Omaha Claim Club - Vigilante Violence

Vigilante Violence

The club was effective in protecting its members' claims, primarily and frequently using mob violence to enforce its rule. The club's vigilantes rode masked and at night, frustrating efforts to identify the mob. The Omaha Claim Club became recognized as the unofficial court governing land claims, and in 1854 Alfred D. Jones, a surveyor, divided land into blocks starting by the ferry landing. That was the first time anyone planned what Omaha would look like. Jones was soon afterwards appointed the first postmaster of Omaha. Later Club leadership included Andrew J. Poppleton.

The club's original claim of nearly four thousand acres (16 km²) frustrated many settlers who came after the club was formed. Generally they objected to the vast extent of territory held by so few individuals and attempted to "jump", or occupy for themselves, the claims of the members of the Omaha Claim Club. After this happened, a vigilante committee formed by members of the club visited the claim jumper to inform him that he was trespassing upon land previously claimed. They would warn the intruder that if he didn't vacate immediately he would be forced to. If the committee encountered resistance, the jumper soon found himself neck-deep in trouble — the severity depending upon the intensity of resistance.