It may be worth while for the satisfaction of persons traveling
southward from Reno on the Virginia and Truckee, to mention some once
promising towns in Washoe County that now only exist as sleepy hamlets:—
Washoe City.
Washoe City.—This place is situated at the North end of Washoe Valley,
sixteen miles south of Reno. It was formerly the county seat of Washoe
County, and contained about seven hundred inhabitants. There was in the
town a substantial brick courthouse, Masonic and Odd Fellows’ Hall,
Methodist Church, public school building, good hotels, and many stores,
shops, and saloons.
Ophir.
Ophir.—This town, three miles south of Washoe City, on the west side of
Washoe Lake, at one time contained two or three hundred inhabitants.
Here was situated a big seventy-stamp mill erected by the Ophir Mining
Company at a cost of over $500,000. To reach this mill with ores from
the Ophir Mine a bridge a mile in length was built across the north end
of Washoe Lake, at a cost of $75,000. The ores were amalgamated by the
barrel or Freyburg process, and everything was on a grand scale, the
buildings covering over an acre of ground.
Franktown.
Franktown.—This town, one mile south of Ophir, was originally settled by
Mormons (about the same time of the settlement at Genoa). Mormon
fashion, it was laid off in four-acre lots, and small streams of water
ran through all the streets. Here John Dall had a thirty-stamp water
mill, and there were several other mills on Franktown Creek. The town
had over two hundred inhabitants in 1869.
At one time there were in operation in Washoe County ten mills (four or
five near Washoe City), having an aggregate of 281 stamps, but the
completion of the Virginia and Truckee Railroad to the Carson River was
sudden death to all the mills, and killed all the towns. All the ore
went to the river.
Wadsworth.
Wadsworth, on the Central Pacific, thirty-four miles east of Reno, is a
bright and growing little town. It is situated at the “Big Bend” of the
Truckee River, a place well known to those who toiled across the plains
in the early days. The place contains about 600 inhabitants. In it are
the machine shops, round-house, and freight depot of the Central
Pacific, and many good and substantial buildings, both public and
private. Before the Carson and Colorado Railroad was built, Wadsworth
was a shipping-point for many mining towns and camps to the southward.
It still has a very fair trade.
Verdi.
Verdi, eleven miles west of Reno, on the Central Pacific, is a pleasant
little lumbering town on the Truckee River, at the eastern base of the
Sierras. It is a town of saw-mills and of manufactories of articles made
of wood. In the way of mills and machinery Verdi contains a large amount
of valuable property.