How do you get into Czech Cellar?
We have not confirmed it. Czech Cellar is in the directory because it calls itself a speakeasy, and that is the whole of what we can stand behind about its door.
Drinks of the era
We have not seen this venue’s own list, so what follows is the period rather than the bar: Blood and Sand, Bobby Burns, and Rob Roy are all drinks of this era, and each links to its origin and its build.
The building
Documented — Czech Cellar occupies the Hotel Wilber, a property listed on the National Register of Historic Places under reference number 78001709. The listing is a federal record maintained by the National Park Service, and the nomination document is the primary source for the building’s architectural and social history.
National Register reference 78001709 · NPS nomination document
Where Czech Cellar sits
Czech Cellar is in Wilber, Nebraska, in Saline County, in the Great Plains of the United States.
This is currently the only verified hidden bar our directory lists in Wilber. If you know another, tell us.
Nebraska holds ten listed venues in this directory. See them all on our Nebraska speakeasy guide.
Prohibition in Nebraska
Nebraska did not wait for the federal government. Statewide prohibition took effect here in 1917, three years before the Eighteenth Amendment came into force nationally on 17 January 1920. By the time the Volstead Act was being enforced across the country, Nebraska already had an established illegal trade and the habits that went with it.
More on the period in our history of Prohibition in Nebraska.
What the newspapers recorded in Nebraska
Searching the Library of Congress run of Nebraska newspapers for speakeasy, blind pig and bootlegger across 1920 to 1933 returns dated pages anyone can open. These are from Nebraska:
- The commoner, March 1, 1921 — read the page at the Library of Congress
- The North Platte semi-weekly tribune, May 12, 1922 — read the page at the Library of Congress
- The Beatrice daily express, August 5, 1921 — read the page at the Library of Congress
- The commoner, September 1, 1921 — read the page at the Library of Congress
Planning a visit
You can reach Czech Cellar by phone on (402) 821-2020 and on Facebook.
What we have confirmed
For Czech Cellar we hold telephone number, social accounts, and a listed-building record. We do not yet hold street address, official website, opening hours, a published drinks list, or an online booking link.
It is in the directory because its own name places it below street level and the description in the source data describes it as a speakeasy.
Overture Maps carries this venue; OpenStreetMap has no matching record.
The source data classifies the premises as a bar.