OMAHA, the largest city of Nebraska, U.S.A., a port of entry, and the county seat of Douglas county; on the west bank of the Missouri river, 50o m. W. by S. of Chicago. It is on Federal high ways 3o (the Lincoln), 38, and 75; is the central station on the main transcontinental airway, and has a municipal airport of 200 ac. ; and is served by the Burlington, the Chicago and North West ern, the Chicago Great Western, the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific, the Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis and Omaha, the Illinois Central, the Missouri Pacific, the Rock Island, the Union Pacific, the Wabash, and electric railways, and by 15 motor bus lines. The population was 191,601 in 1920 (18.5% foreign born white and 5.2% negroes) and was 214,006 in 1930, an in crease of 11.7%.
The city has an altitude ranging from 940 to 1,123 feet. The original town site of 27o blocks, an elongated terrace above the river, is now entirely a business quarter, and gradually the city has extended over the hills and bluffs beyond, until it covers 39 sq.m. The stockyards and the packing plants are in South Omaha (formerly an independent municipality, with a population in 1910 of 26,259), which was annexed in 1915. There are 3o parks, with an aggregate area of 3,60o acres, connected by 37 m. of boulevard; 17 supervised playgrounds for children, 3 municipal golf courses, 6 country clubs, and a fine tourist camp. The Fontenelle Forest Reserve covers 1,800 acres. Ft. Crook (io m. S.) and Ft. Omaha, in the northern part of the city, are important military posts. The public school system comprises 58 elementary and 5 high schools, representing an investment of $20,000,000 and an annual expendi ture of $4,000,000 for salaries and maintenance, and the parochial system adds 29 elementary and 5 high schools. Among the other educational institutions are the State School for the Deaf (1867) ; the College of Medicine, part of the University of Nebraska; Creighton university (1879; conducted by the Jesuits), compris ing seven colleges and a high school; the University of Omaha (Presbyterian; 1908) ; and the Presbyterian Theological seminary (1891). The principal newspapers are the Omaha Bee-News, a merger (1927) of the Bee (established in 1871 by Edward Rose water, who made it one of the influential Republican journals of the Middle West) and the News (1899) ; and the World-Herald, formed in 1889 by the combination of papers established in 1865 and 1885, and edited from 1894 to 1896 by William Jennings Bryan. Among the 7o other periodical publications are the Duroc Journal-Bulletin and a daily devoted to the livestock industry. The city has a symphony orchestra, a community playhouse, a drama club, and a large musical club. Ak-Sar-Ben (Nebraska spelled backwards) is an organization of 5,000 business men (formed in 1894 to promote interest in the history and progress of the city and the State) which holds an annual carnival attract ing hundreds of thousands of visitors and conducts two running race meetings a year at its own track. Omaha is the see of Roman Catholic and Protestant Episcopal bishoprics and a district head quarters of the Methodist Episcopal Church. There are 183 churches and missions in the city. The 21 hospitals (most of which conduct training schools for nurses) have 400 physicians and surgeons on their staffs, and treat annually about patients from outside the city. Thirty of the charitable organiza tions are financed jointly through a community chest, which has an annual budget of about $400,000. The proportion of homes owned by their occupants is high and is increasing (39.8% in 1910; 55.5% in 1926). The percentage of illiteracy is low. There is a telephone for every 3.4 persons, and an automobile for every 5. The city operates under a "home rule" charter of 1923, pro viding for a commission form of government, with biennial elections. The assessed valuation of property for 1927 was
$342,321,905.
Omaha is the headquarters of the air-mail branch of the postal service; the Seventh Corps Area of the U.S. army; the Union Pacific railway system and the western divisions of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy and the Chicago and North Western Lines; the Northwestern Bell Telephone company and the Central Divi sion of the Western Union Telegraph company; and the Western Newspapers Union. It has the largest Federal land bank in the country (on the basis of loans granted) and is the seat of a branch bank of the Federal Reserve system. It is one of the principal railroad centres of the country. The ten trunk-line roads entering the city have 62,547 m. of track. Over 9,000,00o tons of freight is received and forwarded annually. In volume of business as measured by debits to individual banking accounts ($2,386,855,000 in 1926) Omaha ranks loth among the cities of the United States, though 34th (1920) in population. It is the largest retail centre between Chicago and Denver ; an important insurance centre, with 33 home-office companies and branches of many others, receiving $50,000,000 annually in premium income ; and one of the leading manufacturing and wholesale distributing centres of the country. The total output of its 706 manufacturing firms in 1926 was valued at $406,866,090 (about three-fourths of the total for the State), of which $210,795,250 represented packing-house prod ucts. Its 55o wholesale and jobbing houses distributed merchan dise valued at $486,357,570 in 1926. It ranks first in the produc tion of butter and pig lead, as a primary grain market and a feeder sheep market, and disputes with Kansas City for second place as a general livestock market and meat-packing centre.