On the afternoon of October twenty-first, 1876, I sat in the saddle upon the eastern bank of the Missouri River, opposite Omaha, Nebraska, having that day accomplished a horseback journey of twenty-two miles, on my way from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Paul Revere, the faithful horse who had borne me all the way from Boston, declined entering the ferry boat, it being his firm conviction that rivers should either be crossed by bridges or forded. At last, being gently coerced, the horse reluctantly consented, and the muddy current of the river was soon crossed. At three o'clock I entered the city of Omaha, the half-way house across the continent, it having been a little more than five months since I dashed out of the surf, my horse's hoofs wet and dripping with the brine of the Atlantic.

Omaha lies on the eastern boundary of Nebraska, opposite Council Bluffs, on the western bank of the Missouri River, a turbulent stream, which is never satisfied with its position, but is constantly shifting and changing, and making for itself new channels. A bottom land about three miles wide stretches out between Omaha and Council Bluffs, and through this the Missouri rolls, a swift, muddy stream, slowly but surely carrying the Rocky Mountains down to the Mississippi, which, in its turn, deposits them in the Gulf of Mexico, and helps to extend our Gulf coast. The Missouri vibrates like a pendulum, from one side of this bottom land to the other; now being near one city, and then near the other. At the period of my visit its current washed the front of Omaha, leaving Council Bluffs some distance off on the opposite side; but it was already beginning its backward swing. Thus the boundary line between Nebraska and Iowa is being continually shifted, and one State is augmented in territory at the expense of the other.

Omaha is built in part upon the low bottom lands which border the river, and which may at any time be menaced by the swollen and angry stream, unless precautions are taken, in the building of high and substantial stone levees along the river front. The town lies also in part upon the table lands beyond, and is extending to the bluffs which rise still further away. Its business is chiefly confined to the lower portion, where magnificent blocks attest the prosperity of the city. Streets of substantial dwellings, and numerous most elegant private residences, with large and handsomely ornamented grounds, are discovered as one passes through the city. A striking edifice, of Cincinnati freestone, four stories high, is occupied as a Post Office and Court House. Its High School building is one of the finest in the country. When the State Government was, in 1866, removed from Omaha to Lincoln, the Legislature donated the Square and Capitol Building at the former place for High School purposes. The old Capitol was demolished, and a magnificent school building erected on its site, at a cost of $250,000, while other fine school edifices, aggregating in cost about $150,000 more, were erected in other sections of the city. The High School building is on the summit of a hill, overlooking a large extent of country, and has a spire one hundred and eighty-five feet high. The Depot of the Union Pacific Railroad is also a noteworthy edifice.

Omaha was first laid out in 1853, and thus named, after a now nearly extinct tribe of Indians. The first house was built, and the first ferry established in that year; and a year later the first brick-kiln was burned, and the first newspaper—the Omaha Arrow—established. Where Turner Hall now stands, in 1854 was dug the first grave, for an old squaw of the Omaha tribe who had been left by her kindred to die. Whittier's description of the growth of western cities seems particularly applicable to Omaha:—

The first Legislature of Nebraska convened in Omaha in the winter of 1854-5; and in 1856 the Capital was definitely located in that city, and the erection of the capitol building commenced. For a year or two there was a great land-boom, and city property and "corner lots" were held at fabulous prices. But in 1857 a crash came, and for a time the infant town was prostrated. However, in 1859 the discovery of gold in Colorado gave it a fresh impetus. The miners who marched in a perpetual caravan across the plains, in white-topped wagons, marked "Pike's Peak or bust," made Omaha their final starting-point, taking in at that place supplies for their long journey. Two years previous all who could get away from the apparently doomed town had gone to other sections, to begin anew the fight for fortune. Only those remained who were too poor to go, but these were now in luck. Fortune came to them, instead of their being compelled to undertake an ignis fatuus chase after her. At that time the business men of the city laid the foundations of their wealth and prosperity.

In 1857 the town was incorporated as a city; but up to 1867 its only means of communication with the east was by stage-coach, across Iowa, and by steamers on the Missouri, which latter ceased running in winter. In 1865 the population of the town was but four thousand five hundred persons. In 1867 the first train of cars arrived in the city, on the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad. It was not long before other railroads, one after another, made it their western terminus, and its prosperity was established. Then came the Union Pacific Railroad, which started on its long journey across the plains and mountains from this point. The trade to the Pacific coast thus necessarily passed through Omaha, which became a gateway on the route, while many travelers and emigrants paused to breathe and rest before proceeding further, and to take in large quantities of supplies. In 1875 its population had increased to twenty thousand inhabitants, and in 1880 had run up to thirty thousand.

