Thayer County

A Hebron editor stood behind the suffrage story. Erasmus M. Correll came to the county as a surveyor in 1869 and started the Hebron Journal in February 1871, publishing it until his death on September 5, 1895. Elected to the Nebraska House in 1880, he introduced a bill to put a woman suffrage amendment to the voters, and his campaign for it failed. In 1882 he founded the Western Woman's Journal in Lincoln, and he served as president of the American Woman Suffrage Association. In 2025 Hebron opened a Women's Suffrage Legacy of Courage Park beside its library.

What the plaque says

Thayer County The boundaries of the future Thayer County were first defined in 1856, and the county was named Jefferson. In 1867 Jones County to the east was attached. The legislature in 1871 divided the single large county into two, naming the western county Thayer. The eastern county became today's Jefferson County. Thayer County is named for John M. Thayer, Civil War general and Nebraska U.S. senator, 1867- 71. He later served as Nebraska governor. Hebron, the county seat, was established in 1871. Several great trails to the West passed through Thayer County, including the Oregon-California Trail, the Pony Express Trail, and the overland stagecoach route. In 1864 Indians raided ranches and stage stations along the trails in Thayer County. The St. Joseph and Denver City Railroad came in 1872. Thayer County is the home of Nebraska's woman suffrage movement, forming the first permanent woman suffrage association in 1879. The Thayer County courthouse, completed in 1903, is constructed of Indiana Bedford limestone and Vermont marble. The building's tower was so badly damaged by the Hebron tornado of 1953 that it had to be removed. Thayer County Historical Society Nebraska State Historical Society

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Pawnee Indian Museum State Historic Site — 23 mi
  A Kitkahahki Pawnee village of the late 1700s above the Republican, where a museum shelters a lodge the women built and a family bundle carried out of Massacre Canyon and given back to this place.

More markers nearby

• The Hebron CCC and POW Camps — 0.5 mi
• Friedensau — 5.4 mi
• The Forty-Niner Trail — 6.2 mi
• Bruning Army Air Field — 13 mi