DAY 2: 27th Street has never been shy

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By Brian Christopherson
Lincoln Journal Star

Heaven knows how they made it without a Wal-Mart, Imperial Palace or Jiffy Lube, but bless their souls, they somehow persevered.

Go back in time and you’ll find 27th Street was the kind of road that might excite Robert Frost, but few others.

Actually, to label it a road less traveled is almost an understatement.

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The old Nebraska State Penitentiary in June 1962. (LJS File)

The old Nebraska State Penitentiary in June 1962. (LJS File)

Look at 27th Street on an 1889 Lincoln map. You’ll find three universities. You’ll find a budding downtown population. But work your way east past 17th Street and  you’ll find lonesome dust roads.

It seems our beloved 27th Street once belonged to the crickets.

Pass some credit to August Harvey, who helped map the city of Lincoln in 1867. He predicted all the streets east of 17th would one day become populated, though he also suggested the population would be part of a new city: “East Lincoln.”

He was right on one account. The people did come east and 27th Street stories emerged -- tragic stories and inspirational stories, stories that don’t involve a Wal-Mart.

THE HIDEOUT

Digging through yellowed newspaper clippings for 27th Street history.

Nothing... Nothing...

Wait, here’s a story, an article written for the Journal Star by Nebraskan historian and author Jim McKee.

A story that begins with a hymn and ends in a hanging.

Go back to Feb. 11, 1912. Hear the boys at the Nebraska State Penitentiary singing “Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus” to close a week’s chapel service.

Deputy Warden E.D. Davis wears a new gray suit his wife just bought for him.

The hymn finishes and tragedy arrives. Prisoner Albert Prince lunged at the warden, stabbing him six times.

Davis didn’t make it through the night and Prince took his final breath 14 months later, executed by hanging.

Oh, but Prince’s rebellion may have excited some of the boys in prison. Just a month later, some no-good inmates by the names of Charles Taylor, John Dowd and Charles Morley made a bloody prison break, leaving a trail of wounded in their wake and killing the new deputy warden, Henry Wagner.

When the trio got outside, a blizzard met them. Knowing that search teams would soon be on the chase, they needed a place to hide.

Where to go? How about 27th Street? No one out there.

Well, there was someone. Joseph Dickman owned a house around 27th and Van Dorn. That was his misfortune in this case, because the cons took it over and stayed the night.

They left in the morning, ordering Dickman’s son to drive them to 20th and R streets. Their misdeeds continued in places like Havelock and Murdock, where they robbed some stores.

They killed another man in Gretna before their recklessness came to an end.

A sheriff’s bullet left Taylor dead. Dowd shot himself. Morley surrendered.

THE CHURCH

See that church on 27th and R?

Funny story about that church.

In 1885, Mr. M.L. Trester had a trunk shipped by mule car to the end of the line. The end of the line happened to be the John Baughman home.

While collecting his trunk, Trester jokingly asked Mrs. Baughman if she’d like to give the lot away.

No, she had no intention of giving the lot away, but well... yes, she actually would give it away if a church were erected on the spot.

They called it Grace United Methodist Church. Drive by that spot today and notice the name on the sign hasn’t changed.

Sad story about that church, though.

On April 14, 1973, it burned down. It was cruel timing — one day before Palm Sunday and eight before Easter.

“Sure didn’t look like much when I called it in,” witness Gary Glover told the Lincoln Evening Journal of the smoke he saw that morning.

What didn’t look like much required eight firetrucks and 120 men to tame.

The result was a wrecked sanctuary — built in 1913 — and an educational unit built in 1929.

What’s more, the church had just spent $6,500 redecorating the sanctuary.

But there’s a great story about that church, too.

As former church trustee Clyde McIntosh told the paper the day of the fire, Grace congregation is “not a congregation that quits.”

And so it seems. They rebuilt the place and moved back in for a first service on Nov. 3, 1976.

It was a bittersweet moment for Alice Lane, now 83. Her husband, who was chairman of the church board of trustees during the fire, lost his battle to cancer that week.

He never got to see it complete. His funeral service was the second event at the new chapel.

On Alice’s computer desk at home, you might notice something kind of strange, a charred ceramic tube that wires at the old church used to run through.

