Maxwell, Nebraska: Mac's Well

Maxwell, in Lincoln County just south of the North Platte River, carries a name rooted in a simple act of hospitality. When soldiers and travelers came through this part of the Platte Valley for mail and supplies, a man named John McCullugh ran a hotel where they could water their horses and get a cool drink at what everyone called Mac's Well. When it came time to name the post office and the town, people reached for what was already on everyone's lips.

Mac's Well became Maxwell, at least in the local telling; some sources say the town was named for a railroad official. The Union Pacific platted the village formally on July twelfth, eighteen ninety-four. Maxwell is a small community today, just a few hundred people on the rolling plains east of North Platte, but the origin of its name remains one of the more human stories along the whole length of the railroad.