Rock Bluff
Among the most fascinating things about the world are the places and objects that had lived before and are no longer living. The deaths of persons had always held the interest of mankind, whether in trying to detain it, accept it, or embrace it. But the deaths of things – the deaths of things, despite not being thought much of, hold an appeal very much different from the death of the living. You see, despite the fact of their being, in many ways, inanimate, they are in their own ways very much alive with histories, with stories. A ghost town, a place once bustling but ultimately abandoned, holds many in similar thrall.
Rock Bluff, Nebraska is one of the four ghost towns found in the state. Located in Cass County, it stands (or stood, whichever way you would like to look at it) about three miles to the east of Murray. Rock Bluff actually became a settlement in 1854 through the work of a German man named Benedict Spires. Prior to this, the area was simply a pioneer crossing on the Missouri River. Following the settling, Rock Bluff became a hub wherein travelers can equip their freights for the purpose of crossing the plains. By 1877, it had become what could be called an official Nebraskan community, with two hundred residents, a mayor, some major business establishments, a post office and a Methodist Church. The town even had a nearby racetrack and coal mine, and at one point was in the running for Cass County’s county seat.
The shame in Rock Bluff, Nebraska’s fate of becoming a ghost town is the fact that it had contributed so much to the history of the state. For example, in 1866 Rock Bluff played a very important role in giving Nebraska its statehood, and in many ways defined it. Some four years later, in 1870, Rock Bluff local Dr. J.D. Patterson founded the Naomi Institute, which was the very first higher education institution in their county; it was also one of the leading Nebraskan educational establishments at the time, although the lack of support forced it to close down two years later. Rock Bluff was also home to a boxing icon, Kid Graves, who in 1912 became the Welterweight Champion of the World.
The circumstances of Rock Bluff’s death as a community are rather clear, inevitable and gradual, although it is nevertheless heart-wrenching. With the railroad bridge built in Omaha back in the 1870’s and railroad tracks laid out very far away from the town, Rock Bluff stopped being as essential to travel as it had been in its early years.
This town, filled with much historical importance in its youth and heyday, was abandoned completely in the 1940’s. Still, among the ghost towns of Nebraska, Rock Bluff is remembered for its hand in shaping the state.
