RoadsideThoughts
A Gazetteer for the United States and Canada
Home >> State of Nebraska >> Lancaster County >> Prairie Home >> Tidbits & TriviaIndex...

Outdoor Activities ...

As we travel, we like to pursue some of our interests (such as astronomy and bird watching).

When in Prairie Home, we use the following websites to find information relevant to Prairie Home and the surrounding area.

  • Weather ...
  • Astronomy & Satellites ...
    • Whether using binoculars, a small telescope or the naked-eye, the Heavens-Above website can help you to find your way around the night-time sky. In addition to detailed sky charts, their website will help you find planets, asteriods, comets, satellites and their tracks across the sky.
    • To give accurate results, Heavens-Above requires the latitude and longitude of your location. As a starting point, when we link to Heavens-Above, we pass this GPS location for Prairie Home:
    • 40.864770, -96.520961
    • Once you're on the Heavens-Above website, you can improve its accuracy by giving a more precise longitude and latitude as your actual position.
    • Open the Heavens-Above website centered on Prairie Home
  • Bird Watching ...
    • We enjoy finding new spots for bird watching and we use the eBird website for local sighting reports and to help identify hotspots.
    • The eBird website is organized on a county-by-county basis. We have selected Lancaster County as the starting point when you click on the link below:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Lancaster County
    • Since Prairie Home is near Cass County and also Otoe County, we have provided a link to their eBird sighting reports:
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Cass County
    • Open the eBird sighting report for Otoe County
  • Waymarking ...
    • Looking for somewhere out of the ordinary? Find a unique place and want to share it with others? Then it's time to visit Waymarking.com:
    • Open the Waymark.com report for Prairie Home

Communities Also Named Prairie Home ...

We found six communities that are also named Prairie Home.

Within Nebraska, the name Prairie Home is unique.

Beyond Nebraska, we know of six communities that are located in the United States.

  • Communities Elsewhere In North America ...
    • Illinois
      • Shelby County
      • We found mention of this community, but have little information.<1> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Illinois community of Prairie Home [Shelby County].
    • Kansas
      • Republic County
      • This community is historic<2> and although located in Republic County, we don't know where within the county.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Republic County community of Prairie Home.
    • Louisiana
      • Grant Parish
      • We found mention of this community, but have little information.<1> For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Louisiana community of Prairie Home [Grant Parish].
      • Winn Parish
      • This community is historic<2> and we have very little information. For the information that we do have, please visit our profile page for the Louisiana community of Prairie Home [Winn Parish].
    • Missouri
      • Cooper County
      • This Prairie Home is located in Cooper County and lies 251 miles [403.9 km]<3> to the east southeast of the Prairie Home that is located in Lancaster County.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Cooper County community of Prairie Home.
    • Texas
      • Ector County
      • This community is historic<2> and although located in Ector County, we don't know where within the county.
      • For more information, please visit our profile page for the Ector County community of Prairie Home.

Curious and Interesting Names Near Prairie Home ...

As we travel, we always see a community with a name that gives pause. While there are names which are interesting or familiar, some catch our attention or strike our fancy. We always wonder about such a name. If time permits and the community is not too far, we'll usually try to make a side-trip.

How Far From Prairie Home to ...

We spend a lot of time looking through Gazetteers & Almanacs that were published in the late 1800's and early 1900's. Many of the Gazetteers include the distance from a community such as Prairie Home to various places of note, such as the White House.

With a nod to our favorite Gazetteers, the straight-line distance beginning in Prairie Home and extending to:

  • Lincoln, which is the Seat of Lancaster County, lies 10 miles [16.1 km]<3> to the west southwest. If you could walk a straight line from Prairie Home to Lincoln, with an average speed<5> of 2.2 miles [3.5 km] per hour, it would take four to five hours to make the trip. A horse and buggy averaging 3.2 miles [5.1 km] per hour would take a little over three hours.
  • Lincoln, which is the State Capital of Nebraska, lies 10 miles [16.1 km] to the west southwest (WSW). The buggy would take a little over three hours and walking would take four to five hours.
  • The White House (Washington, DC) is 1,039 miles [1,672.1 km] to the east (E). Driving, with an average speed of 63 miles [101.4 km] per hour, would take over two days, a buggy would take 41 days and walking would take 59 days.
  • The shortest distance<6> to Jerusalem (specifically the Temple Mount and the Dome of the Rock) is 6,545 miles [10,533.2 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<7>
  • The distance to the Great Mosque of Mecca (specifically the Ka'bah - or Kaaba ) is 7,297 miles [11,743.4 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<8>
  • The distance to Saint Peter's Basilica (The Vatican) is 5,198 miles [8,365.4 km] and it lies to the northeast (NE).<9>'

Footnotes ...

<1>If we encounter the name of what might be a community, our methodology is to add that name to our Gazetteer as a placeholder. As we find more information about that community, it will be added to our Gazetteer.

Just as a reminder: Our definition of a community is rather broad and includes those places (or areas) where several families lived and had a name which identified that place. For example, you might hear somebody say that they are going over to Mile's to see Pete ... Mile's is just a gas station and a couple of homes at the crossroads. While it might not be on the map, everybody in the area knows it by that name.

Places of interest include buildings at a crossroad, several families clustered in a hollow or maybe the location of a way station. It also includes places like mines, lumber camps, ferry crossings, etc. The community might still exist, is now gone or only existed for just a short period of time.

Also keep in mind that Prairie Home could have been on the original document by mistake, misspelled, the original/alternate name of a community that we've listed elsewhere or was placed in the wrong county. Sometimes a post office or train station would have a different name than the community where it's located, so two names might be referring to the same community - we're working to straighten it all out.
<2>We use the term 'Historic' broadly and it generally means that the community no longer exists. However, it can also mean that the community might still exist, but was significantly larger or had a more 'official' existence in the past than it does now. Unfortunately our sources of data have proven to be unreliable. If you can provide us with more specific information about Prairie Home, please let us know so that we can improve our accuracy.
<3>Our distances are not driving distances, but are calculated as a 'straight-line' (or point-to-point) distance. A straight line distance ignores things like rivers, canyons, lakes, et cetera - it's truly a line drawn from Point A (ie- Prairie Home) to Point B. In other words: 'As the crow flies'.
<4>While we're fans and frequent users of TripAdvisor, you should know that we're also members of the TripAdvisor affiliate program.
<5>While we have tried to pick reasonable speeds, the rate of travel is very theoretical - obstacles like fences, hills, lakes, river crossings and rest stops have been ignored. When we say 'Days' of travel, we're assuming 8 hours of travel per day.
<6>The shortest line can be visualized by stretching a string on a Globe from Point A to Point B - this is known as a Great Circle Route. Where you might expect the shortest route from Prairie Home to the Middle East to be East and South, the Great Circle Route actually lies to the North and East.Our distance measurements begin at a specific point in Prairie Home. The point we use is located at these GPS coordinates - Latitude: 40.8648, Longitude: -96.5210    
<7>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Jerusalem is 320.477 degrees.
<8>The calculated bearing (or angle) to Mecca is 318.129 degrees.
<9>The calculated bearing (or angle) to the Vatican is 313.306 degrees.