Lone Tree 



On the north bank of the Platte River, about three miles south- 

 west of the site of Central City, Neb., stood for many years a solitary 

 cottonwood known as Lone Tree. Named by the Indians, their chiefs 

 are said to have held their councils beneath its spreading shade, long 

 before the first white settler had reached the spot. 



Fifty feet tall, Lone Tree could be seen for twenty miles across 

 the Platte valley, and standing only a few yards from the overland 

 trail north of the Platte River, it was a favorite rendezvous for the 

 many travelers who camped nearby in early days, and cut their names 

 on its bark, until its massive trunk was covered with these hierogly- 

 phics to the height of thirty feet. 



Lone Tree ranch, established in the neighborhood, in 1858, was 

 christened in honor of the old tree, and so were the postoffice and rail- 

 way station three miles distant from it. 



In 1865, the big cottonwood fell victim to the violence of a heavy 

 storm, and a portion of its trunk was preserved at Lone Tree station, 

 (now Central City) as a souvenir of the historic tree that had been 

 loved by thousands of pioneers in the West. It stood on the station 

 platform until all the wood had been chipped off and carried away by 

 tourists. 



In 1911, a stone monument in the form of a cottonwood stump 

 was erected on the spot where Lone Tree grew. "There it stands to- 

 day," says A. E. Sheldon, author of "History and Stories of 

 Nebraska," "in perpetual witness to the worth of a tree." 



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