A Brief History of Arnold. (Stories collected from Noreen Mill’s One Hundred Years on the South Loup, Solomon Butcher’s Pioneer History of Custer County Nebraska (reprinted by Purcell’s Inc. Broken Bow, NE, and an atlas from Kim Beshaler)
“For weeks the covered wagon had crawled slowly over the Nebraska plains, carrying a young family of land-seekers (Richard Allen and his wife of one year Lovira (Levina, most common spelling I’ve seen.) their new baby daughter, and Levina’s sister). They had started from Iowa in early spring 1880, heading for Kansas, but hot winds and parched country caused them to veer NW and head up the South Loup Valley. (p. 16-17) They drew up to where the land was level, the soil rich, and the water plentiful – the valley where the family would find a home and build a town. It was the spring of 1880, they said their goodbyes to their home, and with a wagon loaded, struck off for a new life. Drought conditions discouraged them, but they were undaunted.
John Finch was the first cowboy they met on the last day of their journey. He had come upon them in their small prairie schooner. He was searching desperately for camphor to revive a friend who’d been crushed under his horse when it had stumbled. The Allens sent their supply of Winslow’s Soothing Syrup, but by the time Finch returned, it was too late.
No sooner had the Allens made camp (deciding upon a suitable spot where Arnold now stands) when a group of angry cowboys warned them to move on, not wanting settlers in the area. The young couple, however, were determined and gradually made friends with the ranch hands. The covered box lifted from the wagon made a suitable shelter while Mr. Allen put up a small sod house. The sod house was quickly replaced when Mr. Allen build a log house. Mrs. Allen remembers papering the walls with old newspapers, using flour and water for paste. In this meager log cabin, the small group of four weathered the terrible winter of 1880-81, which was so devastating to the cattlemen. This cabin was located where the town hall now stands possibly closer to the river.
At first, Lovira (Levina in the atlas Kim Beshaler had) Allen and Mrs. Swain (Sarah) Finch were the only women in the country (p. 17). The two women were called often to nurse the sick and “lay out the dead”. More and more homesteaders began to trickle in. Landis Correll, an impoverished, unschooled Church of Christ preacher was among those who arrived in the newly forming town. He filed on the quarter joining Allen’s on the east. Present Correll Street marks the line between the two claims. In a young man’s country, Landis Correll was old, 60, shriveled, with a long white beard, but if any could be said to be the “father” of Arnold, it would be this good and kindly man. No matter what their faith, he served the people well, married them, buried them, and comforted them. His last sermon before his death in 1906 was titled, “Can an old man be useful?” (p. 18-19)
The Finch family, Allen family, Correll family, J. D. Haskell family, and the George Arnold family were some of the other early families to make their homes in Arnold. Since 1876, mail destined for this part of the Loup Valley was brought by horseback every two weeks from Plum Creek (Lexington) and addressed to “Arnold & Ritchie Ranch, C/O Postmaster. The ranch partners had taken turns handling the mail – now a change would have to be made. Richard Allen offered to have the post office in is sod house and on March 21, 1881, he, with Landis Correll and George Arnold, met to choose a name for the new office. The three names considered were “Correll”, “Allen”, “Arnold”, and finally “Arnold” was chosen and a letter was sent off to Washington for a new rubber stamp. (p. 19) George Arnold, partially paralyzed from a stroke suffered the year before, probably never knew the little office given his name ever developed into a town, which was laid out in 1883. After his stroke, he had gone back east to his family home in Ohio, and died in 1900, leaving no relatives in Arnold.
