Dundee, Nebraska

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Dundee is an historic neighborhood located at and around 50th and Underwood Streets in Omaha, Nebraska, United States. It is home to a number of restaurants, including the nationally known Dundee Dell; various other stores, including the locally famous Dundee Hardware Plus; two schools, the Dundee Public Elementary School and Brownell-Talbot School; and numerous historic residences. Two of Omaha's finest parks, Memorial and Elmwood, are also associated with the Dundee neighborhood, as are St. Margaret Mary Catholic Church and Dundee Presbyterian Church. The Dundee-Memorial Park Association promotes the preservation of this historic neighborhood.

Warren Buffett, the "Oracle of Omaha" who is ranked by Forbes Magazine as the second richest man in the world, lives in a house bought for $31,500 in 1958 in the neighborhood.

[edit] History

The neighborhod was developed in 1880 by John Nelson Hayes Patrick and has been dubbed Omaha's first suburb.

Patrick hired Shannon Brothers of Kansas City to construct six homes between 48th and 52nd Street, Capitol to California. The brothers had just converted the Kansas City Fairgrounds on the edge of Downtown Kansas City into a planned residential development called Dundee Place and they hoped to do the same in Omaha.

Unlike other suburban development where the houses look similar, the houses in Dundee were built to look distinctive.

The Omaha Herald on October 30, 1888 noted neighborhood covenants required that the buildings be for residential purposes only, stand at least 25 feet away from the street, cost least $2500, and not be "used for any immoral or illegal business, nor shall any spirits or malt liquors be sold or bartered away."

The houses did not initially sell well and the developers set out to create the neighborhood as a self-contained village. Developers planted 2,000 maple trees along the roadways (one of which was named Underhill for one of the developers). In 1905 developer Walter L. Selby offered free lots if the buyer built. If the buyer stayed for more than a year he got a bonus of $500. Interest in the neighborhood skyrocketed and the developers expanded to be south of Dodge Street and north of Cuming Street.

C.C. and J.E. George laid out Happy Hollow Boulevard and developed the area south of Dodge and west of 50th to Elmwood Park. They filled in the creek that ran along 50th Street and added sidewalks and the Dundee lights. Homes in the area reflected the Colonial, Georgian and Tudor Revival styles.

Omaha annexed Dundee on June 20, 1915. At that time it was 0.7 mi² and had 2500 residents.^[1]

Dundee Place Plat, 1891. Dundee Place, Douglas Co., Neb Original Plat, 1891. Retrieved on August 3, 2005.

Dundee Place Plat, 1915. Dundee Place, Douglas County, Nebr Plat, 1915. Retrieved on August 3, 2005.