Virginia City.
Virginia City having been sufficiently well described in connection with
the Comstock Lode, it now remains to briefly mention the other towns of
Western Nevada. These all lie near the Sierras within a space of
territory forty-four miles long and twenty-five miles wide—under the
“eaves” of the mountains.
Gold Hill.
The town of Gold Hill was originally about one mile south of Virginia
City—a mile south of where silver was first struck in the Ophir Mine.
Buildings now unite the two towns. The boundary line between the two
places is on the ridge called the “Divide,” but at that point there is
no break in the rows of buildings on the streets. Gold Hill is built
along the deep and narrow gorge that forms the head of Gold Canyon. From
the north line on the Divide it straggles down the hill and along down
the canyon for a distance of about two miles—almost down to Silver City
indeed, the main business street following what was formerly the channel
of the ravine.
There were houses and settlers in Gold Hill before there were either in
Virginia City, therefore it is the older town. Here it was that the
Comstock Lode was first struck—though not the silver ore—by “Old
Virginia” (John Bishop) and others, who were prospecting for placer
mines. The town is 6,000 feet above the level of the sea, and, being
shut in on the east and west sides by hills, it is always two or three
degrees warmer than Virginia, 1,000 feet above on the mountain-side.
The first miners at Gold Hill were really at work in a “chimney” of the
Comstock, a little hill sometimes called “Gold Hill proper,” to
distinguish the hill from the town. Much gold was taken out of the top
of this chimney, and at depth it yielded many millions in silver.
Although scores of millions have been taken out of the vein beneath the
foundations of the town, it is still yielding its millions, and still
new ore bodies are being developed in the great vein.
Under the town are situated the world-famous Crown Point, Belcher,
Yellow Jacket, Imperial, Kentuck, Confidence, and other mines, while
farther down the canyon (under Lower Gold Hill) are the Overman, Alta,
Benton, Justice, and several other well-known mines. The mining works in
the town are in every respect first-class and are lighted with electric
lamps. In the town are many fine buildings, both public and private.
There is a handsome Catholic Church, and the High School building is one
of the best buildings of the kind in the State. The Miners’ Union have a
commodious hall on Main Street, and the other societies and orders have
fine halls. Conspicuous among the private residences of the town is that
of U. S. Senator J. P. Jones—the “Jones mansion,” as it is familiarly
called. The town has an abundant supply of water (from the Virginia and
Gold Hill Water Company’s works), and is well supplied with fire
hydrants; it also has electrical lights. In 1878 the population was
about 8,000, but it is now less than half that number. About the town
are many handsome private grounds. Shade and ornamental trees begin to
abound, and to the north, towering hundreds of feet above the town, are
picturesque castellated piles of bare granite rocks. The Virginia and
Truckee Railroad passes through the town.
Silver City.
Silver City is situated on Gold Canyon, a short distance below Lower
Gold Hill. The two towns are separated by a rugged ridge of porphyritic
rock, through which is a pass only three or four rods wide, known as the
Devil’s Gate. About and below Silver City much gravel mining was done by
the Johntowners in the early days. It was at Silver City that the first
silver mill (Paul’s Pioneer) was built. It had a newspaper—the _Washoe
Times_—before a newspaper was published in Virginia, the _Territorial
Enterprise_ being then (1860) published in Carson City. At one time it
had many big silver mills and promised to be the big town of the State;
but the tide turned and all crowded in about the big mines at Virginia
City. The town contains at present a population of only about 600. There
is a fine public-school building, church, Miners’ Union Hall, and many
handsome and comfortable dwellings, with an adequate supply of saloons,
stores, and shops.
About the town are an immense number of small veins of gold-bearing
quartz that pay from the surface down. Nearly every head of a family in
the town has his own mine, and when he wants money he shoulders his
pick, goes out to his mine, and digs it, as a farmer in the East digs a
“mess” of potatoes. Of late some large veins have been opened up in and
about the town—as the Oest, Hawood, and others—and Silver City bids fair
soon to become a busy mining center. The people have lived off their
home mines for thirty years, and constitute the most thoroughly
independent mining community to be found in Nevada.
Dayton.
