USA > Nebraska > Douglas County > Omaha > Omaha: the Gate city, and Douglas County, Nebraska, a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 17
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The office of police captain was abolished in 1874 and the force placed under the control of the city marshal. This system continued for about twelve years, or until the State Legislature of 1887 passed an act creating a board of fire and police commissioners of five members, one of which was the mayor of the city. Pursuant to the provisions of the act, Governor John M. Thayer appointed as the other four members L. M. Bennett, Christian Hartman, George I. Gilbert and Howard B. Smith. The commissioners took office on May 10, 1887, held their first meeting the next day, and at a second meeting on the 16th adopted and filed with the city clerk "rules and regulations governing the appointment, promotion, removal, trial and discipline of the officers and men of the police department of Omaha."
When the board met on May 19, 1887, to appoint a chief of police, a con- flict arose between the commissioners and the city council. There were several applicants for the position, but the board selected Webb S. Seavey, who had served as officer in the Fifth Iowa Cavalry during the Civil war. Two days later Mr. Seavey filed with the hoard a bond in the sum of $10,000, which bond was accepted and approved by the board and sent to the city council. City Marshal Cummings vacated his office on May 25, 1887, and Chief Seavey assumed control of the police force. In the council, the chief's bond was referred to the judiciary committee, and on June 7. 1887, that committee submitted majority and minority reports on the matter. The minority report recommended that the appointment of Mr. Seavey be recognized as legal and that his bond be accepted. The majority report was as follows :
"The judiciary committee, to whom was referred the pretended official bond of one Seavey, together with the report from the police committee, have had the same under consideration and report thereon as follows :
"First. That the board of fire and police commissioners, without the neces- sary rules and regulations to be prescribed by ordinance, have no authority to make any such appointment : and, as the ordinance to prescribe rules is under consideration by the council and has not passed, the pretended appointment is premature and uncalled for.
"Second. That no authority exists at the present time for the presentation of the pretended bond to the city council, and the same is not in form prescribed by any law now in existence. For these reasons we recommend that the pre- tended bond be rejected.
"I. S. HASCALL, "LEAVITT BURNHAM, "MICHAEL LEE."
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A week later the city attorney, John L. Webster, to whom the question had been referred, gave an opinion in which he practically sustained the action of the commissioners. The council then passed an ordinance requiring the com- missioners each to give bond in the sum of $5,000. The bonds of Bennett and Hartman were approved by the council on August 9, 1887, but the bonds of Gilbert and Smith were rejected on the technicality that the names of the sureties signing the bond did not appear in the body of the instrument. The two com- missioners then prepared new bonds correcting this defect and filed them with the council on the 30th of August, but that body neglected to approve or reject the bonds. The commissioners continued, however, to perform their duties with- out objection.
All the members of the fire department were appointed by the board to the positions they had held before the passage of the act creating the commission. This was done on June 28, 1887, and on July 26th the board met to examine applicants for positions on the police force. Among those who appeared for examination were all the members of the old force and a number of new appli- cants. Two days later the board announced the appointment of forty-two men, several of whom were new men, fourteen members of the old force being dropped. This action of the board increased the opposition of the council. That body had refused from the first to recognize Mr. Seavey as the chief of police or to pay his salary, and now refused to recognize or pay any of the new ap- pointees of the board, except those who had previously been members of the force.
On. October 1, 1887, the board of fire and police commissioners adopted resolutions setting forth that the board could not bring suit in the Supreme Court of the state to settle the relative powers of. the board and the city council, while the council could; requesting the council to take the necessary steps to bring such an action ; and also requesting that the salaries of the police officers appointed by the board be paid out of the funds available for that purpose. The council ignored the resolutions and a public mass meeting was called to meet at the rooms of the board of trade. At that meeting resolutions condemning the action and attitude of the council were passed and a "Policemen's Relief Association" was formed for the purpose of raising money to pay the men until the council should do so. This plan was continued for several months, when Edward W. Simeral, county attorney, instituted a suit in the Nebraska Supreme Court, to test the title of Chief Seavey to his office. J. C. Cowin and G. W. Ambrose were employed as attorneys to represent the city and filed an amend- ment to the petition in the Supreme Court. They also instituted quo warranto proceedings against the commissioners to test their title to office. Chief Seavey was represented in this suit by George B. Lake. The Supreme Court sustained the title of the chief and the commissioners to their respective offices, whereupon suit was commenced in the District Court against the city by the commissioners for their salaries and judgment was rendered in their favor. The money advanced by the Policemen's Relief Association was also recovered in an action in the District Court. This ended the trouble.
