Nebraska County Countdown: #29 Washington County

Pretty good looking courthouse Washington County. Some other counties need to step up their courthouse game. I’d give it 8/10.

Named after a landowner from Virginia, Washington County was established in 1854 and currently the county seat is Blair.

Fort Atkinson was the first military fort west of the Missouri River and at the time was the largest military post. The fort’s boundaries stretched seven miles north, west and south. The fort was abandoned at some point and the community of Fort Calhoun grew over the abandoned site. Farming operations erased most traces of the historic fort, except for the musket balls, uniform buttons, coins and other artifacts that surfaced with each spring plowing and after rainstorms.

The original location of Fort Atkinson was established on the site recommended by explorers Lewis and Clark. The Nebraska Games and Parks Commission established a state historical park at the site in 1963.

Washington County Communities

Cities: Blair and Fort Calhoun

Villages: Arlington, Herman, Kennard and Washington

Census-designated place: Fontanelle

Unincorprated Communities: De Soto, Nashville, Orum and Telbasta

DAS MAP

Husker Stuff

Greatest Huskers to wear #29: Jim Pillen

Current Huskers to wear #29: Bennett Folkers (WR) and Cam’ron Jones (DB).

The 1929 Nebraska football team was a member of the Big Six Conference. They went 4-1-3, their only loss to Pittsburgh 12-7 in front of 35,000 people at Memorial Stadium. That would have been a sellout crowd back then. Their first-year head coach was Dana X. Bible, who would coach until 1936, when he left for Texas as they threw money at him that Nebraska could not or would not match.

Dana X. Bible won 6 Big Six (1929, 1931–1933, 1935–1936) championships, and finished at Nebraska with a record of 50-15-7. He was athletic director at Nebraska from 1932-1936.

What’d I miss?