Arbor Day started here — literally on this lawn, when J. Sterling Morton proposed a tree-planting holiday in 1872 and an estimated million trees went into Nebraska ground on the first one. His estate grew from a four-room frame house into a 52-room mansion, now a National Historic Landmark run with the Arbor Day Foundation.
The house is the showpiece — Victorian and Empire rooms, a Tiffany skylight in the sun parlor — but the 72-acre grounds are the reason to linger: an arboretum with hundreds of tree varieties, an Italian terraced garden, a log cabin, a carriage house, and more than 200 varieties of lilacs. At least ten state-champion trees stand on the property.
The grounds are open year-round with no park permit required; the mansion runs seasonal hours. Spring lilac season and fall color are the peaks. Pair it with Arbor Day Farm’s Tree Adventure next door for a full Nebraska City day.