Hastings Brickyard Park

Most of what Hastings fired was paving brick, the 1999 Adams County historic buildings survey says, shipped to other Nebraska towns and to Kansas, Colorado, South Dakota and Wyoming. The yards ran a May-to-October season, and Western Brick and Supply and the two Polenske Brothers yards hired many German immigrants from Russia, men who often worked for the railroads the rest of the year. Judge W. R. Burton's 1916 county history names A. L. Clarke and Peter Hempel among Western Brick's organizers and says it also ran plants at Nebraska City and Holdrege.

What the plaque says

Brickyard Park Brickmaking in Hastings began in 1878, six years after the town was established. A year later much of the downtown was destroyed by fire in September 1879. Following the fire, the city passed an ordinance requiring future commercial buildings to use fireproof materials. Brickyards sprang up to supply brick for new buildings. Western Brick and Supply Company was established at this site in 1900, later adding a second yard on the east side of town. At their peak, the two sites employed upwards of 120 workers and produced twenty-four million bricks and tile each year. In 1942 a fire destroyed the east yard. The facility here supplied brick for construction of the Naval Ammunition Depot southeast of Hastings. During WWII, German POWs worked in this yard. The brickyard at this site was destroyed by fire in 1946. Western Brick continued operations at another facility purchased from Polenske Brothers-Schellak & Co. This 27-acre park was established by the City of Hastings in 1977. The smokestack, kiln, and clay pit serve as a reminder of Hastings' role as an important brick-manufacturing center of Nebraska. Adams County Historical Society Hastings Melon Roasters Car Club Nebraska State Historical Society, 2019 City of Hastings

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Stuhr Museum of the Prairie Pioneer — 21 mi
  Edward Durell Stone's island pavilion in Grand Island and an 1890s railroad town of moved buildings, among them the cottage where Henry Fonda was born in 1905.

More markers nearby

• Hastings Chautauqua Pavilion — 0.7 mi
• Central Hastings Historic District — 1.2 mi
• Heartwell Park Historic District — 2.0 mi
• Hastings College Campus Historic District — 2.0 mi