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OUR HISTORY
Long before homesteaders and immigrants began to pass through and settle in central Nebraska in the early and mid- nineteenth century, the region had long been peopled by Na- tive Americans, and in the last two millennium, the Pawnees. They had occupied a wide swath of territory that included parts of present-day Nebraska, Kansas, and South Dakota. Indigenous peoples had inhabited what is now the United States and Canada for at least ten thousand years and some have suggested as many as forty thousand years. Central Nebraska has long been a transportation artery with its rivers, trails, railroads, and later roadways crossing it. The Great Platte River Road as it was called, was described as the grand corridor of America’s westward expansion and fol- lowed the route of the Platte River beginning at the Missouri River, at the eastern end of Nebraska, to the west end and then continuing into the state of Wyoming. This route was the basis for the later creation of the Overland Trails includ- ing the Mormon, Oregon and the California trails which were most heavily used between 1841 until 1869. These trails ran through on the north side, such as the Mormon, or to the south of Cozad including the Oregon and California trails. In addition, the route of the Pony Express mail system ran to the south of Cozad and a waystation, which was moved, has been preserved in City Park. Those trails were succeeded by the construction of the Union Pacific Railroad which arrived
in the place that later became Cozad in 1866. It proceeded westward until in 1869 it met the Central Pacific Railroad at Prom- ontory Summit, Utah. For the first time a transcontinental railroad was in operation. Then, less than five decades later, the newly designated Lincoln Highway was dedicated in 1913, the first road built across America which ran through Cozad and was suc- ceeded by U.S. Route 30. Finally, there is Interstate Route 80 which begins just west of New York City, passes just south of Cozad, and ends in San Francisco, California. Cozad is located on a corridor of commu- nities including San Francisco, Denver, Salt Lake City, Omaha, Chicago, and smaller cities in between. The 100th Meridian, on which Cozad is located, holds significance beyond the 1862 transcontinental railroad legis- lation that President Abraham Lincoln signed to encourage the construction of a railroad clear across the country. It was a unique place that had been ar- tificially created and, as railroad surveyors would proclaim, was the place where the humid East met the arid West. John Wesley Powell a surveyor with the United States Army and writing for the United States Geological Survey in 1879 had stated that: “The 100th Meridian was the natural demarcation line extend- ing northward from the western shore of the Gulf of Mexico. Evaporation from the gulf waters supplies most of the rainfall east of the Meridian, West of the Meridian precipitation comes largely from the Pacific which is
generally insufficient for agri- cultural needs without irrigation. Here on the Meridian East meets the Arid West.” It remains for the community a matter of pride and continues to play an important role in the city’s identity. For decades, the sign placed along the railroad track by Thomas Durant in 1866 greeted visitors going in either direction. Sometime in the late nineteenth century the sign disappeared. A new monument, made of stone native to the area, was erected by the Cozad chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution at approxi- mately the same location, next to the 1925 Union Pacific railroad passenger station. A sign has straddled U.S. Route 30 des- ignating the community as the site of the meridian for decades. Even today promotional efforts continue to draw attention to that
line although it has been located by more modern techniques and with greater accuracy, to the west of the town on U.S. Route 30 near the Cozad Municipal Airport. The town of Cozad, located on the 100th Meridian, 247 miles west of Omaha, was the dream of John. J. Cozad from Cincin- nati, Ohio. In 1872, when John J. Cozad was traveling through the Platte valley on the Union Pacific, he saw a sign on the right-of-way bearing the words 100th Meridian. This particular location impressed him as being a favorable site for a town. He purchased options on 40,000 acres of land from the Union Pacific Railroad and organized a campaign to encourage people to move to Cozad. A railroad boxcar was the first building, with the name COZAD painted on each end.
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