Tobias is a village in Saline County in southeastern Nebraska. The Lincoln Land Company platted it in 1884 for the Burlington Railroad, which wanted a shipping point for cattle and hog producers who were hauling stock some eighteen miles to the nearest rail. The town was first called Castor, but the postal authorities found that too close to the Custer County office and asked for something else; the same man supplied his given name instead, and Tobias was approved in March 1884.
Growth was quick. By late 1886 the two blocks of Main Street held as many as sixty businesses, among them a drug store, a hotel, a blacksmith shop, a saloon and a bank. The population reached about 500 in 1887 and peaked at 672 in 1900. A fire in 1891 burned 22 buildings, after which much of the business district was rebuilt in more fire resistant materials. A brick school covering all twelve grades went up in 1914.
Drought and financial panic in the 1890s, then the automobile and the Depression, worked the other way. Both banks closed and the business district thinned. The 2020 census counted 114 residents, up slightly from 106 in 2010 but well down from 158 in 2000. Students attend Meridian School.
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Tobias is a village in Saline County, Nebraska, laid out in 1884 when the railroad was extended to the area. It's named for Tobias Castor, a local settler.
With 114 residents at the 2020 Census, Tobias remains one of Saline County's smallest villages, serving the surrounding farmland as a small agricultural trade center.
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