Dayton, the county seat of Lyon County, lies five miles below Silver
City, on the Carson River, at the mouth of Gold Canyon. The beginning of
this town was a log building, erected as a dwelling and trading-post by
John McMarlin, in the fall of 1849. Being on the overland wagon road
passing over the Sierras by the Placerville route, there was a good deal
of trade with incoming immigrants, as well as with the miners, who soon
began to earn from $8.00 to $12 a day in the gravel bank and bars of
Gold Canyon. In 1856, about fifty Chinamen came over the mountains and
began mining on the lower part of the canyon, working over the banks and
bars left by the white miners. In 1858, nearly 200 Chinamen were at work
in the canyon from its mouth up toward Johntown. These had their
shanties about McMarlin’s store, and the place took the name of
“Chinatown,” by which name it was known at the time of the discovery of
silver.
In 1861 an attempt was made (many whites having then settled there) to
give the place the name of “Nevada City.” This did not take, as there
was already a Nevada City in California, and for a time the town was
called “Mineral Rapids,” but this finally gave way to the present name
of Dayton. The place grew apace, it being then expected that nearly all
the ore of the Comstock would be worked at and near the town in mills
driven by water-power. This hope was not realized, though several fine
mills were built near the town. It had in 1878 a population of about
1,200, and has since held its own very well. Though not a very large
town, it has always been a very pleasant and flourishing one.
The Carson and Colorado Railroad passes through the town, and from this
a branch built in 1888 extends down the river to the Rock Point Mill.
Here (at Dayton) is to be the scene of the operations of the Carson
River Dredging Company, an Eastern incorporation headed by Dr. J. H.
Rae. The object is to pump up from the bottom of the Carson River the
millions in gold and silver, amalgam, and quicksilver, washed into the
river and lost with the tailings running from the many mills. No doubt
the “millions” found their way into the river, but whether they can be
brought out of its bottom by means of a big suction pump remains to be
seen. It is the universal wish that the dredger may prove a success. All
will be in readiness to try it this season on a large scale.
Dayton contains good public buildings of all kinds required, both county
and town, has several mills, and many handsome private residences,
surrounded with gardens and fruit and shade trees. In summer the place
is completely embowered.
The acid works of J. M. Douglass & Co. manufacture daily two tons of
sulphuric acid. The sulphur used is a native product of Nevada, and is
brought from the mine in Humboldt County at a cost of $40 a ton. Dayton
is surrounded with a fine agricultural and grazing region. A
narrow-gauge railroad five miles long runs down the river from the
Douglass Mill to a large tailings reservoir.
Sutro.
Sutro is a town laid off at the mouth of the Sutro Tunnel by Adolph
Sutro. Mr. Sutro claimed that his town would kill Virginia City, as all
the reduction works would be located there, and all the miners would
reside there, passing to and from their work through the tunnel. As
there would no longer be any need of anyone remaining in Virginia, the
place would be given up to bats and owls—coyotes would sit upon the peak
of Mount Davidson and “bay the moon.” Believing Mr. Sutro to have got
hold of the mantle of some ancient financial prophet, many persons were
induced to flee the “wrath to come” (bats, owls and coyotes), and settle
down at the mouth of the tunnel. There was quite a brisk little town
there for a few years, but when the tunnel was completed and the miners
discharged Sutro’s “bats and owls” came home to roost—they found no rest
for the soles of their feet at Virginia. Once the men who had been
engaged in driving the tunnel went away, there was nothing more to make
or keep up a town than at any other point along the edge of the valley;
for the big reduction works promised by Mr. Sutro were never built.
Carson City.
Carson City is the county seat of Ormsby County and the capital of
Nevada. It is situated in Eagle Valley, immediately east of the
high-timbered hills forming the eastern base of the main range of the
Sierra Nevada Mountains. Unlike the majority of Nevada towns, it has a
dry, level plain for its site. The city was laid out in 1858 by Major
Ormsby and others. The streets conform to the cardinal points of the
compass. There being no lack of level land, the streets were made
sixty-six and eighty feet wide. Previous to 1858 there was no town where
Carson now stands, and only one house, which was at Eagle Ranch, which
ranch gave its name to the valley in which it was situated. Afterwards
this ranch became better known as King’s Ranch.
Carson City grew rapidly from the start, for it was not only pleasantly
situated, but also occupied an advantageous position as a center of
trade. For several years in its infancy it derived a good deal of
benefit from its trade with the great immigrant trains that yearly
rattled in across the “plains;” besides, it was a halting-place for
people rushing to the silver mines from the California side of the
mountains. In nearly all directions it is surrounded by excellent
agricultural and grazing lands. With the regular and scientific opening
of the mines Carson became the headquarters of an enormous trade in
wood, lumber, and mining timbers, a business it still retains. The city
has at present a population of about 4,100.
