Bayard Nebraska

City · Morrill County · Population 1,140 (2020 census) · ZIP 69334 · Founded 1888 · Peak population 2,127 (1920)

About Bayard

Bayard is a city of 1,140 people (2020) in western Morrill County, at about 3,763 feet less than 2 miles north of the North Platte. US 26 runs through town as Main Street, and NE 92 joins it nearby on the way west to Gering; Chimney Rock National Historic Site is about 4 miles south by NE 92 and Chimney Rock Road. Bayard has Bayard Public Schools, the Chimney Rock Medical Center clinic, a library, the Chimney Rock Villa assisted living, the Bayard Depot Museum and a golf course. Bridgeport is about 15 road miles southeast and Scottsbluff 23 miles northwest. Bayard is on Mountain Time.

History

The first Bayard was founded in 1887–88 about a mile west of today’s town, and Millard and Jap Senteny named it for their old home of Bayard, Iowa; the post office opened in 1888, and the Chimney Rock Transcript, now the Bayard Transcript, began that December. In 1900 the town moved to the new Burlington line. Great Western Sugar built a $2 million factory near town in 1917, the year Bayard became a city of the second class, and the population reached 2,127 in 1920. Bayard lost the 1908 county-seat election to Bridgeport, 375 to 575. The depot, the town’s third, was finished in 1928 and became a museum in 1999. In the 1930s Civilian Conservation Corps Camp BR-61 worked on the North Platte irrigation project here.

Things to see

Chimney Rock National Historic Site: the Abbott Visitor Center and trail exhibits, about 4 miles south · the Bayard Depot Museum, 103 Main St., free · the Faucus Springs (Fliesbach WMA) wetlands east of Chimney Rock · Arnold Trupp WMA, 6 miles north · Chimney Rock Pioneer Days in September