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Lower Plains: Kansas, Nebraska

and second largest city. About a quar- ter of a million Nebraskans live here. According to a 2013 Gallup- Healthways survey, Lincoln residents are the healthiest and happiest in the nation. Fur traders in the early 19th centu- ry appreciated Bellevue’s pleasant scenery and gave the city its name— meaning “beautiful view” in French. Today, Bellevue is Nebraska’s oldest and third-largest city (population 50,137). During World War II, facto- ries in Bellevue assembled B-29 bombers for the U.S. military, includ- ing the ones that that dropped atomic bombs on Japan in August 1945. Almost 25,000 people live in North Platte , according to the U.S. Census Bureau. But although the southwestern Nebraska city is only the eighth-largest in the state, it is the site of the largest train yard in the world. The 2,850-acre facility at Bailey Yard manages up to 14,000 rail cars a day. Back in the 1880s, North Platte was home to Buffalo Bill Cody—famed Pony Express rider, buffalo hunter, U.S. Army scout, and

View of downtown Lincoln, including St. Mary Catholic Church, founded in 1867.

The ranch and home owned by famed Western showman Buffalo Bill Cody is now a state park near North Platte.