Carson contains many fine and costly buildings, both public and private.
The pride of the city is the State Capitol. It is the most striking
structure in the place. The building is handsome architecturally, being
well proportioned in all its parts. It also has a very substantial
appearance, as it is constructed of stone throughout. This stone is a
beautiful, fine-grained sandstone obtained from a quarry at the State
prison, about a mile and a half east of the town. The building was
erected in 1870. The Capitol occupies the center of a square several
acres in extent. This square is surrounded with a handsome and
substantial iron fence. The grounds are handsomely laid out and well
kept. They are well swarded and contain a great variety of shade and
ornamental trees, shrubbery, and flowering plants. The whole is a credit
to the State.
The U. S. Branch Mint building is a large, substantial, and imposing
structure. It is also of stone, from the State Prison quarry. The
building was completed in July, 1869. It has done and is still doing a
great deal of work.
The State Orphans’ Home is a large and well-arranged building with a
small farm in connection therewith. In this institution a great number
of orphan children from all sections of the State are cared for. The
home is governed in a paternal way, and the children are well clothed,
well fed, and well educated both morally and intellectually.
The town contains several churches of leading denominations, excellent
school-houses, and a number of halls of various societies, orders, and
lodges. There are half a dozen fine hotels, many large fire-proof stores
and business houses, with the usual proportion of neat and attractive
retail shops of all kinds, saloons, and the like.
The buildings of the Virginia and Truckee Railroad Company are a
noticeable feature of the town. The depot buildings are commodious and
conveniently arranged, and are always kept neatly painted and in good
repair. In the town they have an immense car shop. The building is in
large part constructed of iron. In it are a foundry, machine shop,
roundhouse, and car manufactory.
Carson has a large box factory and other manufacturing establishments of
several kinds. The place has both electrical lights and gas. It is well
supplied with pure mountain water, which is led through all the streets
under a heavy pressure. The town site has sufficient slope to the
eastward to afford good drainage. The city supports two daily
newspapers, the _Appeal_ and _Tribune_, and has a good theater.
A fine large brick building has this year (1889) been erected in the
town by the United States Government. It will contain several public
offices. It fills a gap in the center of the town that long stood as a
staring vacancy—supplies a “long-felt want.”
There are pleasant drives in all directions from Carson, with smooth and
level roads. A mile west of town are Shaw’s Hot Springs, with every
convenience for either bathing or swimming. The swimming bath is 60 by
24 feet, 4½ feet deep at one end and 5½ at the other.
All visitors to the town of a scientific turn of mind will wish to visit
the State prison and grounds, situated a mile and a half east of the
place. A portion of the building now occupied as a State prison was
built for a hotel by Col. Abe Curry (of whom the State purchased the
property), and was of stone, two stories high, 32 feet wide, and 100
feet long. Colonel Curry also excavated and walled up the magnificent
swimming bath now connected with the prison and fed by warm springs.
In the floor of the quarry, beneath from fifteen to twenty feet of
strata of sandstone, is a stratum of fine-grained stone that is filled
with the tracks of all manner of animals and birds, and even one set of
tracks supposed to have been made by some prehistoric giant of the human
species. There are tracks of elephants, horses, deer, lions, tigers,
panthers, giant cranes, and all manner of creatures. The tracks supposed
to be human present the appearance of having been made by a large man
wearing moccasins of the undressed hide of some animal. All the tracks
tend toward a common point, which must have been a spring or small lake.
Omnibuses run to the Hot Springs and the State prison, and stages leave
for Lake Tahoe and Genoa on the arrival of trains.
There are several lumber flumes near Carson that are worthy of
inspection.
Empire City.
This town is situated on the banks of the Carson River, three and a half
miles east of Carson, and on the line of the Virginia and Truckee
Railroad. Empire is pre-eminently a milling town. Here are located the
Mexican, Morgan, Brunswick, and Merrimac Mills, all first-class silver
reduction works. The town is in Ormsby County, and contains about 700
inhabitants. Each year thousands of cords of wood floated down the
Carson River from Alpine County, California, are taken out here.