The first store in Arnold was located in the sod house of Richard Allen. A visionary, Allen quickly added “Allen’s addition” increasing the size of the town. The Allen family had outgrown their log home, so in 1887, they built a frame structure located where the town hall site is now. It was believed to be the first frame structure in Arnold. My husband and I are now the proud owners of that house, located just north of the city library. We did extensive remodeling in 2012, but the shell of the original house remains the same. (pg. 73)
Another one of the older houses still standing in Arnold was the Fay G. and Ruth (MacFarland) Finch house, which you saw on your tour earlier this morning. The present owners are doing extensive remodeling to try to retain the beautiful interior as it was in the early 1900s. Fay and Ruth’s granddaughter is still a resident of Arnold and provided me with much of the information that I’ve presented to you. Ephriam SWAIN Finch (1836-1905), as mentioned earlier, was one of the first settlers in the Arnold area and made quite a name for himself. (p.7) “Swain and Sarah Finch’s life as rugged pioneers have been recorded in detail in Butcher’s and Gaston’s histories of Custer County. They made their home on the ranch until his death in 1905 when Sarah Finch moved to Arnold and stayed in her home until she died in 1920. Solomon Butcher, a well-known pioneer photographer and author of “Pioneer History of Custer County”, became a close friend of Swain Finch and was a frequent visitor in his ranch home. It was Swain Finch who raised the money for Butcher to publish his county history in 1901”, as reported in “One Hundred Years on the South Loup”, by Noreen Hall Mills. The rest of my presentation will give you a little taste of the history of some of our longest-standing buildings downtown. Cheryl has put together a map with brief descriptions so that you can spend as much time as you need looking at these historic buildings. (Each building will be numbered to match it’s position on the map.)
Hotel Custer – Economy Department Store
(John Jameson – 1928)
At least three different businesses have occupied the SE corner of Arnold Avenue and Walnut Street. The 1912 Duckett and Maddox building housed Arnold Hardware on the main floor with the “Opera House” on the second floor. The year 1912 will be remembered as the day the trains came. Wanting to be ready for business when the trains arrived on March 13, 1912, Tucker Jones left Arnold headed for Callaway in 2 feet of snow to get two wagon loads, pulled by four horses each, loaded with hardware. It took him from dawn to dusk to make the 23-mile trip. An Arnold Hardware Co. Ad depicting a beautiful horse-drawn funeral car boasted, “We are connected with a licensed embalmer and are prepared to render the best service possible”, as its owner J.D. Duckett was an undertaker. When Jones moved his Hardware business across the street to the building now housed by Farmhouse Antiques, the store then became Farmers Union Store and Thelan’s Pharmacy.
Saturday, December 10, 1927, a memorable
Day in Arnold—the day of the big FIRE!!
An occupant sleeping in the back of the store woke to find the roof and wall in flames beside his bed. He hurried to ring the fire bell, but it was too late. The fire caused a $50,000 loss. Even hundreds of dollars worth of damage was done by the intense heat, to the windows of the Arnold State Bank located across the street. This is the building, still standing (empty) directly west across the street from the Custer Hotel. John Jameson bought the lots on the burned-out corner from the Maddox estate and began construction of a two-story building with the upper floor to be used for a hotel. The stones near the top of the present building (on the west) show J J 1928, the year that it was completed. He moved his Jameson & Co general store from the Vogel building. The Vogel building was the first brick building built in Arnold in 1920 and was torn down in 1982, by Bob Forrester for his car dealership. Both stores in Jameson’s new building had opening celebrations offering $10 prizes for the best names. “HOTEL CUSTER”, and “ECONOMY DEPARTMENT” were the winning store names. (The building was remodeled during the 1970s. My three sons and I removed the old decorative tin ceiling and plaster in the upstairs rooms. My husband and I are now the lucky owners of that old ornately decorated tin that was carefully remounted on the ceiling of the dining room in our home east of Arnold.
In 2013, the wording on the outside of the entire building got a facelift. Hotel Custer/Economy Department now houses a variety of businesses on the lower level as it has for the last 98 years, with four updated office suites. The upper floor contains seven modern apartments.
Compiled by Berni Crow, 4/17/16
The following information has been Submitted by Marcy Lucas,
Darrell Sheets’ Museum
At 104 North Walnut stands a frame building, it is the last remaining original frame structure in downtown Arnold.
In 1907 Arnold’s leading businessmen bought a lot north of the Finch drug store and erected a frame building, complete with a cellar, to be used as a general store called the Arnold Mercantile Company.
The Company bought a team and wagon and hauled goods from the railroad at Callaway up to Arnold. On the trip back to Callaway the driver would haul cream and eggs produced by Arnold farmers. This was a profitable enterprise that lasted over 10 years.
Proud that Arnold was stepping right along in spite of hard times, Editor J.C. Naylor of the Arnold Sentinel printed a summary of changes in town between 1932 and 1937. He noted that Vernon and Persis Tubbs had opened a U and I Store, fruits and groceries, in what had been the Arnold Mercantile.
By about 1940, the U and I Grocery had changed owners and was being operated by Lloyd and Alice Beltz.
