids for the construction
of
the bridge.
By
1860, a regular mail route
was established between
Nebraska City and Marysville,
Kansas, via Beatrice. Joseph
Saunders was the first mail
carrier in
this route. He first
rode into Beatrice with
the United States Mail on
the evening
of October 3, 1860.
In
1868 a regular stage route
was established from both
Nebraska City and Brownville,
via Tecumseh, to Beatrice.
On August 26, 1868,
the Blue Valley Record
announced the Kansas
& Nebraska Stage Line,
was in perfect working
order and made trips regularly
to Nebraska City every other
day.
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