Omaha/Council Bluffs Area DUers check in

Just checking to see if there is enough interest in the area for a DU Meet Up. I’ve run across a few DUers in the last year in Omaha and Council Bluffs area and in between Lincoln NE and places in rural IA that might make a quorum for a DU gathering, so just checking to see if there is any interest for now.

I know a handful of you but just looking to see how many there are. Not necessarily now with the holidays coming up but just looking to see who is out there and if there is any interest in the area. Perhaps if there is enough interest we could pull something together after the holidays.

Linda/Boober

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that a great uncle of mine and his wife had a house built to scale for them back in the 30s or so. I think it's called the Little People's house. I've never been there.

Is it still standing?

My great uncle's name was Jean Bregant.

and the closest I can find in the phone book is "Little Hands At Work And Play", and that sounds like a Day Care, but I am pretty sure I have heard Little People's in years past.

I looked for an Bregant in the phone book too and there are none.

Do you know anything about the "Little People's" home that you could tell me? Because I am thinking of a place and if it's the same place you are referring to, you would like to hear what I have to tell you about it.

Do you know what end of town your great uncle built his house on?

Linda

Inez Bregant met while working in vaudeville. He was brought here to the US to work in vaudeville. They were both "little people" and also did post card advertisements for some candy store in Council Bluffs,
I have been told they had a house built to their scale.
I think after Jean Bregant died, Inez had a column in the local paper. This is in the 1930s. They had no children and what money there was, I think it was left to the city. Again this is family lore.

That's not what I was thinking but now you have me on a different track. I know just who to ask about it and could get back to you on this. I'll call her next week and get back to this and let you know what I find out if anything.

Thanks for asking, ikojo!

I lived right near Aksarben, and it was, I admit, the nicest time I've had in the last ten years or so. Nice people around there. Even ignoring the "car wash days", the 12-pound snow-turds I had to kick off the fenders, the -23 wind chills, and crawling under the car to unstick a frozen accelerator linkage... I LIKED it there! :-)

I like the way you describe the 12-pound snow-turds we have to kick off the fenders in the winter, LOL!

BTW, since you lived by Aksarben, did you know that is Nebraska spelled backwards? :D

Apparently, they had some serious problems with the local governance, so they said "if Nebraska is determined to be a backwards state..." Ah, memories. I bought my first jar of Udder Ointment there (just so I could show the jar to my southern friends, more than anything else), there was a decent Mexican restaurant right by the apartment complex, in addition to a liquor store (let it snow!), a comic book store nearby, and the first place I ever managed to skid across three lanes of traffic in the snow without getting hit (most people around there saw my Georgia tags and gave me a wide berth!). :-)

I grew up in Omaha which sometimes I miss, but many times I'm happy to not be there anymore because it seems overrun at times by football and freepers (although I was lucky to meet some pretty cool progressive people in my childhood years as well). Depends on what day you ask me as to how much I miss it LOL.

Well, I'm sure there there are a few others. FlashHarry is in Omaha and I'd have to go digging to remember the others in this area.

This is E-I-E-I-O land still, and still all freepers, and all BIG RED football, but I'm a BIG RED fan. Football has been the SHITS since Solich took over - I don't even watch the games anymore.

It was east Iowa that carried the state Blue for Gore in 2000 and Nebraska and Omaha of course is all Republican. Everyplace I have ever worked in CB and Omaha is mostly freepers.

I was working at a place in Bellevue (Offutt AFB- FREEPERS) during the Clinton impeachment and I was considered the Affirmative Action hire for being one of the only Democrats in the company. I shared an office with the only other Democrat who was a black man that I dearly love to this day but he was an asshole and impossible to work with. Gus. He still emails me.

Where are you now? I'm east end Council Bluffs now.

I'm in Connecticut. I moved here when I was 15 in 1987.

Hi east coast!!! :hi:

Cool words like that make me miss it (and nice, friendly people like you, Booberdawg)! :hi: back to you!!!

neighbor :hi:

but have family in the vicinity. Mother is from Woodbine/Dunlap area and we still go back a few times a year. That's a pretty strong republican area though, isn't it? Keep me posted if you get a get together, I live in Iowa City and am pretty busy but would be interested if a gathering occurred there

So far all we have are memories in this thread. I was looking to see how much mileage we might have in the area.

WOW, Iowa City is like a 4 hour drive but if on a weekend you were visiting your folks in Woodbine/Dunlap it would be less than an hour.

Yes, this IS a pretty strong Republican area. But they don't bite. :D I grew up with these people - they know I would bite back!

I think I am the only Democrat in Council Bluffs! I think my next door neighbor might be too just by talking to him but I don't ask.

If any interest develops in the area I'll pull up the thread and let you know. So far I just don't think there are enough people in the area.

Linda :hi:

.

maybe a little more, south of you maybe a drive sometime this spring would be a good idea.

yeah, down by stinktown (st. joseph) so it's not that big a drive if you get something going let me know.

she's in Lincoln. For a time I thought she was a certain liberal Old Weird Harold columnist, but I guess not. Anyway, drop her a line.

You are beginning to grow on me snow. :loveya:


Who?? PM Rainbow whatsit?? I don't take a paper so maybe that's why I don't know what you are talking about.


Nice to see you again! :hi:

See a message from Snow regularly, keeps you on your toes. I couldn't resist jumping in when I saw Omaha & Booberdawg all on the same thread. Anyway, the poster here is Rainbowreflect, who has stated she lives in Lincoln, and her screen name bears enough resemblance to Rainbow Rowell, who writes a good column in the OWH, that I assumed she was her - her was she? Anyway, apparently not, but there she is. I wonder if I've gotten more befuddled since moving to LA?

I'm up for anything that will annoy the Republican status quo in Nebraska.

:yourock:

I think that makes 4 of us now!

:toast: :party: :beer: :toast: :party: :beer: :toast: :party: :beer: :toast: :party: :beer:

even in the "heartland."

I believe the moniker of the Lincoln DU'er you're asking about is Rainbow Reflect.

They scoff! I think we could sit in any bar in town all night and not be noticed. That's how bad it is here. *sigh*

But I have seen some signs of hope here. Last January over a thousand people at the capitol showed up to demonstrate against the war, even though it was freezing. Tomorrow a hundred people are signed up to attend the Moveon.org meetup at the Ross Media Arts Center here in Lincoln.

So, there are progressives here, and they will act if properly motivated. Too bad it takes a war for them to show their faces.

I think I got an email on it but I was gone all day today.

Yes, I'll bet you do see more in Lincoln. I have a sis and bro in law that lives there - I should ask them where they land on the spectum this Xmas. I think I will !

Mixing relatives, the holidays, and politics can be a lethal combination.

I learned this the hard way with my father-in-law. ;-)

I will proceed with caution. (And they usually get stoned half way through the party anyway)

But they are not very well informed so I think it is safe to say I could influence them. :D

UP is closing down St. Louis offices and moving everyone to Omaha.

I am staying in St. Louis.

:toast: