Stromsburg Nebraska

Stromsburg is a city of about a thousand people in Polk County, along Highway 81. Swedish immigrants with roots in Ockelbo founded it, and the town was platted in 1872 after Lewis Headstrom, an agent for the townsite company, picked the spot. It incorporated as a second class city in 1888, by which time the population had reached roughly a thousand.

The Swedish connection never faded. Governor Frank B. Morrison granted Stromsburg the title Swede Capital of Nebraska in 1966, at the Swedish festival. That festival still runs on the third full weekend of June, with a parade, a smorgasbord, Viking reenactments, a car show and dancing. A building on the town square carries the word Välkommen, Swedish for welcome, and brick streets surround the square itself. By the 1880s two brickyards were working in town.

Several older buildings remain in use, including the Viking Center, which began as an opera house, and a brick Carnegie library put up in 1918. Buckley Park has camping with electrical hookups, a heated swimming pool and volleyball courts, and a lighted trail connects it to City Square Park. The 1929 civic center has been restored for community events and films. The census recorded 1,028 residents in 2020, down from 1,171 in 2010 and 1,232 in 2000.

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