Neale Woods is a nature preserve nearly 600 acres in size in

North North is one of the four compass points or cardinal directions. It is the opposite of south and is perpendicular to east and west. ''North'' is a noun, adjective, or adverb indicating Direction (geometry), direction or geography. Etymology T ...

Omaha, Nebraska Omaha ( ) is the List of cities in Nebraska, most populous city in the U.S. state of Nebraska. It is located in the Midwestern United States along the Missouri River, about north of the mouth of the Platte River. The nation's List of United S ...

. Located about 10 miles north of

Downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in American and Canadian English to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business district ( ...

, Neale Woods is located in the Ponca Hills on top of the

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. It is operated by

Fontenelle Forest Fontenelle Forest is a forest, located in Bellevue, Nebraska. Its visitor features include hiking trails, a nature center, children's camps, a gift shop, and picnic facilities. The forest is listed as a National Natural Landmark and a Nat ...

History

Neale Woods was begun with a donation of 120 acres of land by Edith Neale in 1971. Neale's father had homesteaded the land in the mid-1800s. An additional 60 acres of contiguous land was given by Carl Jonas, whose father had been one of the founding members of

. After his death, a bequest from Jonas' estate made possible the purchase of 112 acres of additional land. Of that amount, 25 acres were cleared and designated as prairies, planted in a way thought to be representative of the land in the mid-1800s. Jonas' former home now serves as the Neale Woods Nature Center.

Facilities

The Neale Woods Nature Center provides trail maps for visitors. A printable trail map is also available online in digital

PDF Portable document format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe Inc., Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, computer hardware, ...

format. Trails are open every day from dawn until dusk. The nature center building is open to visitors seasonally during the spring/summer/fall.

Astronomy

Neale Woods was home to the Millard Observatory, which was the largest public observatory in the Omaha metropolitan area. Astronomy nights were generally held two times per month, between the months of August and May. Featured telescopes included: *10” Schmidt-Cassegrain *2 - 12” Meade LX 200 GPS *14” Celestron *13” Coulter *8” Meade *3 - 6” telescopes The Observatory closed in 2013 and the equipment moved to the

Strategic Air Command & Aerospace Museum The Strategic Air Command & Aerospace Museum is a museum focusing on aircraft and nuclear missiles of the United States Air Force during the Cold War. It is located near Ashland, Nebraska, along Interstate 80 southwest of Omaha. The objective of ...

References

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External links

Fontenelle Forest Visitor Information

Neale Woods
- reviewed by Omaha.net
Audubon Nebraska
- Audubon Nebraska 1971 establishments in Nebraska Geography of Omaha, Nebraska Protected areas established in 1971 Protected areas of Douglas County, Nebraska Nature centers in Nebraska Tourist attractions in Omaha, Nebraska

History

Facilities

Astronomy

See also

References

External links