Blood & Biohazard Cleanup Near West Wellfleet Wellfleet, NE

Wellfleet is an incorporated village in Lincoln County in west-central Nebraska, and it is part of the North Platte micropolitan statistical area.

Wellfleet was platted about 1887 when the railroad was extended through Lincoln County, with the townsite chosen the year after the tracks arrived.

The village was named after Wellfleet, Massachusetts, the Cape Cod town — the name itself is traditionally explained as a corruption of "whale fleet," an odd namesake for a landlocked prairie village.

The townsite was promoted by Carroll Hawkins, a Massachusetts real estate man, together with a wealthy English investor, Dr. Tomkins; Wellfleet's post office opened in 1887 and a depot and stockyards followed in 1888.

Wellfleet briefly boomed to about 400 residents, but many of its buildings were later moved to North Platte and the population dropped below 200.

A dam completed in 1932 after the Wellfleet Lake Company was formed created a roughly two-mile-long lake on Medicine Creek for flood control and recreation.

The 2020 census counted 72 residents in Wellfleet.

At the 2010 census there were 78 people in 30 households and 24 families living in the village.

The village covers 0.27 square miles, making it one of the smallest incorporated places in Lincoln County.

Wellfleet's community calendar centers on its annual Fall Festival, held on the second Saturday of September; the village celebrated its centennial alongside the festival in 1987.