“It almost looks like a tiny little milk can,” she said.

She’s never given thought to throwing it away.

THE ORPHANAGE

And what’s this is in the newspaper archives? An orphanage?

Yes, for 64 years, 27th Street was the home of orphans. St. Thomas Orphanage opened in 1902.

It was started by Bishop Thomas Bonacum, who often wore a Prince Albert coat and top hat.

He died in 1911, but the orphanage stayed, occasionally filling the local paper with wonderful little headlines like this one in 1959: Toys Collected by 11 Boys To Make Orphans Happy.

Accompanying story is a picture of a priest and boys with perfectly parted hair analyzing a toy truck.

Throught the years, some 11,000 orphans lived between those walls at 4001 S. 27th.

Then, in 1966, a crane swung in and took it down, making way for a ranch-style house.

The Lincoln Evening Journal ran a picture of the crumbled orphanage, with a somber caption:

“Time showed Thursday it is a feeble friend of tradition and landmarks, running out suddenly on a December day to let the builders have their way.” 

THE TRAGEDY

Here’s a story that rattles the insides, not just because of the shame of it all, but also because it’s really wasn't that long ago.

You’ll find heartache on Aug.t 20, 1988, at Pentzer Park on North 27th Street.

That’s where 35-year-old Eugene Nnakwe was found beaten to death with a tire iron.

An autopsy showed Nnakwe had been struck in the head at least five times with a blunt object.

It didn’t take long for the police to track down suspects — 15-year-old Ben Nevels and 18-year-old Jason Lee Daniels.

That duo had been drinking and smoking marijuana when they ran across Nnakwe.

The boys testified that Nnakwe said he wanted marijuana, but

In court, the question wasn’t if Nevels and Daniels had played a part in Nnakwe's death. Rather, why did they do it? And did some inappropriate action by Nnakwe perhaps provoke Nevels?

Nevels said he didn’t intend to kill, but lost his cool when Nnakwe made sexual advances to him.

“Sometimes it’s hard ... to verbalize my feelings,” Nevels said a presentencing hearing in 1989. “I just kind of think about it all the time, want to back up and change it. I regret it a lot.”

Despite the allegations of Nnakwe's sexual advances and the claim that Nevels was an emotionally messed-up teen, he received the maximum sentence — a combined 12 to 32 years in prison.

As for Daniels? The former boxer who testified he hit Nnakwe once before the tire iron was used?

He was arrested 33 times in his short life and died in the early hours of Sept. 6, 2000 — the victim of a Lincoln stabbing. He was 29.

THE BAR

Probably anyone younger than 38 never got to meet Bo.

But anyone who spent a night at Little Bo’s can tell you the history of 27th Street must include the bar that lasted more than 50 years.

The story of Bo’s began in 1933. Prohibition had just ended and John J. Clare was ready to take advantage.

An excellent carpenter, Clare built a small building next to his house. Soon, blue collar workers knew that was the place to get beer after a tough day.

The tavern was called Tap’s Cafe until '38, whensome Bohemians leased the thing. And so a name switch: Little Bohemians.

It took until 1975 for the name to get shortened. Little Bo's it was.

“We were probably one of the very first after Prohibition, and my father had the first drink there when it opened," John's son, Truman, told The Lincoln Star in 1988. "Since we’re Irish, I guess that’s appropriate."

Little Bo’s changed as the fads did. It was there for disco, for rock ‘n roll, for the country boom. It was gutted by a 1967 fire that happened only 30 minutes after a full-house Friday crowd had left, but reopened just a month later.

By the '70s, it had expanded to three clubs in one building, each one catering to a different crowd. It held 800 people. Among the more popular attractions was a hypnotist named Jay B. Zee and the rock group Cricket.

College kids loved it. But then, on April 30, 1988, Little Bo's had its last call.

"It didn’t close because of poor management or failure to attract a customer,” said the final owner, Bob Earley.

“We’re closing because of progress. We’ve been bought out by Super Saver."

Yep, Little Bo’s became the Super Saver.

Sad to some, sure. But in a way, things haven’t changed that much.

The college kids still show up at 27th and Cornhusker for beer, only now they get it with six packs of Ramen.

Reach Brian Christopherson at 473-7438 or bchristopherson@journalstar.com.