Bloomington Nebraska - Nebraska Directory

Mailing ZIP code: 68910

Bloomington Area Cameras

Village · Franklin County · Population 110 (2020 census) · ZIP 68929 · Founded 1872 · Peak population 554 (1910)

About Bloomington

Bloomington is a village of 110 in southern Franklin County, on the north side of the Republican valley just south of US 136, about 4½ miles west of Franklin. It was the county seat for 46 years, and its old courthouse square is now the village park.

History

After the Civil War, soldiers from Fort Kearny marked a road south toward Kansas and built a stockade, Antietam Post, at what became the southeast corner of town; a home post office along the road was called Brookline, then Brooklyn. In 1872 a town company organized at Brownville laid out the town, Sol Males and his family arrived that August, and the name Bloomington was chosen at his suggestion, for Bloomington, Illinois. The Bloomington Guard, the first newspaper in the county, began that summer, and the post office opened in 1873. In 1874 the U.S. Land Office moved here from Lowell, and that October Bloomington won the county seat over Macon, Riverton and Franklin; it held the seat until voters moved it to Franklin in 1920.

The Burlington & Missouri River Railroad reached Bloomington from Red Cloud on March 10, 1879, and for about a year the town was the end of the line, with as many as 200 to 300 freight wagons a day hauling supplies to the country beyond; Bloomington incorporated that April. Fires burned two sides of the square in 1887. The census peak was 554 in 1910. Outfielder Frank "Kid" Willson, who played for the Chicago White Sox in 1918 and 1927, was born here in 1895.

Highways and trails through Bloomington

Route	One way	Other way
US 136Just north of the village	East to Franklin (about 5 mi)	West past Naponee to Republican City and Alma

Nearby towns

Franklin	about 4.6 mi east	US 136
Naponee	about 5 mi west-southwest	US 136 and S-31C
Macon	about 9 mi north-northeast	US 136 and NE 10
Republican City	about 10 mi west	US 136
Riverton	about 15 mi east	US 136
Hildreth	about 17 mi north	County roads
Alma	about 17 mi west	US 136

Things to see

The Old Rock Jail, built in the mid-1890s of green river rock, with its three cells; a 155 mm German howitzer captured in France in 1918, at the northwest corner of the square; an 1870s horse trough and the old high school bell, all on the courthouse square · Ash Grove WMA, about 3 mi southeast · Harlan County Dam and Lake, about 9 mi west in Harlan County

Schools and health care

Schools: Bloomington is in Franklin Public Schools: Franklin Elementary, Franklin Middle School and Franklin High School, 1001 M St., Franklin, about 5 mi east

Health care: No clinic in Bloomington; nearest: Franklin County Memorial Hospital, 1406 Q St., Franklin, (308) 425-6221, a 14-bed critical access hospital, with the FCMH Pool Medical Clinic, about 5 mi

Sources: U.S. Census; Wikipedia; Andreas, History of the State of Nebraska (1882); Nebraska State Gazetteer (1890); Who's Who in Nebraska, Franklin County (1940); NEGenWeb Franklin County and its county histories; History Nebraska and its historical markers; National Register of Historic Places; SABR; Nebraska Game and Parks; Nebraska Department of Transportation; Nebraska Department of Revenue; school, hospital, library and city websites. Distances marked "about" are straight-line estimates.