BEATRICE  , a

city and the county-seat of Gage county, in S.E . Nebraska, U.S.A., about 40 M . S. of Lincoln . Pop . (1900) 7875 (852 foreign-born); (1910) 9356 . It is served by the Chicago, Burlington& Quincy, the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific, and the Union Pacific railways . Beatrice is the seat of the state institute for feeble-minded youth, and has a Carnegie library . The city is very prettily situated in the valley of the Big Blue river, in the midst of a fine agricultural region . Among its manufactures are dairy products (there is a large creamery), canned goods, flour and grist mill products, gasoline engines, well-machinery, barbed wire, tiles, ploughs, windmills, corn-huskers, and hay-balers . Beatrice was founded in 1857, becoming the county-seat in the same year . It was reached by its first railway and was incorporated as a town in 1871, was chartered as a city in 1873, and in 1901 became a city of the first class .