The Elkhorn River curls along the edge of Stanton, and the timber that lines its bottomland is Kerbel's Tree Services' usual territory—limbs trimmed back, storm damage cleared, the kind of work that keeps a small county seat's older trees standing through the next windstorm. In winter that same crew turns its trucks toward the streets radiating out from the Stanton County courthouse square, plowing driveways and clearing walks with the same unhurried attention they'd give a stubborn branch. Snow settles heavy in the river bottom here, low ground holding cold air longer than the open fields above it, so the first icy patches of the morning are usually down near the water before they show up anywhere else in town. That means an early start, working outward from the low ground toward the higher, drier streets near the square. By the time the courthouse lot has emptied for lunch, most of Stanton's residential blocks carry the same clean edges the crew leaves on a well-kept tree line in July.