General Notes

Anton Toman was born in Moravia, Austria, which is now, the Czech Republic, on Nov.5, 1859.  When he reached near his adulthood at the age of seventeen he decided to seek a home to which so many of his friends and associates of his native land had moved. So he boarded the Steamer "Suevia"  and on 25 May 1876 came to the United States. According to my records, he first moved to South Dakota where he spent a few months then finally settled in Plattsmouth, Nebraska.  Those days in Plattsmouth, the Irish settled to the North, the Germans to the South and the Bohemians all settles in the West of Plattsmouth which was called "Bohemian Town". Bohemian Town had its own school house which still stands today,  two stores, Kvapil's and Svoboda's and later, its own Catholic parish, with their own Czech priest and in their own language.
His Father and Mother, John and Antonia Toman with their children Emma, Josepha, Josef, Frantisek, and Edward followed him to Plattsmouth on 3 July 1877.  They left Bremen, Germany on board the Steamer, "Pommerania".
He entered the services of Burlington Railroad and was for many years a faithful and diligent employee. He was a Blacksmith.
Anton was married at St John's Church in Plattsmouth on August 29th 1884 to Miss Marie (Chyba) who's family later changed the name to "Hiber".
Anton naturalized Sep. 30, 1892.
As mentioned above,  Bohemian Town was fairly self sustaining but lacked a Catholic Church that was in their own Czech language.  So some of the men formed a committee to build a church.  It was headed up by Cyrill Janda who served as President, Anton Toman was the Vice-President, Joseph Kalasek  as Secretary, and Thomas Janda as Treasurer.  They purchased three lots from John Svoboda in the Dukes Addition for $300 and started construction of the new "Holy Rosary Church"  The total costs were about $2400.  It was completed in 1890. Many of the parishioners donated the furnishings.  Anton and Marie Toman donated a statue of an Angel holding a candelabra. Though the church still stands today, at 1610 First Avenue, it has been left derelict.  But one nice thing remains, the original stained glass windows, each one with a member of the committees name on it. (see note below regarding stained glass) The church had its last mass on 6 September 1973.  The closing was the results of lack of priests in the Lincoln diocese.
Anton health was failing in his last years in life and quietly spent his declining years with his family at home.  On Friday, February 20, 1942 at 3:00 in the families home, Anton passed away leaving his wife and children.  He was 82 years old.

References came from Joe Kenny's research from ship records, newspapers, obituaries and from Joe Kvapil, a Bohemian Town expert.

added on April 12, 2021
approximately in 2015, I, joe kenny stopped by the old Holy rosary church . I had driven by countless times, but this time, the doors were open. I met the minister  from a bible church and I  explained the relationship I had with the church building with Cyrill janda and Anton Toman and how their names were on the bottoms of the stain glass along with the other people responcible for the construction of the church..
he explained to me that some vandals thru a brick threw the bottom section of Antons stained double hung window, but he managed to rescue the upper half of the double hung window, and offered it to me. After over 100 years , the putty had broiken and become loose between the glass and the lead, making this piece VERY fragile and the glass ready to fall out..  I carefully, placed it into my van and got it home, and reputtly the entire window with lead/stain glass putty. This stregthened it greatly. Near the upper half of this unit, was  a centered circle of a religous peice of glass that was badly damaged and faded. It had been painted on regualr glass a century ago and was 2 keys, symbolizing the keys to heaven,  With some hesitation,I did remove this glass and replaced it with similar glass that was typical to the other stained glass sections.. One would never know, this was altered, but i am documenting this here, for future generations, incase it manages to last another century.