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Rural Success Stories: Rural Nebraska Telecommuters
Telecommuting combines the best of both worlds for many rural workers
Eileen and Rod Golus moved to Phelps County in June after researching areas with Internet connectivity options. Their new home is halfway between Rod's parents in Loup City and Eileen's parents in McCook, so their two young boys get to see a lot more of their grandparents. more...
Rural Success Stories: Cather & Company
Cather & Company Booksellers and Coffeehouse is a unique gathering spot in Red Cloud
The earthy voice of Frank Sinatra, stylishly mismatched chairs arranged around well-used wooden tables, original art hanging on exposed brick walls, the luxurious smell of crushed coffee beans, and hundreds of books shelved on handmade wooden bookcases — along with two customer-oriented cats — identify Cather & Company as a genuine, L.A.-style coffee house and bookstore. more...
Rural Success Stories: Bar Ten Kennels
Cozad trainer proves a well-trained retriever is a beautiful thing
True communication between man and animals is a rare and wonderful thing to watch. Most of us are satisfied if we can teach Fido to come when called, fetch a ball and not pee in the house, but some people have a much deeper sense of what really communicating with another species means. more...
Rural Success Stories: Kaufman Trailers
Kaufman Trailer expansion is economic bright spot in Beaver City
In a town of 640 people in the middle of America and in the middle of the worst economic downturn in decades, a trailer manufacturing company is in the midst of a major expansion project, more than tripling the size of its production and storage facilities. more...
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Articles & Essays: McCook's Cookie Jars
McCook restaurant's vast cookie jar collection shifts to a holiday theme
by Gene O. Morris
Linda Thayer and Val Fuller's cookie jar collection started – as all collections do - with just one cookie jar. Linda was shopping one day in 1998 and noticed a charming cookie jar shaped like a goose. "Hey, I thought, that would be a cute item to display at the restaurant," she said. more...
Articles & Essays: Massacre Canyon Monument
Massacre Canyon saga is just one story in a rich Native American history in Nebraska
by Pat Underwood
In 1873, a battle in what is now known as Massacre Canyon in southwest Nebraska occurred when several tribes were off their reservations at the same time to engage in their annual summer buffalo hunts. more...
Articles & Essays: Nebraska's College of Technical Agriculture
NCTA: Why graduate with just a sheepskin, when you could have 100 cows? by Gene O. Morris
Upon arrival at the University of Nebraska's College of Technical Agriculture in Curtis in 2006, Dr. Weldon Sleight realized the farms, ranches and rural communities of America's heartland were facing a troubling future. more...
Articles & Essays: NCTA Housing
Transforming nursing home into residence hall is a challenge for ex-Texan
by Britini Freiboth
At first glance, I stick out like a sore thumb. Usually in stiletto heels and dressed for corporate America, I now stroll the streets of my new home in Curtis, Nebraska on an adventure of morphing a former nursing home and assisted living facility into a state-of-the-art student residence hall called Aggie West. more...
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Rural Foodies: Franklin's Down Home Café
There are two kinds of dreamers in the world — the ones who sing in the shower and dream of standing on a stage and the ones who cook at home and dream of opening a restaurant. If you’ve ever pulled a sublime dish out of the oven — done to perfection, the air filling with the rich redolence of Good Food — and said to yourself, “What’s Wolfgang Puck got that I haven’t got?” you have to appreciate what Alicia and Michael Williams have done.more...
Rural Foodies: Minden Coffee House
There’s more to a coffeehouse than just a good cuppa joe
by Pam Soreide, Betty Sayers and Phil Soreide
When you get right down to it, a great coffeehouse is as much about the ambiance and atmosphere as it is about the coffee. It has to feel right. There needs to be some big easy chairs and a couch, a few high stools, and at least one geeky guy with a laptop, and a lady of a certain age with a romance novel and a mocha latte... more...
Rural Foodies: Cunningham's Feed
Cunningham’s Feed Grill, Bar and Bakery rivals big-city gourmet dining
by Pam Soreide, Betty Sayers, Phil Soreide
Sometimes, flipping though one of those glossy City magazines you find in hotel rooms, you come upon an ad for some rustic-themed restaurant that gushes about their antique pinewood floor or international beer selection or how Chef Antoine (or Philippe or Maurice) garnishes dishes with heirloom tomatoes and fresh herbs to create the “gourmet experience of a lifetime.” Oh, please... more...
