Lincoln

Sister cities

• Tbilisi

History

Before the expansion westward of settlers, the prairie was covered with buffalo grass. Plains Indians, descendants of indigenous peoples who occupied the area for thousands of years, lived in and hunted along Salt Creek. The Pawnee, who included four tribes, lived in villages along the Platte River. The Great Sioux Nation, including the Ihanktonwan and the Lakota, to the north and west, used Nebraska as a hunting and skirmish ground, but did not have any long-term settlements in the state. An occasional buffalo could still be seen in the plat of Lincoln in the 1860s. The village was sited on the east bank of Salt Creek. The first settlers were attracted to the area due to the abundance of salt. Once J. Sterling Morton developed his salt mines in Kansas, salt in the village was no longer a viable commodity. Captain W. T. Donovan, a former steamer captain, and his family settled on Salt Creek in 1856. In 1859, the village settlers met to form a county. A caucus was formed and the committee, which included Donovan, selected Lancaster as the county seat. The county was named Lancaster. After the passage of the 1862 Homestead Act, homesteaders began to inhabit the area. The first plat was dated August 6, 1864. By the end of 1868, Lancaster had a population of approximately 500. The township of Lancaster was renamed Lincoln, with the incorporation of the city of Lincoln on April 1, 1869. In 1869, the University of Nebraska was established in Lincoln by the state with a land grant of about 130,000 acres. Construction of University Hall, the first building, began the same year. Nebraska was granted statehood on March 1, 1867. The capital of the Nebraska Territory had been Omaha since the creation of the territory in 1854. Most of its population lived south of the Platte…

Geography

Lincoln has an area of , of which is land and is water, according to the United States Census Bureau in 2024. The city's growth has led to development of the surrounding land, much of which is composed of gently rolling hills. In recent years, Lincoln's northward growth has encroached on the habitat of the endangered Salt Creek tiger beetle. The Lincoln Metropolitan Statistical Area consists of Lancaster County and Seward County. Seward County was added to the metropolitan area in 2003. Lincoln is also in the Lincoln-Beatrice Combined Statistical Area which consists of the Lincoln metropolitan area and the micropolitan area of Beatrice. The city of Beatrice is the county seat of Gage County. The Lincoln-Beatrice combined statistical area is home to 372,313 people (2024 estimate) making it the 109th-largest combined statistical area in the United States. As of December 2013, Lincoln had 45 registered neighborhood associations within the city limits. One core neighborhood that has seen rapid residential growth in recent years is the downtown Lincoln area. In 2010, there were 1,200 downtown Lincoln residents; in 2016, there were 3,000 (an increase of 140%). Around the middle of the same decade, demand for housing and rent units began outpacing supply. With Lincoln's population expected to grow to more than 311,000 people by 2020, prices for homes and rent costs have risen. Home prices rose 10% from the first quarter of 2015 to the first quarter of 2016; rent prices rose 30% from 2007 to 2017 with a 5–8% increase in 2016 alone. Located in the Great Plains, far from the moderating influences of mountains and large bodies of water, Lincoln has a highly variable four season humid continental climate (Köppen Dfa, Trewartha Dcao): Winters are cold; summers are hot and…

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• American Robin

  Turdus migratorius Linnaeus, 1766 · Aves
  15,392
• Blue Jay

  Cyanocitta cristata (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  14,310
• Northern Cardinal

  Cardinalis cardinalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  13,515
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  12,557
• European Starling

  Sturnus vulgaris Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  9,720
• American Goldfinch

  Spinus tristis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  9,688
• Downy Woodpecker

  Dryobates pubescens (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  9,238
• House Sparrow

  Passer domesticus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  9,219

Largest nearby schools

• LINCOLN EAST HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 2,268 students · 17.9:1 ratio
• LINCOLN HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 2,196 students · 14.4:1 ratio
• SOUTHWEST HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 2,171 students · 19.9:1 ratio
• NORTH STAR HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 2,072 students · 16.3:1 ratio
• LINCOLN SOUTHEAST HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 1,929 students · 16.6:1 ratio
• LINCOLN NORTHEAST HIGH SCHOOL
  High · LINCOLN · 1,812 students · 15.6:1 ratio
• SCOTT MIDDLE SCHOOL
  Middle · LINCOLN · 1,136 students · 16.2:1 ratio
• SCHOO MIDDLE SCHOOL
  Middle · LINCOLN · 917 students · 15:1 ratio

Most recent

• M 2.9 — 2014-01-06
  5 km NW of Liberty, Nebraska
• M 3.3 — 2010-11-18
  4 km E of Octavia, Nebraska
• M 3.6 — 2009-12-17
  2 km NW of Auburn, Nebraska
• M 3.5 — 2004-07-16
  6 km SSE of Riverton, Iowa