Abandoned Towns
Scattered headstones and a small iron-fenced plot on the grassy hilltop of the St. Deroin cemetery, under bare trees in early spring

River and lake town

St. Deroin

A trading post and ferry town of the 1850s on the Nemaha Half-Breed Reservation, eaten away by the Missouri and empty by 1920. Its schoolhouse, moved up the bluff in 1912, and its cemetery are kept in Indian Cave State Park, where volunteers demonstrate old crafts on living history weekends.

40°16′20″N 95°33′36″W · ≈880 ft

Photo: DickClarkMises, Wikimedia Commons, CC0

Open: state park, park permit required

St. Deroin is part of Indian Cave State Park, run by Nebraska Game and Parks. Every vehicle needs a park entry permit ($7 a day for Nebraska plates, $14 for others). The park's page, read October 20, 2026, describes the restored schoolhouse and general store, with old-time crafts demonstrated on living history weekends in summer and fall, and the park's 2026 Haunted Hollow ran a trick-or-treat trail through the town on October 9. Game and Parks doesn't post hours for the buildings; call the park at 402-883-2575 before a long drive.

Overview

A ferry town the river took back

St. Deroin grew on the Missouri River floodplain below the bluffs of what is now Indian Cave State Park, inside the Nemaha Half-Breed Reservation, set aside in 1830 for mixed-heritage families. Its namesake, Joseph Deroin, was the son of a trapper and an Otoe mother and kept a trading post for the reservation's people. The town was named for him in 1853 and chartered in 1854, when a ferry began carrying passengers across from Iowa. Deroin, known on the river for his temper, was shot dead in 1858 by a settler over a $6 hog payment; the killer was acquitted.

The ferry kept the town alive for about thirty years. St. Deroin had a post office from 1861, a brick schoolhouse from 1868, and at its peak in the 1870s somewhere between nearly 200 and 300 people. Floods and the railroad ended it. Spring floods had washed away some buildings on the floodplain by 1880, a railroad spur between Nemaha and Shubert passed it by, and the 1885 state atlas marks the Missouri's 1865 bank across the northeast corner of the town plat. The post office closed in 1910, the river flooded the town again in 1911, and in 1912 the schoolhouse was taken apart and rebuilt on the bluff. When the channel moved away from the ferry landing in 1915, the town was finished. It was empty by 1920.

Today the site is the northern end of Indian Cave State Park. The schoolhouse and the cemetery are what remain of the original town. The schoolhouse stands with a rebuilt general store at the north end of the park road, where volunteers demonstrate old crafts such as broom making, soap making and blacksmithing on living history weekends in summer and fall. Game and Parks' park map puts the St. Deroin Cemetery about a mile to the southwest, near the Ash Grove campground.

Timeline

Ferry, floods and a moved schoolhouse

The 1885 state atlas page by Everts & Kirk. St. Deroin's plat is at lower right, with the Missouri River's 1865 bank drawn across its northeast blocks
The 1885 state atlas page by Everts & Kirk. St. Deroin's plat is at lower right, with the Missouri River's 1865 bank drawn across its northeast blocks · Photo: Everts & Kirk, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
  1. The 138,000-acre Nemaha Half-Breed Reservation is set aside for the children of French trappers and Native American mothers.
  2. Joseph Deroin, son of a French or Métis trapper and an Otoe mother, opens a trading post. Wikipedia dates it to 1840 at the mouth of the Platte; Nebraska Life says he claimed 320 acres here in 1842.
  3. The town is named for Deroin in 1853 and chartered in 1854, when a ferry from Iowa begins running. The townsite below the bluffs is laid out in 1856.
  4. Deroin is shot dead by a settler, James Biddow, in a dispute over a $6 payment for a hog. The killer is acquitted. A subscription school opens.
  5. A post office opens.
  6. Residents build a brick schoolhouse.
  7. The town's peak: nearly 200 people by Wikipedia's count, 300 by Nebraska Life's. By 1880 about 90 remain.
  8. By 1880 spring floods have washed away some buildings on the floodplain. The 1885 state atlas draws the Missouri's 1865 bank cutting across the plat's northeast blocks.
  9. The post office closes.
  10. The Missouri floods the town in 1911. In 1912 the schoolhouse is taken down and rebuilt brick by brick on the bluffs.
  11. The river channel moves away from the ferry landing. Wikipedia says the ferry service moved to Brownville.
  12. St. Deroin is completely abandoned.
  13. Indian Cave State Park is established around the site.
  14. The park's 31st Haunted Hollow includes trick-or-treating along a decorated trail through the town of St. Deroin on October 9.