Rural Foodies: Mac's Creek Vinyards
A loaf of bread, a jug of wine, and thou beside me at Mac’s Creek Vineyards
by Pam Soreide, Betty Sayers & Phil Soreide
For many of us who, in our salad days, may have preferred Boone’s Farm, Annie Green Springs or Blue Nun to, say, a saucy little French Pinot Noir, enjoying wine requires a certain maturity. When I was a child, I drank as a child, but eventually I put aside childish wines and began to gradually appreciate the subtle differences between varieties of grape, as well as the climate and soil in which they are grown.more...
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Livable Small Towns: Red Cloud
Red Cloud is an Historic Treasure...and a Treat For The Eyes
Red Cloud’s place is unique in American and Nebraska history. Celebrated author, Willa Cather’s best-known work, My Antonia, was inspired by the town, the land and the hardy pioneers in Webster County. Cather lived in rural Webster County and the town of Red Cloud until she left in 1890 to attend the University of Nebraska. Red Cloud’s strong literary heritage is juxtaposed with a hunting and farming culture, a theme woven into many of her stories. more...
Livable Small Towns: Oxford
Village of Oxford Proves Good Things Come In Small Packages
Cruise into the small (pop. 900) Village of Oxford in south-central Nebraska, and you’re greeted by a main street broad enough to park cars in the middle as well as at the curbs. The first Oxford citizens designed a spacious community with room to expand. Clean, wide streets and sidewalks with big, shady trees welcome customers and visitors. Twenty-two businesses comprise the business district, first laid out and built in 1880 when the Republican Valley Railway Company (later to become the Chicago, Burlington and Quincey) crossed Harlan County and into the fledgling town.
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Livable Small Towns: Minden
If the perfect small town exists, it just might be Minden
If you could sit down at a drawing board to design the perfect small town, you’d start with a superb education system, then add in gracious and affordable homes. You’d want to make sure you had a prosperous manufacturing sector so there would be good jobs and a sound economy, then perhaps you’d want to add some interesting retail enterprises on wide, safe streets. You’d want to make sure to design in a strong sense of community, with a lot of citizen participation in community decisions, quality healthcare facilities and nearby opportunities for camping, hunting and fishing. Put down your pencil. You’re describing Minden.more...
Livable Small Towns: Red Cloud
Red Cloud is an Historic Treasure...and a Treat For The Eyes
Gracious homes, buildings and more remind visitors of Nebraska heritage. Red Cloud’s place is unique in American and Nebraska history. Celebrated author, Willa Cather’s best-known work, My Antonia, was inspired by the town, the land and the hardy pioneers in Webster County. Cather lived in rural Webster County and the town of Red Cloud until she left in 1890 to attend the University of Nebraska. Red Cloud’s strong literary heritage is juxtaposed with a hunting and farming culture, a theme woven into many of her stories. more...
Welcome to Nebraska Rural Living
Nebraska Rural Living is the brainchild of two sisters who returned to their small town roots after a life pursuing their dreams in big cities. Nebraska Rural Living's mission is to market the very real benefits of a rural lifestyle by highlighting the amenities of rural communities and spotlighting successful entrepreneurs, who make good livings, free of the stress of urban environments. We offer links to a wide variety of sources and resources.
If you miss the safe, quiet streets, the wide-open sky, the sense of knowing – and caring about – your neighbors, we urge you to register and be a part of our community. And perhaps after you join us in spirit, you’ll join us in fact. more...
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What's Going On in Rural Nebraska
McCook to host Nebraska’s first “First Night” celebration
First Night celebrations — although actually held on the last night of the year — have been happening in America since the 1970s, when the idea for a no alcohol, public festival was first introduced in Boston, Mass. In the 30-plus years since then, the First Night idea has spread to cities across America, as well as towns in Canada, Great Britain and New Zealand. more...
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Wilcox man is one man classic car factory
Restoring classic cars was something that got into Kermit's blood, and one project led to another...and another...and another. more...
Concert promotion has grown into unusual hobby for Holdrege couple
Tim and Bev Rehm love live acoustic music so much they’ve turned themselves into homegrown concert promoters. more...
Historic Red Cloud café lures restaurateur from retirement
Mary Terry intended to retire from the restaurant business when they moved to Red Cloud, Nebraska a few yeas ago. “I couldn’t stand it,” she said. “I miss the people.” more...
