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Anselmo: The End of Farming

Published July 29, 2019

I, Bernie Harberts, did not use generative AI to write or illustrate this article. Spell check and grammar check, yes. AI, no.

Mules Brick, Cracker and I have arrived in Anselmo and the end of farming in this part of central Nebraska.

Satellite view of Anselmo, Nebraska showing dividing line between green farmland and brown ranch land
Anselmo as seen from space: the dividing line between green (farm land) and brown (ranch land)
Downtown Anselmo, Nebraska with abandoned 1915 Peoples State Bank building on right during cross-country mule ride
Anselmo as seen from where I’m writing you. The building on the right is the old Peoples State Bank built in 1915. Now abandoned.

By “the end of farming”, no, I don’t mean they’re canceling the Husker corn crop this year. Rather, the mules and I are traveling from arable farm country to land too dry to farm. Anselmo sits square on the line that divides farm land from ranch land. We’re going from corn and soybeans to wind, grass, cows and windmills.

Google Maps aerial view of mule route from Broken Bow through Anselmo into Nebraska Sand Hills ranch country
View of Anselmo from above. The dotted blue line is our route. The green circles between Anselmo and Broken Bow are sections of irrigated land. To the north and west, the land is browner. This is ranch land. We spent last night in Broken Bow. (Google maps)

It feels like we’re oh so close to entering the America west (which starts, for me at least, in Wyoming).

A Photos of the Day

Mike Welles hog farm feed delivery driver met by Bernie Harberts outside Merna, Nebraska during mule ride
Mike Welles. Mike delivers feed to hog farms. (Outside Merna, Nebraska)
Mules Cracker and Brick resting outside Anselmo, Nebraska with ranch and farm distance sign behind them
Cracker and Brick taking a break outside Anselmo. Behind them sign listing the names and distance to nearby farms and ranches
1915 carved stone date on abandoned Peoples State Bank building in Anselmo, Nebraska
1915. Carving on the old Peoples State Bank (Anselmo, Nebraska)
Historic sod house soddie exterior in Anselmo, Nebraska spotted during Bernie Harberts cross-country mule ride
Sod house. (Anselmo, Nebraska)
Interior of historic sod house soddie in Nebraska Sand Hills during Bernie Harberts cross-country mule ride
Inside a “soddie” as they’re called here in the Sand Hills.
Living sod roof on historic soddie made of boards tar paper and sod in Nebraska Sand Hills
Living roof on soddie. The roof is built of boards and tar paper topped with sod. Plastic sheeting and roofing screws are concessions to modern times the early sod busters would have gladly incorporated in to their often leaky dwellings.
Anselmo, Nebraska town park where Bernie Harberts and mules camped overnight during cross-country mule ride
The Anselmo park where we’re camped tonight.
Mules Brick and Cracker eating well deserved grain at Anselmo, Nebraska park camp during cross-country mule ride
A well deserved feed of grain.

Tomorrow the mules and I set off for Dunning, 21 miles away from Anselmo. At long last we walk in to the Sand Hills proper.

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One Response to Anselmo: The End of Farming

  • Todd Bryant on July 30, 2019 at 1:56 am

    I much enjoy your postings of the towns you visit. Where I grew up we were five miles from the nearest town, and in the 50s there were only about fifty people there. Our local grocer kept all his cash under his cooler, wrapped carefully in blue laundry paper and tied up with string. I am sure most people knew that. As I read your posts and see your photos I am taken back there. Of course things are different now. Most of the farms have been purchased by Hollywood people and rock stars. And that grocery store is now an attorneys office. Change is constant que no?

    Reply

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