Crime Scene and Trauma Cleanup in Palmyra, NE

Palmyra is a village in northwestern Otoe County in southeastern Nebraska, set on gently rolling hills near Little Nemaha Creek.

Palmyra's post office was established on June 20, 1862, and the settlement took its name from the ancient city of Palmyra.

The village was platted in 1870 on land belonging to the Reverend John M. Taggart, a Baptist minister who donated half of his farm for the town site.

The four-square-block park laid out at Palmyra's founding was named Taggart Park in his honor and remains the village's central green.

The Midland Pacific Railway was built through Palmyra in 1870-71 alongside the old cutoff trail from Nebraska City to Fort Kearny, and the first train arrived in April 1871.

By 1881 Palmyra had about 200 people and a busy main street with two hotels, three general stores, two drug stores, and a grain elevator that shipped out 250 carloads of grain and livestock that year.

The 2020 census counted 534 residents in Palmyra, nearly unchanged from 545 in 2010, when the village had 207 households.

Palmyra's students attend District OR-1, the school district Palmyra shares with neighboring Bennet.

In August 2018 the Village of Palmyra and District OR-1 Schools received a $5.4 million grant from the Leland and Dorothy Olson Foundation to build new athletic facilities, including baseball and softball fields, a competition track, and an artificial turf football and soccer field.

Palmyra's Old Settlers Picnic tradition dates to the 1800s, when the annual gathering in McKee's grove south of town drew crowds reported at more than 10,000 people, many arriving on special excursion trains.