Some places hold the memories of North Omaha’s past more eloquently than others. While some of North Omaha transitioned from country estates to suburban bliss, from commuter haven to neglected hood, one building has stood steady in the community throughout almost everything. It’s called The Sherman.

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The town of East Omaha was south of the present-day Eppley Airport, west of Abbott Drive, and north and west of the Missouri River. Throughout the years, this town has been home to more than 2,600 homes, countless businesses, a school, the East Omaha River Rats, and now the Open Door Mission, the Omaha Correctional Center, the Omaha Immigration Court, and businesses like Monarch Oil and the FleetPride Service Center.

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Located on the southwest corner of 24th and Lake for more than 50 years, Duffy Drug was an iconic store in North Omaha. Before they were there, the site at 2424 North 24th Street was home to the farthest north drug store in Omaha. Then the first Black-owned business in Omaha was on the southwest corner of 24th - the Soul House music store opened in 1968.

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Malcolm X was born in 1925 as Malcolm Little in Omaha to Earl and Louise Little, but lived in Omaha less than a year. His story in the city is longer though, where leaders have never managed to memorialize him with a building, street, park, library or museum. Adam Fletcher Sasse guides us through a biography of Malcolm X in Omaha.

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Did you know that North Omaha has been home to FIVE higher education institutions in its history? It was 1863 when the Town of Saratoga, now located in North Omaha, went to the Nebraska Territorial Legislature and secured a charter for the first-ever University of Nebraska. Unfortunately, their efforts amounted to nill—but their legacy did not!

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Imagine a time when riding a streetcar was interesting, respected and almost a little glamorous. On the dusty, granite-covered streets of Omaha, that time was during the 1870s and 1880s. That new technology needed fanciful buildings to go along with the times, and the streetcar maintenance shop at 2606 North 26th Street in North Omaha was one of those buildings.

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There are several lost towns and villages located inside present-day North Omaha. Over time, they’ve been annexed, absorbed and otherwise soaked into the fabric of the city of Omaha and largely forgotten. Only Florence and Benson have retained distinctive identities as dedicated former towns. The rest are almost wholly missing from the public record.

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North Omaha’s African American culture has grown and changed dramatically since its founding in 1854. One of the main drivers of the culture for more than a century has been the Black media. From the time Omaha’s first Black newspaper was published in 1889 through Shanelle Williams’ continued use of Facebook, Twitter and other social media today to build the African American community in Omaha, Black media has continued to transform the North Omaha community and the city at large.

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The Belt Line railway was once a passenger service, then an industrial line for 75+ years. Today, there’s nothing left of it besides an empty rail bed. The railroad heading up the modern-day Sorensen Parkway was the Fremont, Elkhorn & Missouri Valley Railroad. Another railroad headed north from the Webster Street Station north to Florence and points beyond. It was the Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis and Omaha Railway, aka the Omaha Road.

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In the 1860s, the Union Pacific established its shops north of downtown Omaha, and Scandinavians came to work there. The largest populations to settle in Nebraska were in North Omaha. Scandinavians also had homes in other parts of Omaha, but between 1860 and 1919, the vast majority lived north of Dodge and west of North 30th Street.

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