Having the "Patience of Job" One thing I've learned with my long trek of preserving Manning's history is you need a lot of patience...patience with some people who only think that throwing is the only thing good about items from our past.
Patience with looking for and waiting decades to find a picture of some historical event.
Patience with the digitizing process - to take the extra time to properly scan, restore, and document the history that is left.

Back in the mid-1970s I took over my mother's interest in going through old pictures that were for sale at the Manning Monitor office.

As my interest grew, I started talking to the "old timers" of the community about old picture postcards they had. I discovered that lots of small photography companies went from town to town in the late 1800s and early 1900s to take pictures of various scenes in those communities and also of new construction and then print picture postcards.

For years I've been looking for any pictures that show the construction of the churches in Manning.
I found some of the 2nd & 3rd Catholic Church, 3rd Zion church, and odds/ends pictures of other church buildings after they were built, but I was always looking for construction pictures of the 2nd church building of Zion - the large brick building.
Finally, in February of 2020, I found 2 picture postcards on the Internet for sale, one of which showed the 1920 construction of Zion.
I previously had several other images of the other church shown below but this one was slightly different and I was more interested in the information on the back...It tells an interesting story about Manning and its early history.

February 16 update: Below is some historical information from the "History of Manning 1898" book, and also some of my own perspective.

CHURCH SOCIETIES

M. E. Epworth League

M. E. Foreign Missionary

M. E. Earnest Workers

M. E. Sabbath School Supt.

Presbyterian Aid Society

Presby. Young People's S. C. E.

Sabbath School Supt.

Christian Aid Society

Christian Young People's S. C. E.

Christian Sabbath School Supt.

Miss Clara Parker

Mrs. Mary Coe

Mrs. Rose M. Wilson

William H. Reever

Mrs. H. M, Free

David Summerville

Charles Redick

Miss Anna Robb

W. Lancelot from Gray

Frank H. Long

A more complete report of the census taken in 1895, is as follows;
Total number of inhabitants .................. 1144
Males ....................................................... 582
Persons over 18 years of age................. 653
Persons 5 to 18 years of age ................. 347
Persons under 5 years of age ................ 156
Single....................................................... 654
Married.................................................... 490
Widowed.................................................... 48
Divorced...................................................... 7

From the above table we deduct the following matrimonial results;
Persons eligible to marriage................................................................ 144
Number of females aspiring to matrimony.......................................... 162
Number of males aspiring to matrimony ...............................................38
Number of widows and widowers aspiring to matrimony ..................... 48
Number of grass widows and grass widowers aspiring to matrimony.... 7

Number of persons who are capable of supporting a family, aspiring to matrimony.................................... ????

Number of persons not capable of supporting a family, aspiring to matrimony...................................... ????

Born in Iowa ..........................................588
Born in Germany .................................. 246
Born in Canada ....................................... 15
Born in Ireland ......................................... 9
Born in England ..................................... 10
Born in Denmark ..................................... 7
Born in Norway ........................................ 3
Born in Austria ........................................ 4
Lutheran ............................................... 451
Christian ............................................... 115
Presbyterian ........................................... 96
Methodist .............................................. 135
Catholic .................................................. 73
Congregational ....................................... 14
Universalist .............................................. 5
Episcopal .................................................. 2
Baptist ...................................................... 5
Evangelical................................................ 3
United Brethern ....................................... 7
Church of England .................................... 2
No religious belief ................................. 242
Old soldiers ............................................. 24
Births ....................................................... 32
Deaths ..................................................... 13
Subject to military duty ........................... 176
Voters ..................................................... 288
Not naturalized ..........................................16
Foreign born between the ages of 6 and 17 ........... 7

As seen above, the vast majority of Manning citizens held a Judeo/Christian belief. Even before the town was incorporated, the citizens met at homes and before long there were church buildings popping up, left and right and by 1900 there were 5 different churches in Manning.

Think about how these structures were built...all by hand and when you look at the Zion bell tower final construction below, note the scaffolding and also the pulley system used to lift the bricks and mortar to the top...all done by hand - no boom trucks or cranes.