The police force as constituted in 1916 consists of 181 persons, with H. W. Dunn as chief. There are four captains, seven sergeants, four desk sergeants, one traffic sergeant, four patrol conductors, six chauffeurs, one Bertillon man.
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fourteen detectives under the chieftainship of Stephen Maloney, seven motor- cycle men, one matron, one police woman, eleven trate men and ninety-six patrol- men, the other twenty-two men being assigned to various duties connected with the department.
PUBLIC IMPROVEMENTS
Savage & Bell, in their History of Omaha, say: "The public improvements carried on by the city were insignificant in extent until about 1882, when the necessity therefor became so apparent that a general system of grading, sewerage and paving was inaugurated. In January of that year a board of public works was appointed by the mayor and council, consisting of James Creighton, chair- man, Joseph Barker and John Wilson. Previous to the appointment of this board, a very considerable sum had been expended by the city, under direction of the street commissioner, for grading, and Farnam Street had been macadam- ized from Ninth to Fifteenth at a cost of $25,000; but general improvements were conducted so loosely that the aggregate amount thus expended cannot now be ascertained."
The first asphalt pavement in the city was laid on Douglas Street, from Fourteenth to Sixteenth, in the fall of 1882. It was put down by the Barber Asphalt Company, under the superintendency of John Grant, at a cost of $2.98 per square yard. About the same time Farnam Street was paved with Sioux Falls granite, making a roadway that would withstand the heavy traffic to which that street was subjected. In some of the early paving contracts wooden blocks were used, but they were found to be unsatisfactory as a paving material and were abandoned about 1890, since which time vitrified brick and asphalt have been chiefly used. On January 1, 1916, Omaha had 218 miles of paved streets and alleys, and during the year 1915 the city expended $580,878.99 for new pavements.
GRADING THE STREETS
Visitors to Omaha sometimes speak of it as "a city of hills and hollows," but had they been here forty or forty-five years ago they would have had much better reason for applying that appellation. The conversion of the Town of Omaha, as it was when incorporated in 1857, into its present condition has involved the removal of a vast amount of earth in cutting down hills and filling up hollows. The first established grade in the city was on St. Mary's Avenue in 1873. The avenue then was an important thoroughfare and the property holders along it remonstrated against the radical change in the grade. The result of this opposition was a modified grade, necessitating the removal of a less quantity of earth, and even then some of the property holders insisted that the change was too radical.
On Farnam Street the grade has been changed three times, the last grade involving a cut of over forty feet at Seventeenth Street and a fill quite as much between Twentieth and Twenty-fourth streets. The City Hall, on the northeast corner of Eighteenth and Farnam, stands on an elevation, but it may not be generally known that the elevation was much higher, and that in cutting it down
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to the present grade the handsome residence of Governor Alvin Saunders, which then occupied that corner, was destroyed. Just across Farnam Street, the block bounded by Farnam, Harney, Seventeenth and Eighteenth streets had been pur- chased by the county as a site for a new courthouse. The county commissioners, knowing that the grade of the surrounding streets was to be changed, removed a large quantity of earth from the premises before erecting the building. For this they were criticized by some of the citizens, but after the new grade was estab- lished the board came in for equally as much criticism from visitors to the court- house, because of the long flights of steps they had to climb to get into the building.
Douglas Street, from about Seventeenth Street west, was cut down forty feet or more, the heaviest excavation being in the neighborhood of Nineteentli Street. Just a block north of this point, on the southwest corner of Nineteenth and Dodge streets, a little of the original hill remains, and the foundation of the house standing on that lot is higher than the roofs of some of the surround- ing buildings.
