Stockville Nebraska - Nebraska Directory

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Village · Frontier County · County seat · Population 25 (2020 census) · ZIP 69042 · Founded 1872 · Peak population 269 (1900)

About Stockville

Stockville is a village of 25 people (2020) and the seat of Frontier County, near the middle of the county at 2,484 feet. NE 18 runs through it, northwest to Curtis and east toward Elwood. Stockville has the county courthouse, a post office and the county fairgrounds, where the Frontier County Fair is held each summer. Medicine Creek State Recreation Area (Harry Strunk Lake) is about 14 miles southeast. Stockville is on Central Time.

History

The county was organized in January 1872, and Stockville was laid out that year by W. L. McClary as its seat; settler Samuel Watts named it for the ranch country around it. E. G. Nesbitt, who arrived about Christmas 1871, became postmaster when the post office opened on August 19, 1873. The railroad went to Curtis instead, and Curtis tried to take the county seat in 1920, 1930 and around 1950, but every attempt failed. The two-story frame courthouse, built in 1888–89 by Sebastian Binger for $3,400 after an earlier courthouse burned, still serves the county; it got indoor restrooms in 1962, the same year Stockville became the last county seat in America reached by a paved highway. The Red Smoke archeological site nearby, with remains 7,000 to 9,000 years old, has been on the National Register since 1974. Stockville peaked at 269 people in 1900.

Highways and trails through Stockville

Route	One way	Other way
NE 18Through the village	Northwest to Curtis	East toward Elwood and US 283 (partly gravel)

Nearby towns

Curtis	about 9 mi northwest	NE 18
Moorefield	about 11 mi north	county roads
Farnam	about 15 mi northeast	county roads
Maywood	about 15 mi northwest	NE 18 and NE 23
Eustis	about 21 mi east-northeast	NE 18 and NE 23
Cambridge	about 21 mi southeast	county roads
McCook	about 26 mi south-southwest	NE 18 and US 83
Elwood	about 28 mi east	NE 18