Also, during the 1940s the building became a pool hall with a 3-lane bowling alley that was being run by Glen Taylor. During their high school years, Doug Cole and Jerry Ahrens, both of Arnold, worked for Mr. Taylor setting pins at the bowling alley. It continued to be a pool hall into the early 1950s with Virgil Catterson operating the business.
In 1959 the Odd Fellows and Rebekahs purchased the building from Glen and Margaret A. Myers. During those years the Rebekahs (the female version of the Odd Fellows) supported various organizations with the use of the hall for the bloodmobile, funeral dinners, fall festival displays, and banquets.
From 1998 to the present, Darrell Sheets has owned the building. Turning it into a museum for his vast collection of antique tools and hay carriers.
Submitted by Marcy Lucas – Arnold Library
Located on North Walnut, 1 ½ blocks north of Arnold Avenue (Highway 92) stands the Finch Memorial Library, a brick building topped with a green tile roof.
Eight ladies met at the Wm. Jennings home in February 1913, to organize a club called the Arnold Women’s Improvement Club. Or A.W.I.C. They elected Mrs. Fred Brittan president, Mrs. Jennings, vice-president, Mrs. Tom Backes treasurer, and Mrs. Chas. Beardsley reporter. Others present that day were Mrs. Wm. Conrad, Mrs. T. L. Jones, and Mrs. A. J. McCants.
The idea of a library at Arnold came from the Arnold Women’s Improvement Club in 1914. Each member donated a book to a private library for club members only. It was not opened to the public until 1917 when each member took their turn at running the library. Mr. Wheeler, cashier of the Farmers State Bank, allowed the use of the west room in the new bank building as a library, to be open on Saturday afternoons. The first book was borrowed from a bank employee, George DeMetz. The entire 1917 collection was contained in one small bookcase.
The library continued in this location until the summer of 1918 when the Farmers Bank became the Arnold State Bank and the new officers needed the west room for themselves. The little library was moved to the ladies’ lounge, thereby eliminating one-half of the population from becoming borrowers. Other quarters were needed and Fred Brittan offered to share his office in the back room of the new Security State Bank.
The book collection had gradually grown through donations, and in 1919 the AWIC offered it to Arnold Township, with the request they make a tax levy for its support. Township voters accepted the gift, 513 books, four bookcases, and all necessary equipment, and levied the necessary tax. Miss Essie Haskell, Charles Sanderson, Mrs. Fred Brittan and Miss Laura Peterson were appointed as board of directors. Miss Peterson was chosen to be the librarian.
That same year the Arnold High School freshman class gave the library 21 new books, selected by themselves. Mr. Brittan could no longer spare the room for the library, so it was moved once again, this time to the basement of the bank in 1921. This location was a bit damp and dark for library purposes and cost $7.50 a month rent. When Neil Logan offered to rent them his office, they quickly moved, but in less than three months the Logan building was sold.
After a long search, the Tom Backes house was rented and another move made, but finally a permanent home was in sight. Mrs. Swain Finch, who died in 1920, willed $17,000 to the village to erect a library building in memory of her husband and herself. By the time the cornerstone of the large brick structure was laid in 1924, the bequest had grown to $23,000. The final move was made on January 14, 1925. The building was made a public institution, administered by a library board, and supported by a tax levy.
The large bronze memorial tablet on the library’s east wall was designed by librarian Laura Peterson and is a tribute to the pioneer life of Ephriam and Sarah Finch. It was unveiled on April 30, 1925, before an audience that filled the building’s main floor.
Librarians have been Laura Peterson, Mrs. Hawley Wehrley, Alice Beltz, Clara Fox, Caroline Geiser, Norene Mills, Darlene Rimpley, and Marcy Lucas. (Have her stand if she’s in the crowd.)
Official word was received on July 1, 2015, designating Finch Memorial Library as a National Historic Landmark. The process began in the spring of 2014 as a project of the Arnold Economic Development Corporation (AEDC) with intern Dayna Larreau, and the AEDC Director, Sandy Hicks. They worked on several sites in Arnold that they felt might be eligible. Only the library met the strict criteria set by the registry.
In April of 2015, Cheryl Carson the new AEDC Director made the final presentation to the State Historical Preservation Board. Its acceptance to the registry will now make federal funds available for the library.
One of the first projects will be to do some resurfacing on the exterior of the building called Tuck Pointing. In doing so it will keep the library viable so it can continue to serve the people of Arnold now and into the future as it has done in the past.