Shelton Nebraska

Village · Buffalo County · Population 1,034 (2020 census) · ZIP 68876 · Founded 1879 · Peak population 1,140 (2000)

About Shelton

Shelton is a village of 1,034 people (2020) at the east edge of Buffalo County on the Hall County line, at 2,018 feet on US 30 and the Union Pacific about 19 miles east-northeast of Kearney. I-80 Exit 291 is south of town, with War Axe State Recreation Area beside it. Shelton has its public schools and a Carnegie library on the National Register. Shelton is on Central Time.

History

Joseph E. Johnson, a Mormon, settled here about 1858–59 and kept a road ranche on the Mormon trail called Wood River Centre, with a store, blacksmith and wagon shop, bakery and tintype gallery. From April 1860 to August 1, 1861, he published the Huntsman’s Echo, the first newspaper in Nebraska west of Omaha, and the first post office in the county opened here on August 20, 1860; the telegraph arrived that November. Wood River Centre was named the county seat when the county was reorganized in 1870. The Union Pacific built through in 1866, and on February 3, 1873, the station was renamed for N. (Nathan) Shelton, a UP auditor, because its mail was being confused with Wood River’s. Patrick Walsh platted the town in March 1879, and the village was incorporated on January 6, 1882. The library, begun by the Nineteenth Century Club in 1896, moved into its $9,000 Carnegie building on June 1, 1914. Shelton was featured on CBS’s On the Road in 1983. The population peaked at 1,140 in 2000.

Things to see

the Shelton Public Library, 313 C St. (Carnegie, 1914; National Register 2024) · the Meisner Bank Building, 128 C St. (National Register) · the Huntsman’s Echo historical marker in Railroad Park, Main St. and US 30 · War Axe State Recreation Area at I-80 Exit 291: a 16-acre fishing lake