The Chicago & North Western Railroad (CNW) built a 115-foot tall steel bridge across Long Pine Creek in 1905, and the town became a division point between Norfolk and Chadron. Crews bunked in town, while steam engines were serviced at the roundhouse.
The railroad harnessed the Seven Springs south of town and pumped water to the standpipe providing residents with pure spring water. Freight trains carried goods and livestock to market from surrounding ranches and farms. Five passenger trains per day stopped in Long Pine, bringing many visitors to the annual Chautauqua and the Hidden Paradise resort.
They lodged at Long Pine’s numerous hotels, including the Upstill Hotel and Miller Hotel, which is listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Transferred to Union Pacific in 1984, the last train ran through Long Pine in 1992. Known as the ‘Cowboy Line,’ it is now part of the Cowboy Trail.
]]>Ainsworth Army Air Field, completed on November 30, 1942, was a satellite of Rapid City Army Air Field and under command of the Second Air Force. The field was one of eleven Army Air Force training bases built in Nebraska during World War II.
The 2,496-acre field included three 7,300 x 150-foot concrete runways, a hanger, warehouse, repair and machine shops, link and bomb trainers, Norden bombsite vaults, and barracks for over 600 officers and enlisted men. The base's primary mission was to provide proficiency training for P-39 and P-47 pilots of the 364th and 53rd fighter squadrons, and for B-17 crews of the 540th and 543rd bombardment squadrons before deployment to the European Theater of Operations. Aircraft camouflage experiments were also conducted on the site.
The airfield closed in 1945 and the following year the city of Ainsworth received a U.S. Government revocable license for commercial aircraft operations on the field. In 1948 the War Assets Administration declared the property surplus, and the city of Ainsworth received title to the airfield for use as a municipal airport.
]]>Lakeland High School was constructed 20 miles south of this site by ranchers from several rural school districts during the summer of 1934. School began that September with 11 students. Constructed of prairie sod, with a sod roof supported by pole rafters, this two-room building housed the classroom and living quarters for the teacher. Outbuildings...two toilets and barn for the students' horses..were also built of sod. The rooms were heated by "prairie coal" (cow chips) picked up by teachers, students and parents.
Altogether 33 students attended Lakeland, with 11 receiving high school diplomas. Some students rode horseback up to ten miles; others stayed with families and helped with chores for their room and board. With Nebraska Department of Education approval and through the efforts of the county superintendent and school patrons, students in the sparsely populated sandhills of southern Brown County received their higher education during the hard times of the 1930s.
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