At the intersection of Sonth Sixteenth and Jones streets about fifty feet of earth was removed; over sixty feet were taken from the natural grade at the intersection of South Eleventh and Pierce streets; fully forty feet were taken from the lot at the southwest corner of Sixteenth and Harney, where the Burgess- Nash stores are now located, which lot was once the property of Gen. W. W. Lowe, a son of Dr. Enos Lowe, one of the founders of Omaha; the creek that once flowed along Nicholas Street has been filled up, and in fact, in nearly every part of the city changes in grade have been made to facilitate traffic and accom- modate pedestrians.
SEWER SYSTEM
The first sewers in Omaha were constructed on what is known as the Waring system, but the almost marvelous growth of the city was not taken into consider- ation and the sewers built by this method were soon found to be entirely inadequate to the demand for sanitary sewage. Then the plan of building large trunk sewers, with lateral branches, was adopted and has given much better satisfaction. All the trunk sewers of Omaha proper discharge their contents into the Missouri River, but in the western part of Dundee, where the natural drainage is in the opposite direction, a separate system has been installed. Here a septic tank was built in 1914, sufficiently large to receive and disinfect all the sewage of that suburb. During the year 1915 the city expended $220,136.55 upon the sewers, bringing the total mileage up to 297. Few cities of its size can boast a better sewer system than Omaha.
HOW THE STREETS WERE NAMED
Although a number of the first streets were named before the city was incorporated. in 1857, it may be of interest to note in this connection how their names were derived. But after the lapse of more than three score years since the first streets were marked and named. and in the absence of records relating
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OMAHA AND DOUGLAS COUNTY
to the subject, it is impossible to give accurate information regarding the origin of the names of some of the city's thoroughfares.
No explanation is needed concerning the numbered streets, from First to Fifty-third. These streets run north and south, beginning with First Street at the Missouri River and numbering consecutively westward to the city limits. The same is true of several streets which bear the names of states, such as Nebraska, Missouri, Kansas, Indiana, Ohio, etc. Names of trees were given to quite a number of the streets, and in South Omaha twenty-six streets running east and west are named for the letters of the alphabet from A to Z inclusive.
Ames Avenue was named for Oakes Ames, a friend of George Francis Train, one of the promoters of the Union Pacific Railroad and one of the largest stock- holders in the Credit Mobilier.
Bancroft Street was doubtless named for the historian, George Bancroft, whose history of the United States is regarded as the most authentic ever published.
Bauman Street was named for Otto Bauman, a large property owner aud hotel proprietor of early days, who died some years ago at West Point, Neb.
Blaine Street was named for James G. Blaine, of Maine, who was for many years in Congress and served as secretary of state in the cabinet of President Benjamin Harrison.
Boyd Street was named for James E. Boyd; one of the early settlers of Omaha, mayor of the city in 1886, and in 1890 was elected governor of Nebraska.
Burdette Street bears the name of Robert Burdette, humorist and lecturer. for many years editor of the Burlington (Iowa) Hawkeye.
Burt Street was named in honor of Francis Burt, the first territorial gov- ernor of Nebraska, who died at Bellevue on October 18, 1854, a few days after his arrival in the territory.
Caldwell Street was named for Smith S. Caldwell, who came to Omaha in 1859, was one of the early bankers and was elected mayor of the city in 1871.
California Street is said to have been so named because the gold seekers of the early '50s, on their way to California, landed near the foot of this street upon crossing the Missouri River.
Capitol Avenue derived its name from the fact that it formed the main approach to the old territorial capitol building, which stood on the elevation where the high school is now located.
Carter Street was named for O. M. Carter, president of the American Savings Bank, one of the early financial institutions, and vice president of the Nebraska Central Railroad Company.
Cass Street was named for Gen. Lewis Cass, of Michigan, a prominent leader in the democratic party and secretary of state in the cabinet of President Buchanan.
Castellar Street bears the name of Emilio Castelar, a Spanish statesman and journalist, who was born in 1832. In 1865 he made an attack on the Queen in a radical journal, for which he was sentenced to death, but escaped to Switzer- land and later to Paris. In 1868 he returned to Spain and five years later was made minister of foreign affairs. Just why his name should have been selected for an Omaha street is not certain. There is also a public school called the Castelar school, in which the name is spelled correctly, with only one "1."
