Moving a Courthouse by Railroad

Old Photographs posted
Moving a building by train. The caption tells us they are moving this court house 20 miles from Hemingford to Alliance, Nebraska, 1899.

Several things come to mind when seeing this photo.

• It is very top heavy. There had better not be any banked curves.
• All of the crossing warnings would have to be removed because they are normally pretty close to the tracks.
• No "code line" (signalling wires) was along the track.
• How many power and phone (telegraph) lines crossed the track and had to be taken down?
• Why would you move a court house? Some comments talk about entire towns being moved when a mine plays out or an engine watering facility is no longer needed.
• The courthouse is mixed in a train with other cargo. Today, a big load would be much smaller than this, and a train would be dedicated to the move.

Gary Yaeger posted
This is a steam train moving this courthouse on this postcard. Courtesy Craig Detwiler.
Ashli Jensen: And people still talk about how alliance stole the county seat from us. Lol

Gary Yaeger posted
A postcard of moving a court house 20 miles from Hemingford to Alliance, Nebraska, 1899 using a steam locomotive and rail cars.
Cameron Schuett: Nicolis Todd. Is the court house still in alliance??
Nicolis Todd: Cameron Schuett yup still here and being used. Got a bunch of stuff on this at the local museum. Railroad paid off local citizens to vote to move the county seat to the town the railroad was building in.
George Sapp: Had to take down the switch stands...

I couldn't find the original courthouse, but they have built a proper courthouse since then.

Street View