Talk:Brady (Nebraska)

History lesson

I removed the following from the article, as it is not quite what we're looking for.-- (WT-en) Fastestdogever 01:16, 15 August 2007 (EDT)

As a result of the great overland migration across Nebraska, many towns sprang up to serve as way-stations. The building of the railroad brought many more people to the area, as did the freight business development due to the heavy demand for goods and supplies from the east.

In the 1860s, when Union Pacific Railroad construction workers in the area numbered nearly 1,000, the town was a collection of tents and soddies along the river, the only water supply. When the construction gangs moved on, Brady Island became a deserted river site, except for G.W. and Sarah Parsons, who lived across the river, and John McCullaugh, Ed Springer, Ben Murphy, Byron Whightmans and Wm.G.I. Craig, who stayed on.

There were businesses at this location in the 1880s, but the town was not formally laid out until January 1889. As one of the railroad's pump house sites, early merchants profited from having the trains stop here. Brady Island had the only saloon between Grand Island and Cheyenne for a time. The stockyards, where thousands of head of cattle were brought for shipment, stretched for almost half a mile along the tracks.

The first school was formed by chance in 1874 when a group of immigrant families stayed over due to an injury to one of their group. Enlarged several times, the present school was built in 1925. Roy Cochran, graduating in the first class from Brady High School in 1906, became the 24th Governor of Nebraska and served three terms from 1934-40. The present K-12 school district entails a large area, including residents from Jeffery Lake four miles south of town.

The first church was built in 1892 at the present location of the United Methodist, with a second church built and enlarged in 1925. Sacred Heart Catholic Church was built in 1910. The Berean Fundamental Church, organized in 1954, dedicated its building in 1967.

The town incorporated in 1907, at which time it officially changed its name from Brady Island to "Brady." (It took the railroad until 1955 to paint the "Island" off their depot.) From 1910 on, the town's physical structure took form. There was a weekly paper (in 1880, "The Brady Blade" and in 1908, "Brady Vindicator"), a bank, several grain elevators, the usual assortment of shops, a cream station, a pole and neckyoke factory. Brady also had a good city band and bandstand. Norm Edward, who built the drug store, invented "Vancoa," a medicated salve which helped many people through the influenza epidemic in 1918.

Fourth of July celebrations were big affairs in Brady. The Commercial Club sponsored parades, balloon ascensions, and street carnivals on Market Street that brought in as many as 5,000 people. Horse races, rodeos, and baseball were among the early 1900s recreational activities.