Ryan Roenfeld

In old Omaha, the scent of opium wafted through saloon doors, while prostitutes openly solicited customers. When the St. Elmo theater ran short of the usual entertainment, the residents could always fall back on robbing strangers. Tenants of the Burnt District squirmed under the extorting thumb of a furniture dealer dubbed the Man-Landlady. The games of chance and confidence and outright municipal graft all played a part in a wicked city where gambler Tom Dennison ran politics and Madam Anna Wilson drove philanthropy. Join Ryan Roenfeld for a stroll along the seamier side of Omaha's past.

In old Omaha, the scent of opium wafted through saloon doors, while prostitutes openly solicited customers. When the St. Elmo theater ran short of the usual entertainment, the residents could always fall back on robbing strangers. Tenants of the Burnt District squirmed under the extorting thumb of a furniture dealer dubbed the Man-Landlady. The games of chance and confidence and outright municipal graft all played a part in a wicked city where gambler Tom Dennison ran politics and Madam Anna Wilson drove philanthropy. Join Ryan Roenfeld for a stroll along the seamier side of Omaha s past."

From the outside it looks like a stately home. Inside, it''s quite different. Just 18 rotary cell jails were ever build. Most were promptly condemned as unsafe and cruel, but the biggest one lasted the longest, its three story 90,000 pound rotating cell block serving as the Pottawattamie County jail in Council Bluffs, Iowa from 1885 until 1969. This book is the second in a series, exploring the conditions of local incarceration before the "squirrel cage" was built, and goes into detail of the crimes of some of those who called it "home" over the years.

The Union Pacific Transfer Grounds at Council Bluffs developed along the shores of Spoon Lake after 1867. The railroad yards grew into a key component of the transcontinental railroad as the city of Council Bluffs grew around it.