Strange as it may seem, the building of the Union Pacific Railroad has diminished rather than increased the local trade of the city. In overland times single houses sometimes traded as much as three million dollars' worth in a year; but the railroad has so dispersed and distributed business, that now none reach even half that amount. The city, however, does an immense manufacturing business. Within its limits is located the largest smelting works in America, employing nearly two hundred men, and doing an annual business of probably not less than five millions of dollars. One distillery alone, in 1875, the year previous to my visit, paid the government a tax of $316,000; while there are extensive breweries, linseed-oil works, steam-engine works, and pork-packing establishments. The engine shops, car-works and foundry of the Union Pacific Road occupy, with the round-house, about thirty acres of land, on the bottom adjoining the table land upon which the city is built. Over one million dollars is paid out annually in these establishments, for manual labor alone, without including payments for merchandise and supplies. A notable industry is the manufacture of brick, over five millions being turned out annually from the four brick-yards of Omaha. The city is also the headquarters of the Army of the Platte, which annually distributes nearly a million of dollars.

The first postmaster of Omaha used his hat for a post office, and carried around the mail matter in that receptacle wherever he went, delivering it by chance to its owners. Twenty years later the city possessed the finest government building west of the Mississippi, while the post office receipts are to-day upwards of a million dollars annually. Hides, buffalo robes, and furs, to the value of one hundred and fifty thousand dollars, are annually collected and shipped from Omaha; while two hundred and fifty thousand dollars is the extent in a single year of the sewing machine business. The Pacific Railroad ships from Omaha vast quantities of grain to the Salt Lake Valley, and brings back in return supplies of Utah fruit, fresh and dried. The first shipment of fruit, made in 1871, amounted to three hundred pounds. In four years the quantity had increased to nine hundred thousand pounds, and is still greater to-day. The Grand Central Hotel was the finest hotel between Chicago and San Francisco, having been erected in 1873, at a cost of three hundred thousand dollars; but it was destroyed by fire in 1878.

The visitor to Omaha will probably reach that city by means of the great bridge across the Missouri River. This bridge is two thousand seven hundred and fifty feet long, with eleven spans, each span two hundred and fifty feet in width, and elevated fifty feet above high water mark. One stone masonry abutment, and eleven piers, each with two cast iron columns, support this bridge. Its construction was commenced in February, 1869, and completed in 1872, during most of which time not less than five hundred men were employed upon it. Each column was sunk in the bed of the river until a solid foundation was reached. One column penetrated the earth eighty-two feet below low water, before it rested on the bed-rock. The approach to the bridge from the Council Bluffs side is by means of a gradually ascending embankment, one mile and a half in length. This bridge was constructed at a cost of two million six hundred and fifty thousand dollars, and brings an annual revenue of about four hundred thousand dollars. It is now, by act of Congress, considered a part of the Union Pacific Railroad, making the eastern terminus of that road really at Council Bluffs. Its total length, including its necessary approaches by embankment on the eastern shore, and by lengthy tressel-work on the western shore is nine thousand nine hundred and fifty feet, or nearly two miles.

The old depot grounds of the Union Pacific Railroad were on the bank of the river, directly under the present bridge. In order to complete the connection between the bridge and the road, a branch line, seven thousand feet in length, was laid down directly through the city, and a new, spacious and most commodious depot constructed, on higher ground. And from this depot the westward-bound traveler takes his departure for that western empire toward the setting sun, and may, perhaps, continue his journey until he has reached and passed the Golden Gate, and only the solemn immensity of the ocean lies before him.

Situated midway of the American continent, on a navigable river, which drains the northwest, and opens communication with the east and south; a prominent point on the great road which clasps a continent and unites the Atlantic with the Pacific; and at the same time a terminus for lesser roads which open up to it the trade and commerce of the interior; and on the borders of two states rich in agricultural and mineral wealth, and settled by a thrifty, intelligent and enterprising people; Omaha can scarcely fail to become the greatest city west of St. Louis. Founded but a generation ago, its business is already stupendous, though it is really but a beginning of what it promises to be in the future. As Iowa, Nebraska, and the States and Territories still further to the northwest, become more thickly settled, with their resources developed, it will form their natural commercial centre, to which they will look for supplies, and where they will find a market or a port for their produce and manufactures. With such an outlook, who will dare to limit Omaha's possibilities in the future, or say that any flight of the imagination really exceeds what the actuality may prove?

CHAPTER XXIII.