NEMAHA COUNTY.

TOPOGRAPHY.

NEMAHA COUNTY adjoins Nebraska on the south, and is the third county of Kansas in the northern tier west of the Missouri River. It is bounded on the east by Brown and Jackson Counties, on the south by Jackson and Pottawatomie, and on the west by Marshall. Its size is twenty-four miles east and west, and thirty miles north and south, its area comprising 460,800 acres of land, 247,117 acres of which is divided into farms in the counties; contains about 87 per cent. of prairie and 10 per cent. of bottom lands, the amount of timber being estimated at about 3 per cent. The surface of the land, taken as a whole, is sufficiently rolling to insure good drainage, and hence is admirable adapted for both grazing and agricultural purposes. Good water is abundant - in fact, it may be said of all of Northeastern Kansas, that very few of the prairie States are so generously supplied with streams. The great water-shed in the northern part of the State lied in Town 4, Range 13, in Harrison Township, of Nemaha County.

The waters run southward, making the heads of Elk, Soldier and the Red Vermillion, and northward, making the heads of the south branch of Harris, Tennessee, Hickey, Illinois and Wild Cat Creeks, which find their way into the Nemaha, the latter leaving the county in Town 1, Range 12. None of the streams afford water power; but they pervade almost every portion of the county, and no considerable amount of a prairie is far from timber. The average width of the creed bottoms is one mile, of the soil is a dark, sandy loam, varying in depth from one to six feet, with limestone, the latter, of a quality suitable for building purposes, cropping out in various localities. Sandstone is also found in limited quantities. Numerous coal beds about of little value, except in Illinois Township, where two shafts are worked, the product being used locally; and in Washington Township, where a vein eighteen to twenty-four inches thick has been recently been discovered. The native timber is hickory, oak, hackberry, elm, walnut, cottonwood, locust, sycamore and ash; the agricultural products comprising all almost that are indigenous to the temperate zone, the principal being wheat, barley, corn, oats and rye. Of wheat the yield is from fifteen to twenty- five bushels to the acre, of corn the average yield is about fifty-five bushels. Root crops, such as potatoes, sugar beets and turnips do remarkably well.

Wild fruits are moderately abundant, particularly plums and grapes, while the cultivated varieties of these may be found in every township in profusion. Peaches do well if protected from the winter winds, and no better country for the apple orchard can be found anywhere.

Artificial forestry has been carried to such an extent that the prairie farms are nearly all embellished with one or more thriving groves, from one half an acre to four, six and ten acres in extent. The growth of young trees, both fruit and forest, is very rapid.

Nemaha County is pre-eminently adapted to stock raising, the highly nutritious properties of the native grasses being best seen in the rapid change which takes place when cattle that have been poorly wintered, luxuriate on the young grass of May and June, their hair rapidly becoming smooth and glossy, and the animals taking on flesh very quickly.

The climate is salubrious, mild winters and healthful summers being the rule, for while the summer day may be such as is best for the great staple - corn - the night atmosphere is certain to be cool and bracing. The average rain fall for the past five years from 1876 to 1881, both inclusive, has been 44.03 inches per annum.

POPULATION.

                                                1870   1880
                                                ----   ----
Capioma Township  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  424    864
(a) Clear Creek . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  367    490
(b) Gilman Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    637
(c) Granada Township  . . . . . . . . . . . . .  893    618
(d) Harrison Township . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    559
(e) Home Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  719    963
(f) Illinois Township . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    554
(g) Marion Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    370
(h) Nemaha Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  491    566
(i) Neuchatel Township. . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    524
(j) Red Vermillion Township . . . . . . . . . .  775    528
(k) Reilly Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    301
(l) Richmond Township, including Seneca City.  2,153  1,971
    Rock Creek Township, including Sabetha City  740  1,854
(m) Granada Township  . . . . . . . . . . . . .  777    539
(n) Harrison Township . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    461
(o) Home Township . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    663

        Total . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7,339 12,462

Seneca City . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..  1,203
Sabetha City. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ..    849

(a) In 1879, a part to Marion Township.
(b) In 1878, from part of Richmond Township.
(c) in 1870, part to Harrison; in 1872, part to Wetmore.
(d) In 1870, from part of Granada Township.
(e) In 1878, part to Illinois;
    in 1879, parts to Marion and Richmond Townships.
(f) In 1878, from parts of Home and Valley Townships.
(g) In 1878, from parts of Home and Clear Creek Townships.
(h) In 1878, part to Washington Township.
(i) In 1879, from part of Red Vermillion Township.
(j) In 1870, part to Neuchatel; in 1879, part to Reilly.
(k) In 1870, from part of Red Vermillion Township.
(l) In 1878, part to Gilman;
    in 1879, part of Home Township annexed.
(m) In 1878, part to Illinois Township.
(n) In 1873, from part of Nemaha Township.
(o) In 1872, from part of Granada Township.