Legend and record

Haunted Hollow

Visitors and park staff repeat a set of ghost stories around the campfires, and Nebraska Life collected several of them in 2018. Joseph Deroin, the legend says, was buried sitting on his favorite horse, and people near the cemetery report hearing hooves. A. J. Ritter, who lost an arm fishing with dynamite on the Missouri and was later buried in the St. Deroin cemetery, is said to rise on moonless nights to look for it. A park employee once reported a man in old clothes by a gate who vanished, and later matched him to a historic photo of the livery stable.

None of these stories is on record. We tell them because you will hear them at the park, and we label them as legend.

The record behind them is plain enough: Deroin was shot in 1858 and his killer acquitted, and the cemetery on the bluff holds the town's dead. The park's Haunted Hollow, in its 31st year in 2026, is held each October.

What's left

A schoolhouse on the bluff

The St. Deroin cemetery on the bluff, April 2011
The St. Deroin cemetery on the bluff, April 2011 · Photo: DickClarkMises, Wikimedia Commons, CC0

Game and Parks describes the restored schoolhouse and general store of St. Deroin, where crafts are demonstrated on living history weekends. Nebraska Life wrote in 2018 that the cemetery and the schoolhouse, moved brick by brick to higher ground, are all that remain of the original community, with the general store a rebuild overlooking the river. In 2018 a volunteer broom maker worked at an 1879 broom winder in the store, beside a soap maker and a blacksmith. Game and Parks' 2025 park map labels St. Deroin at the north end of the park road, near the river, and the St. Deroin Cemetery about a mile southwest, near the Ash Grove campground. The floodplain where the town's streets ran is now wetland and woods along the river.

The 1915 USGS sheet in the historic maps below labels St. Deroin at the foot of the bluffs, with a road climbing into the hills, and prints ST DEROIN in large letters across the surrounding district. The 1966 sheet shows only roads at the foot of the bluffs, and on the 1986 sheet the area is Indian Cave State Park.

  • Brick schoolhouse (1868; rebuilt on the bluff 1912)
  • St. Deroin cemetery
  • Rebuilt general store
  • Town plat, now wetland and woods
USGS topographic map of the north end of Indian Cave State Park, with North Ridge, History and Lincoln Bend Wetland trails, the bluffs and the Missouri River
USGS The National Map, topo. St. Deroin sits where the park roads meet at the foot of the bluffs; the History Trail climbs south and the Missouri runs along the right.
Aerial view of wooded bluffs at left, a green floodplain with a long pond in the middle and the Missouri River at right
Aerial imagery, same area. The forested bluffs meet the floodplain where the town stood; the Missouri runs down the right side.

Historic maps

St. Deroin on USGS maps, 1915–1986

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

USGS topographic map around St. Deroin, 1915
Nemaha sheet, 1915, 1:62,500 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Day trip

Plan a day trip to St. Deroin from Falls City

Take it with you

Day trip itinerary

The essentials, the sample day with boxes to tick, what to photograph and the coordinates, on two printable pages. Handy where there's no signal.

Download the PDF (640 KB)

St. Deroin is about half an hour from Falls City, at the north end of the park road in Indian Cave State Park. The schoolhouse, the rebuilt store and the cemetery take a morning. Add the petroglyphs at Indian Cave and a walk on the park's trails and you have a full day. The buildings come alive on living history weekends in summer and fall; Game and Parks doesn't post their dates or hours.

A sample day

  1. Leave Falls City north on US 73, then follow 652 Avenue and 720 Road into the park, about half an hour.
  2. Buy the entry permit at the park entrance and drive to the north end of the park road.
  3. St. Deroin: the brick schoolhouse, moved up the bluff in 1912, and the rebuilt general store.
  4. The St. Deroin Cemetery, about a mile southwest near the Ash Grove campground on the park map.
  5. Picnic, then walk the boardwalk to the Indian Cave petroglyphs and the view of the Missouri.
  6. Take one of the trails along the river or the bluffs, then head back to Falls City.