So the people of the community were very dedicated in having a faith-based town.
These strong values still hold true today, with 5 church congregations, while greatly reduced in members but still very active in helping the community stay strong.

February 26 update with this 2013 picture
As most everyone knows in the Manning community, I'm constantly taking pictures of things going on around town, sometimes on a daily basis.
Where necessary I always ask permission - many times even if I don't have to ask permission I still talk to the owner of the property.

Ruth Ohde was one of my biggest supporters of my Manning history and other projects.
Here is an example of why I'm glad I took pictures of the chimney repair on the Ohde Funeral Home in 2013 so I can show people how things compare and contrast now to how they were done 100 years ago...so look at this picture and then the picture below...A big difference and also some of the same methods still being used such as scaffolding but now they don't have to build the scaffolding like 100 years ago with the church construction.

Even though I didn't have to technically get permission since I could take the pictures from a public street, I always worked with Ruth on things like this that dealt with the funeral home and she was always grateful for pictures like this that I took.

Jim McLaughlin Construction repairing the Ohde chimney in 2013 Jim McLaughlin also appreciated my efforts in capturing construction and other events like this. He actually got a kick out of it when I would take video of his work back in the 1980s and then show some of it on Channel 2.
Jim was another great person who I could work with and get along when taking pictures of his many construction projects.
While he didn't need any promotion from me by showing his excellent work on my web pages and Channel 2, it sure didn't hurt his business...

Zion Lutheran Church - now the Calvary Baptist Church

1920 final construction of the bell tower

Christian Church - NW corner of Second & May Streets.

From the History of Manning 1898
The followers of this faith, who are commonly called Campbellites or Deciples of Christ, for a number of years, worshipped with other denominations.
A congregation was organized in June of 1885, by Elder, H. E. Hidgbee, in the public school building. After this, they held meetings in the school building and for a time in the Presbyterian Church which was very kindly tendered them by that congregation.
In the spring of 1886, a lot was purchased of John Stillmans, and a church was erected in the summer of 1887. The committee who had charge of this was: F. W. Arney, L. M. Conklin and F. H. Long. The building has never been dedicated.
Those who have officiated over this congregation as regular pastors are: Elder. H.E. Hidgbee, June, 1885 to June, 1886; O.H. Thurmann, October 1886, resigned in 1888; J. G. Encell, fell of 1888, resigned in summer of 1889; J. A. Linder, April, 1890 to 1891; O. H. King, April, 1891 to April, 1892; D. J. Howe, December, 1892 to September, 1893; C. A, Lochart, after a protracted meeting of three weeks in which fourteen additional members were enrolled, was employed as regular pastor end remained until the following October; O. L. Davis, May, 1895 to August, 1895; J. W. Paine, May, 1896 to May 1897.
In the summer of 1892, Marion Boles held e protracted meeting end increased the congregation with fifty nine members. He met with a severe and painful accident, however, during the progress of these meetings, which compelled him to close them on account of the injuries sustained. While using a gasoline stove to heat the water in the baptistry, the building caught fire, and in extinguishing the flames Rev. Boles was badly burned.
In the summer of 1897, Elder. D. A. Hunter and son held a protracted meeting which lasted five weeks end resulted in adding eighteen new members to the congregation.
According to the Manning Centennial book the Christian Church closed and was torn down in 1920.

Did you notice the return and mailing addresses on backs of both postcards?
One was postmarked Blair, Nebraska, and the other Kansas City, Missouri, and they were sent to Manchester, Kansas.
As far as I know the Seely family has no connections to Manning - so how did these postcards get into the hands of the sender?
Manning had 3 different railroad companies during this time, so an unknown number of people came through Manning over the decades with stop-overs here, where they would purchase picture/postcards and then use them to mail to friends and relatives.
This is why there are so many Manning picture/postcards all over the US - because of all of the train traffic through town.

It put Manning on the map and while this may have not been much of a benefit to the community, it definitely made it possible to where I am now able to find very old pictures of Manning to add to my database.

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