Nebraska Historical Societies

This directory lists 6 historical societies, museums, and archives in Nebraska. They range from the Nebraska State Historical Society (now operating as History Nebraska) in Lincoln, which holds the state's archives, to Homestead National Historical Park near Beatrice, the national center for homestead research, and Chimney Rock National Historic Site on the Oregon Trail in the Panhandle. The guide that follows tells you where Nebraska's records sit and which ones were created at the county, state, or federal level.

Nebraska Territory was organized in 1854 and Nebraska became the thirty-seventh state on March 1, 1867. Nearly all of its land passed from the United States to private owners through federal land offices, the first of which opened in Omaha in 1855, and the Homestead Act of 1862 was first put to use here. That history shapes research: the earliest record of most Nebraska families is a federal land entry file, not a deed, and county boundaries kept shifting until the 93 present counties settled in the 1880s.

Featured Historical Societies

Major repositories for Nebraska records

History Nebraska (the Nebraska State Historical Society) is both the state archives and the state historical society. Its James E. Potter Research Room at 1500 R Street in Lincoln, on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln campus, is open Wednesday through Friday from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on Mondays by appointment (402-471-4751, reference@hn.libanswers.com). The collections include Nebraska newspapers on microfilm, territorial and state censuses, county government records, manuscripts, photographs, maps, General Land Office tract books and township plats, and more than 500 county atlases and plat books, mostly from 1885 onward. Start at history.nebraska.gov, which also houses the State Historic Preservation Office.

University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Archives and Special Collections, 318 Love Library at 13th and R Streets in Lincoln (402-472-9568), holds university archives and Nebraska manuscript collections, searchable through its Nebraska Archives Online finding aids. UNL is also the technical partner behind the Nebraska Newspapers site and the homestead-records digitization described below.

Homestead National Historical Park, 8523 West State Highway 4, Beatrice, maintains a Heritage Center where researchers can search digitized homestead case files at no charge; see the land section for what those files contain.

Vital records

Nebraska's statewide registration dates are late compared with eastern states: births and deaths from 1904, marriages and divorces from 1909. Before then only a few cities kept their own registers; Omaha has birth records from 1869 and death records from 1873.

• State certificates (1904 or 1909 to present): order from the Nebraska Department of Health and Human Services, Vital Records, 301 Centennial Mall South, Lincoln (mail: P.O. Box 95065, Lincoln, NE 68509-5065; 402-471-2871). Certified copies cost $17 for a birth certificate and $16 for a death, marriage, or divorce certificate, and can be ordered online, by mail, or in person. Births and marriages less than 50 years old are released only to immediate family.
• Marriages before 1909: the County Clerk has recorded marriages since each county was organized, and the clerk is still the place to go for a record more than 50 years old.
• Divorces: filed in the district court of the county, whose clerk holds the case files from the 1850s onward; the state copy exists only from 1909.

For deaths before 1904, use the 1885 state census mortality information, county probate files, cemetery records, and newspaper obituaries, which Nebraska weeklies printed in detail. Our article on finding where someone is buried explains how to work from an obituary to a plot record.

Homesteads, land patents, and the Register of Deeds

Nebraska is a public-land state. Title to almost every acre began with the United States, which surveyed the land into townships and sections and conveyed it through local land offices by cash sale, military bounty warrant, preemption, timber culture, or homestead. Under the Homestead Act of 1862 a settler filed an application and paid $18 in fees, lived on and improved the claim for five years, and then filed final proof to receive a patent. The first claim under the act, Daniel Freeman's, is the site of Homestead National Historical Park.

• Land entry case files are the richest records: the final proof includes the claimant's age, citizenship or declaration of intention, family members living on the land, the house, well, fencing, and acres broken, and the testimony of two neighbors. The originals, more than 30 million pages for all states, are at the National Archives in Washington, D.C. Since 1999 Homestead National Historical Park, Fold3, FamilySearch, and UNL have been digitizing them; Nebraska's files were the first completed and cover entries up to 1908. Search them free at the park's Heritage Center or by subscription on Fold3 and Ancestry; post-1908 Nebraska files must still be requested from the National Archives. Details are on the park's Homestead Records page.
• Patents (the government's deed to the first owner) are searchable by name or legal description on the Bureau of Land Management's General Land Office Records site, along with survey plats.
• Deeds and mortgages after the patent are recorded by the county Register of Deeds, who under Nebraska statute 23-1506 keeps and indexes all deeds, mortgages, plats, and other instruments presented for recording (in smaller counties the County Clerk serves as ex officio register). Lancaster County's office at 555 South 10th Street in Lincoln is typical: a grantor-grantee index and, for recent decades, an online deed search.

History Nebraska's tract books and township plats let you convert a legal description into a map of neighbors, and its county atlases (1885 onward) show landowner names section by section.

Newspapers and city directories

Nebraska Newspapers, built by UNL Libraries and History Nebraska, offers free full-text searching of Nebraska papers published as early as 1854, along with a publishing history and a map of every town that ever had a paper. The National Endowment for the Humanities has funded six grants (2007, 2009, 2016, 2018, 2022, and 2024) to digitize 600,000 pages for the National Digital Newspaper Program, including the Omaha Bee, William Jennings Bryan's The Commoner, and the Czech-language Pokrok zapadu; state and private funding added the Plattsmouth papers, more Czech-American titles, and the Daily Nebraskan. The NDNP pages are also searchable on Chronicling America.

