How Broken Bow, Nebraska Got Its Name (The Post Office Kept Saying No)

Broken Bow, Nebraska, is named for a broken bow found near the town site. Homesteader Wilson Hewitt sent it in as a name after the post office turned down his earlier choices.

Where the name comes from

A 1925 study of Nebraska place names tells it this way. Wilson Hewitt suggested the name to the Post Office Department after finding “a broken bow and arrow” on an old Indian camping ground nearby. He had already suggested three names for the town, and the department rejected all of them. After the third one was turned down, he came across the bow and picked the name right away, “feeling sure that there was no other town by that name in the state.”

The study adds that nobody knew who the bow had belonged to. In 1925, a fragment of it was owned by E. R. Purcell, editor of the Custer County Chief.

Who found the bow?

The stories don’t agree on that detail. The 1925 study says Hewitt found it himself. A family history published by the Hooker County Historical Society says two of his sons, Fred and Edwin, found it along the banks of Muddy Creek and brought it home, and that it was hanging on the wall when their father was trying to come up with a name.

The number of rejected names isn’t settled either. The city’s history page and the family history both say two names were turned down, while the 1925 study says three.

When

The city’s history page says the post office opened on November 4, 1879. The 1925 study says the town was located and platted in June 1882. The U.S. Geological Survey’s record also gives 1882 for the platting, then 1884 for incorporation as a village and 1888 as a city. It doesn’t explain the name.

Sources & further reading

• Lilian Linder Fitzpatrick, Nebraska Place-Names (University of Nebraska, 1925). A public-domain study of the state’s place names, county by county. Hewitt, the rejected names, the bow and arrow, and the fragment kept by the editor of the Custer County Chief.
• City of Broken Bow, “History.” The 1879 post office and the name accepted after two rejections.
• Clifford G. Boyer, Hewitt family history (Hooker County Historical Society). The version where Hewitt’s sons found the bow on Muddy Creek.
• GNIS feature 827664 (U.S. Geological Survey). The federal record for Broken Bow. Platted 1882, incorporated as a village in 1884 and as a city in 1888.