Formerly no fewer than 150,000 cords of wood came down to this town in
the drives of a single season. On account of these wood drives Empire
was jockularly termed the “seaport” of Nevada. The wood “drives” and the
landing of them for a time each year gave employment to a great number
of men and teams.
The town contains a number of handsome residences and a few good public
buildings.
Genoa.
Genoa is the oldest town in Nevada, and is the place where the first
white settlement was made. These settlers were Mormons, and they
established a station there as early as 1848. For this reason the place
was long known as “Mormon Station.” For several years most of the
settlers in the valley and about the town were Mormons. Genoa is the
county seat of Douglas County, and is situated in Carson Valley, at a
point about 13 miles south of Carson City. Although in a beautiful
valley it lies close in against the Sierras, at an altitude of 4,335
feet above the level of the sea. To the westward the main timbered
Sierra Nevada Mountain Range rises to a great height, while above its
ridge tower many bald, granite peaks. Among these (to the southward)
Job’s Peak rises to the height of 10,639 feet.
The town contains a fine court-house, and other handsome public
buildings, as school-houses, churches, and halls. There are in the place
several good, substantial stores, and business houses and shops. There
are many neat dwellings and cottages surrounded with fine gardens and
grounds. In the town is published the Genoa _Courier_, a sprightly
weekly paper devoted to the interests of the people of the town and
county. In this town was first published (in 1859) the _Territorial
Enterprise_, the pioneer newspaper of Nevada. The paper was moved to
Carson in 1860, and thence in a short time to Virginia City, where it
was soon made a daily, and where it has ever since been published as
such.
Fine ranches lie up and down the valley. A mile and a half south of the
town are Walley’s famous hot springs, of which more particular mention
will be found in another place. Lake Tahoe forms part of the western
boundary of Douglas, and both Glenbrook and Cave Rock are in the county.
The Carson River passes near Genoa and through the heart of the county.
Genoa contains about 1,000 inhabitants.
Reno.
Reno, on the line of the Central Pacific Railroad, and pleasantly
situated on the banks of the beautiful Truckee River, is the county seat
of Washoe County. Reno began to be a town in 1868, and under the
influence of the Central Pacific Railroad, it grew very rapidly. The
town at once became the shipping-point of all goods, machinery, and
supplies destined for the Comstock Mines, and for all parts of Storey,
Lyon, Ormsby, and Douglas Counties; also for Susanville, Honey Lake
Valley, and a great scope of country to the northward. In the days
before the completion of the Virginia and Truckee Railroad, Reno was
filled with teams and stage coaches. The place was a sort of teamsters’
paradise. This was good for the town, but it could not be expected to
last forever. The present ambition of the place is to become a railroad
and manufacturing center. It has the Virginia and Truckee Road leading
southward, while to the northward the Nevada and California is fast
advancing to completion.
Reno is the center of one of the finest agricultural and grazing
sections in the State, and is a point for the shipment to California of
immense numbers of beef cattle. Although there are in the town large and
fine reduction works for smelting refractory ores, and two flouring
mills, it may be said that hardly a commencement has been made toward
the utilization of the immense water-power afforded by the Truckee River
at and near the town.
Here is located the Nevada Insane Asylum, the building and grounds of
which do credit to the town and State. The State University is also now
located at Reno (having been removed from Elko), and is in a more
flourishing condition than ever before. The buildings, and grounds, and
teachers are all that could be desired. This institution has recently
been made an Agricultural Experiment Station. Here is located Bishop
Whitakers’ excellent school for young ladies, and also a similar school,
first-class, in charge of the Sisters of Charity. There are, besides,
five public schools. The town is well supplied with churches and public
buildings of all kinds adequate to present requirements.
The town contains many first-class fire-proof business houses, five
depots and railroad buildings, many attractive retail stores and shops,
excellent and commodious hotels, “palatial” saloons, and handsome and
comfortable private residences. It is lighted with electrical lamps, has
good water works, and almost everything else that its public-spirited
citizens have thought it necessary to provide. It has two excellent
daily newspapers, the _Gazette_ and _Journal_, and a first-class
theater. This spring (1889) there has been in the place a boom in town
property, and much building is in progress. Not only is the town on the
highway of the nations of the world leading East and West, but is on the
highway of the Pacific Coast leading North and South, along the great
range of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, from Oregon to Arizona. The
present population is estimated at 5,000 souls.