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OMAHA AND DOUGLAS COUNTY
Clark Street, according to some authorities, was named for S. H. Clark, one of the early superintendents of the Union Pacific Railroad. Others say it was named for William Clark, of the Lewis and Clark expedition which went up the Missouri in 1804.
Clarkson Street was no doubt named for the Rt. Rev. Robert H. Clarkson, the first bishop of the Nebraska diocese of the Protestant Episcopal Church and founder of the Clarkson Memorial Hospital.
Davenport Street was named by a firm of bankers who came from Daven- port, Iowa, and established a bank at Florence. The street was named in honor of their home town and also a leading family of that city.
Decatur Street was named for Stephen Decatur, an eccentric character of pioneer days, an account of whom may be found in another chapter of this history.
Dewey Street was named for Charles H. Dewey, who came to Omaha about the close of the Civil war and was for years one of the leading furniture dealers.
Dodge Street bears the name of a prominent Iowa family, but more particu- larly the name of Augustus C. Dodge, who introduced the bill in the United States Senate that resulted in the organization of Nebraska Territory in 1854.
Dorcas Street was named by Samuel E. Rogers for his mother, whose maiden name was Dorcas Kent.
Douglas Street was named for Stephen A. Douglas, United States Senator from Illinois, who championed the Kansas-Nebraska Bill that resulted in Nebraska becoming an organized territory, and who was the democratic can- didate for president in 1860.
Drexel Street was named for Frederick Drexel, one of Omaha's early settlers, who was elected to the Legislature in 1866 and was at one time county com- missioner.
Dupont Street is so named because the Dupont Powder Company once had a powder house in the grove near Gibson Station. This powder house was blown up-accidently it is supposed-by four young men while out hunting, all of whom were killed by the explosion.
Ed Creighton Avenue was named for Edward Creighton, founder of Creigh- ton University. John Creighton Boulevard is named for another member of the family.
Emmet Street was probably named for Robert Emmet, the Irish orator and patriot. as a compliment to some of the Irish pioneers of Omaha.
Farnam Street was named for Henry Farnam, a banker of Hartford, Conn., who was one of the principal promoters of the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific Railroad.
Florence Boulevard was so named because it is the thoroughfare that leads to Florence, a suburban town in the northeastern part of Douglas County.
Fontenelle Boulevard needs but little explanation to those at all familiar with Omaha history. It bears the name of Logan Fontenelle, the last chief of the Omaha Indians.
Funston Avenue was named for Gen. Frederick Funston, of Kansas, who won distinction in the Philippine war by the capture of Emilio Aguinaldo, the insurgent leader.
Goodwill Street (now Grand Avenue) was originally named for Taylor G.
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Goodwill, a member of the upper branch of the first Territorial Legislature and the first treasurer of Douglas County.
Grover Street bears the first name of Grover Cleveland, the twenty-second President of the United States.
Hamilton Street was named for Charles W. Hamilton, one of the early settlers, who was at one time president of the United States National Bank, and was a member of the first board of education under the present school system.
Hanscom Boulevard, which connects Hanscom and Deer parks, was named for Andrew J. Hanscom, a member of the first Territorial Legislature, and was for many years prominently identified with Omaha affairs.
Harney Street bears the name of Gen. William S. Harney, a noted Indian fighter in the days before Nebraska Territory was organized.
Hascall Street was named for Isaac S. Hascall, county judge of Douglas County in 1865; state senator in 1867 and again in 1871, and who was elected a member of the city council in 1883 and 1887.
Himebaugh Street was named for Pierce C. Himebaugh, one of the active promoters of the Omaha Young Men's Christian Association, of which he was president for seven years. He was also president of the Dime Savings Bank and vice president of the Omaha Union Grain Company.
Howard Street, some claim, was named for the father-in-law of Henry Farnam. Other authorities say it was named for Thomas P. Howard, who was a member of the Lewis and Clark expedition of 1804.
