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Potter's Field Cemetery
Douglas County,
Nebraska

The Potters Field Cemetery in Omaha, Nebraska is located on a five acre plot of land at 5000 Young Street near the intersections of Young Street and Mormon Bridge Road. Like all Potter's Fields, it was used to bury poor people or people with no known identity from across the Omaha area. The cemetery was active from 1887 to 1957.

Potter Field 1887 1957
Potter Field is located at Mormon Bridge Rd and State St., Omaha NE 68112


Enter with reverence and respect for the 3,912 souls who are buried in this 5 & 1/2 acres of ground. These nearly forgotten citizens of past history, were in their own way responsible for the running
of the west. Do not desicrate their memory.

The Potter's Field was used as early as 1887, and over the next seventy years almost 4,000 burials were made. However, there were few markers. People who were buried there were too poor to afford burials in regular cemeteries, and therefore were too poor to afford headstones. Burials were commonly made without markers of any sort. There is speculation that Mormon pioneers from Cutler's Park were buried here in the 1850s, as well.[1]

Despite being owned by Douglas County, the cemetery fell into disrepair from the late 1950s through the 1980s. In 1986 a volunteer group rehabilitated Potter's Field, adding a serene walkway and meditation area, as well as a listing of every burial accounted for in government and the neighboring Forest Lawn Cemetery records.[2] Potter's Field was reconsecrated in September, 1986.[3] Forest Lawn maintains the area today.

Perhaps the most notorious internment in Potter's Field was that of Willy Brown, an African American who was lynched in downtown Omaha in 1919. On October 1, 1919 Brown was laid to rest, with the internment log listing only one word next to his name: "Lynched."

Contributed on 12/31/07 by dougvikki
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Record #: 44468

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Submitted: 12/31/07 • Approved: 1/2/08 • Last Updated: 2/16/13 • R44468-G0-S3

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