Humphrey, NE

Humphrey is a Platte County city at the junction of U.S. 81 and Nebraska 91, roughly midway between Columbus and Norfolk. The 2020 census counted 857 residents. Humphrey Public Schools and St. Francis Catholic School serve the area, and the city's grain, lumber, churches, bank, and newspaper history still shows up in a town built along the old rail corridor. Farm roads lead out from the highway to the surrounding Platte County fields.

Humphrey was platted in 1880 when the Omaha, Niobrara and Black Hills Railroad reached the site, and it was named for the first postmaster's hometown in New York. The city incorporated in 1883. Catholic immigrants from Germany, Austria, Holland, Poland, Ireland, and Switzerland had settled nearby by the late 1860s, and four churches followed. The railroad brought stores and grain trade; schools, churches, and the local newspaper carried that settlement forward after the tracks stopped defining the town. The two highways still meet at the center of local travel.