Jones Street's name has been attributed to two individuals of that name- Alfred D. Jones, who made the first survey of the town of Omaha, and George W. Jones, a prominent figure in Iowa politics in early days. The former is more likely correct, as he was actively identified with Omaha's early history.
Lafayette Street bears the name of the Marquis de La Fayette, who came from his native France with a large body of soldiers and fought on the side of the American colonists in the War for Independence.
Lake Street has been considered by some as being inappropriately named, for the reason that there is no lake in the vicinity. It was named for George B. Lake, an early member of the Omaha bar and one of the first justices of the Nebraska Supreme Court when the state was admitted in 1867.
Leavenworth Street was named for Gen. Henry Leavenworth, a noted mili- tary figure in the West in early days, and founder of Fort Leavenworth, Kan.
Manderson Street was named for Charles F. Manderson, a delegate to the constitutional conventions of 1871 and 1875, city attorney of Omaha in 1877. after which he served two terms in the United States Senate.
Marcy Street was named for William L. Marcy, secretary of war in the cabinet of President Pierce at the time Nebraska Territory was organized.
Martha Street was named by S. E. Rogers for his wife, whose maiden name was Martha Brown, whom he married in Indiana in 1848.
Mason Street is said to have been named for Judge Charles Mason, an eminent lawver and jurist of Iowa in early days.
Mercer Street, or Boulevard, was named for one of the early families of Omaha, of which Dr. Samuel D. Mercer and David H. Mercer were the best
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known representatives. The latter was elected to Congress from the Omaha District in 1892.
Meredith Avenue was in all probability named for John R. Meredith, a native of Pennsylvania, for years one of the leading attorneys of Omaha, a member of the city council in 1868 and one of the incorporators of the Omaha Horse Railway Company.
Military Avenue derives its name from the fact that it leads to the old military road.
Miller Street was named for Dr. George L. Miller, the first practicing phy- sician in Omaha and one of the builders of the Herndon House, the first pretentious hotel in the city.
Orchard Avenue, in South Omaha, is named for Andrew R. and Samuel A. Orchard, who were among the purchasers of the land by patents from the gen- eral government on which South Omaha is now situated.
Oregon Trail is so named because it forms a part of the once famous thor- oughfare over which emigrants from the eastern states were accustomed to pass on their way westward.
Park Wild Avenue ( now written Parkwild) derives its names from the claim staked off by Alfred D. Jones before Omaha was surveyed, which he named "Park Wilde."
Paxton Boulevard and Paxton Avenue are named for William A. Paxton, who was for many years one of Omaha's leading business men.
Poppleton Avenue was named for Andrew J. Poppleton, the first attorney to locate in Omaha, member of the first Territorial Legislature, and in other ways intimately associated with the city's development.
Pratt Street is said to have been named after Augustus Pratt, a member of the first board of park commissioners, and at one time a member of the board of education.
Redick Avenue was named for John I. Redick, one of the pioneer lawyers of Omaha, a member of the Legislature of 1860, and who was appointed one of the territorial judges of New Mexico by President Grant.
Redman Avenue was named for Joseph Redman, a member of the first board of education, and who was elected to the city council in 1878.
Riverview Boulevard, a short thoroughfare leading northward from River- view Park, derives its name from the park and from the fine view of the Missouri River that may be obtained.
Ruggles Street was named for Gen. George D. Ruggles, who graduated at the West Point Military Academy in 1855 and was in command of the garrison at Fort Kearney at the breaking out of the Civil war.
St. Mary's Avenue takes its name from an institution there in early days known as St. Mary's Convent. The convent is gone but the name still remains.
Sahler Street, in the northern part of the city ; was named for John H. Sahler, who went with O. D. Richardson to Washington in 1859 "to urge legislation in behalf of the city," and who was the first police judge of Omaha when that office was created in 1868.
Saratoga Street takes its name from the old Saratoga Precinct on the north side.
Seward Street is one about whose name there is a difference of opinion.
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Some are inclined to favor the theory that it was named for William H. Seward, secretary of state in the cabinet of President Lincoln, and others say it was named for H. L. Seward, who was city marshal for a short time in 1871.
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