History Nebraska holds microfilm of nearly every surviving Nebraska newspaper for titles not yet online, and small-town weeklies are the best source for Nebraska obituaries, final-proof notices (homesteaders had to publish notice of intent to prove up, naming their witnesses), and land sales. Omaha and Lincoln city directories begin in the 1860s and 1870s; History Nebraska and the two cities' public libraries hold the long runs. See our guide to old city directories for using them to track a family between censuses.

Census, military, and statewide indexes

Nebraska appears in the federal census from 1860 as a territory and from 1870 as a state, through 1950. Its own enumerations are the special prize: territorial censuses in 1854, 1855, and 1856 (heads of household for the organized counties), scattered county censuses between 1864 and 1917 (Cass County 1876-1882 and Lancaster County 1875 among them), and the 1885 state census, a full household enumeration that fills the gap left by the lost 1890 federal census. The 1885 census is indexed on FamilySearch and Ancestry; most of the others are at History Nebraska. Federal Indian census rolls for the Winnebago, Santee, and other reservations run from 1869 to 1939.

Naturalization records were created in county district courts before 1906 and are among the county records held by History Nebraska and the counties. For military research, History Nebraska holds Grand Army of the Republic post records and state militia and National Guard material, while federal pension files for Nebraska veterans are at the National Archives.

Researching a house or farm in Nebraska

For a farmstead, begin with the legal description (section, township, range) on the current deed, look up the original patent on the BLM General Land Office site, then pull the land entry case file: it will tell you when the first house was built, what it was made of, and how many acres were under cultivation when final proof was made. From there, work forward through the Register of Deeds grantor-grantee index; our guide to tracing a property's deed history covers the method.

For a town building, the Nebraska State Historic Preservation Office, a division of History Nebraska, administers the National Register of Historic Places program and the state's historic buildings survey. Search listed properties through the National Park Service database; a district nomination usually gives a construction date and architectural description for every contributing building. Sanborn fire insurance maps exist for Omaha, Lincoln, and dozens of smaller Nebraska towns from the 1880s into the 1950s; the Library of Congress has digitized its pre-1900 sheets, and History Nebraska holds later editions. Combine them with city directories, county atlases, and the county assessor's records, then follow the steps in when was my house built and researching an old building's history.

Working with Nebraska county societies

Nebraska's local societies are mostly county organizations, often running a museum in a former depot, school, or courthouse that is open seasonally or a few afternoons a week; call ahead, especially outside summer. Many hold the records that never reached Lincoln: cemetery sexton books, school district registers, township board minutes, and family files assembled for county centennial histories in the 1960s and 1970s. Those county history books, usually with a biographical sketch of every pioneer family, are the most useful local publication for Nebraska research, and the county society will have a copy.

Additional Nebraska History Resources

• History Nebraska (Nebraska State Historical Society) - State archives, library, and State Historic Preservation Office; research room at 1500 R Street, Lincoln
• Nebraska DHHS Vital Records - Birth and death certificates from 1904, marriages and divorces from 1909
• Homestead National Historical Park, Homestead Records - Digitized Nebraska homestead land entry case files through 1908
• BLM General Land Office Records - Federal land patents and survey plats searchable by name or legal description
• Nebraska Newspapers - Free full-text Nebraska newspapers from 1854, UNL Libraries and History Nebraska
• UNL Libraries Archives and Special Collections - University archives and Nebraska manuscripts, Love Library, Lincoln
• Lancaster County Register of Deeds - Example of a county recording office with an online deed search
• Chronicling America - Library of Congress search across Nebraska's NDNP newspaper pages

Frequently Asked Questions

When did Nebraska start recording births and deaths?

Statewide registration of births and deaths began in 1904, and of marriages and divorces in 1909. Order those certificates from Nebraska DHHS Vital Records in Lincoln ($17 for a birth certificate, $16 for a death, marriage, or divorce certificate). Before 1904 only a few cities kept registers; Omaha has births from 1869 and deaths from 1873.

How do I find my ancestor's Nebraska homestead records?

Find the patent on the BLM General Land Office Records site to get the land office and entry number, then look up the land entry case file. Nebraska's homestead case files through 1908 are fully digitized and can be searched free at the Homestead National Historical Park Heritage Center near Beatrice or by subscription on Fold3 and Ancestry; later files are requested from the National Archives in Washington, D.C.

Did Nebraska take state censuses?

Yes. Territorial censuses were taken in 1854, 1855, and 1856, various counties took censuses between 1864 and 1917, and a full statewide census was taken in 1885. The 1885 census is indexed on FamilySearch and Ancestry; most of the rest are held by History Nebraska in Lincoln.

Which Nebraska office records deeds?

The county Register of Deeds records and indexes all deeds, mortgages, and plats under Nebraska statute 23-1506. In smaller counties the County Clerk acts as ex officio register of deeds. Patents from the federal government to the first owner are a separate record held by the Bureau of Land Management.