Coming from Omaha? It's about 2 hours. Leave by 7:30 a.m. to be at St. Deroin by 10.

What to photograph and film

  • The schoolhouse. Game and Parks' own photo shows children ringing its bell. Frame the brick front and the bell from the path.
  • Living history. Broom making, soap making and blacksmithing on living history weekends make good video. Ask before filming people up close.
  • The cemetery. Scattered headstones and a small iron-fenced plot on a grassy hilltop under the trees.
  • The Missouri. The boardwalk below Indian Cave looks over the river. Game and Parks also points to the overlook on Loop Road in fall color.

Map & directions

Getting there

Falls City is the nearest city, about half an hour south. From Omaha the drive runs down I-29 through Iowa into Missouri, crosses back into Nebraska on US 136 and heads south on NE 67. Both routes enter Indian Cave State Park on 720 Road and end on the park road at the St. Deroin site; buy a park entry permit when you arrive.

USGS topographic map between Falls City and Indian Cave State Park with the route drawn on it

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

From downtown Falls City16.8 miabout 31 min
  1. From downtown Falls City, take Harlan Street (US 73) north; it becomes 651 Boulevard.5.7 mi
  2. Turn right on 712 Road.0.5 mi
  3. Bear left onto 652 Avenue and follow it north.8.1 mi
  4. Turn right on 720 Road (S-64E), which becomes Indian Cave Recreation Road.1.3 mi
  5. Turn left, then bear left on the park road to St. Deroin.1.1 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • The routes are computed from OpenStreetMap and haven't been driven by us. We have no dated source on road surfaces.
  • A Nebraska park entry permit is required. Buy one at the park entrance, at Game and Parks offices and permit vendors, or online.
  • Game and Parks posts no hours for the St. Deroin buildings; living history weekends run in summer and fall. Call the park office before you go.
  • Game and Parks says most modern facilities in its parks close from mid-October through April, depending on weather.

Photos

St. Deroin in photos

Visitor reports

Been to St. Deroin?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

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Nearby

Other sites near St. Deroin

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Nebraska index.

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "St. Deroin": fact sheet fields (county, climate, best time, post office dates).
  2. Wikipedia, "St. Deroin, Nebraska", retrieved October 2026: Joseph Deroin and his 1840 trading post, the 1830 reservation, the 1853 naming, 1854 charter and 1856 townsite, the ferry, post office, schools, population, floods, the railroad spur, the move of the school, abandonment by 1920, the location in the park, and coordinates.
  3. Nebraska Life, "Nebraska's Haunted Hollow", September/October 2018: Deroin's 1842 claim and his killing, the 300 peak, the 1911 flood and 1915 end, the moved school, the rebuilt store, the living history volunteers, and the ghost stories.
  4. Nebraska Game and Parks, "Indian Cave State Park", read in the browser October 20, 2026: the restored schoolhouse and general store, living history weekends, the permit rule, address and phone; its 2025 park map places St. Deroin and the St. Deroin Cemetery.
  5. Nebraska Game and Parks calendar, "Haunted Hollow at Indian Cave State Park", read October 20, 2026: the 31st annual event, the October 9, 2026 trick-or-treat trail through St. Deroin, and the vehicle permit rule.
  6. Nebraska Game and Parks, "Park pricing", read October 20, 2026: park entry permit prices and the off-season closure of modern facilities.
  7. Wikipedia, "Indian Cave State Park", retrieved October 2026: the park's 1962 founding.
  8. Nebraska Game and Parks, "Indian Cave State Park", read again in the browser October 21, 2026, for the day trip: 22 miles of hike and bike trails and 16 of equestrian trails, the Indian Cave petroglyphs and boardwalk, campground restrooms, picnicking and the shelter, the schoolhouse photo, the Loop Road overlook.
  9. Nebraska Game and Parks, "Park FAQs", read October 21, 2026: self-service fee boxes, and the photography and filming rules.
  10. Photos and the 1885 atlas page: Wikimedia Commons, credited below each one. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits