Alma, NE

Alma is Harlan County's seat, set where U.S. 136 and U.S. 183 meet the northwest end of Harlan County Reservoir. Union Pacific railroad laborers from Cheyenne founded the town in 1871, and the county-seat question got lively enough that an Alma resident famously took the county records from Melrose in 1875. That bit of civic mischief is still part of the local story: Alma did not simply receive the county government; its residents fought to keep it.

The Republican River flood of 1935 pushed the region toward a dam, and Harlan County Lake now supplies flood control, irrigation support, boating, fishing, and camping. Alma's downtown and county offices sit a short drive from the water, so the city works in two directions at once: inland toward farms and ranches, and south toward the reservoir. It is a courthouse town with a lake at the edge, where a railroad beginning and a disputed county seat still shape the local character today.