Trip to Mary Austin's 'Land of Little Rain'

  “If ever you come beyond the borders as far as the town that lies in a hill dimple at the foot of Kearsarge, never leave it until you have knocked at the door of the brown house under the willow tree at the end of the village street, and there you shall have such news of the land, of its trails and what is astir in them, as one lover of it can give to another.”— Mary Austin, The Land of Little Rain

  It’s easy to see how the Owens Valley area inspired writer Mary Austin. Bordered to the west by the craggy peaks of the Sierra Nevada range and majestic Mount Whitney, it is a land of great beauty.

  When Austin lived in the area at the end of the 19th century, Owens Lake hadn’t yet been drained to provide water to the city of Los Angeles and the area hadn’t become as dry and dusty as it is today.

  Austin spent 18 years in the small town of Independence, which is a pleasant, tree-lined community that is also the seat of Inyo County. It was during her time in Independence that she became interested in the western landscape and began writing about it.

  She arrived in the Owens Valley after her husband, Stafford Wallace Austin, was hired by the U.S. General Land Office in the 1890s. Austin soon became fascinated by Eastern California’s people and environment, and began spending considerable time listening and observing.

  Filling notebooks with stories, Austin practiced her art, eventually crafting stories that she was able to sell to national magazines. In 1903, she published “The Land of Little Rain,” a collection of short stories about the connection between the land, animals and people in the West.

  After gaining a measure of fame, Austin departed Independence but her experiences continued to flavor her work for the rest of her life. She died in New Mexico in 1934.

  Today, Austin’s presence can still be felt in Independence. The brown house under the willow tree (at 253 Market Street), which she and her husband built, remains standing. While it is a California Historical Landmark, it is also a private residence, so don’t disturb the inhabitants.

  Additionally, the nearby Eastern California Museum (155 N. Grant, about two blocks from the Mary Austin home) is an excellent place to learn more about Austin and the rich history of the region.

  The museum, founded in 1928, contains fine displays of Paiute and Shoshone basketry as well as an exhibit on Manzanar, the World War II Japanese-American internment center located five miles south of Independence.

  The five-acre grounds of the museum are covered with artifacts that help tell the region’s story.

  For instance, an extensive collection of agricultural machines and equipment remind you about the large farms that could once be found in the valley while the giant digging tools remind you about the construction of the Los Angeles Aqueduct (1908-1913), which eventually dried out the valley.

  Additionally, more than a dozen historic buildings can be found in the museum yard in a recreated pioneer village. The structures are authentic 19th century buildings relocated to the museum because they would have been destroyed if they had remained in their original settings.

  The collection of buildings includes an old general store, a blacksmith shop, an assay office, miner’s shacks, a livery stable, a barbershop and a three-hole outhouse.

  Adjacent to the pioneer village is a recreated Shoshone settlement with grass shelters and lean-tos.

  The museum gift shop offers a wide selection of books about Inyo County, including the works of Mary Austin. The museum is open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday. There is no admission charge but donations are welcome.

  Independence is located about 200 miles south of Carson City via U.S. 395.

  For more information, contact the Eastern California Museum, www.inyocounty.us/residents/things-to-do/eastern-california-museum.

The Complicated Nature of Beautiful Mono Lake

 

  Mono Lake is a true wonder. With its stark, otherworldly appearance and other attributes, it is by far one of the most complex and unique ecosystems in the American West.

  It is, at the same time, a desolate high desert lake and a vibrant, living, special environment teeming with unusual lifeforms and formations.

  Located about three hours southwest of Fallon via U.S. 50 and U.S. 395, Mono Lake traces its beginning to more than 700,000 years ago, making it one of the oldest bodies of water in North America.

  Fed by melting glaciers, the lake once measured five times its present size of about 60 square miles (geologists believe the lake covered about 338 square miles and reached a depth of 900 feet).

  In addition to having direct ties to the Ice Age, the lake also has been the site of extensive volcanic activity, starting about 13,000 years ago, which helped shape its current state.

  For example, the rounded black hills to the south are remnants of giant, uplifted volcanic craters. At one, Panum Crater, easily accessible from Highway 120, you can hike to the dome and rim of a long-dead volcano.

  The area's volcanic heritage is also evident at Black Point, at the lake's north end, which features large fissures you can walk through, and at various hot springs and steam vents found in the basin.

  The lake's trademark tufa formations, however, are its most impressive and unusual landmarks. At various places around the lake, you can find clusters of these towering calcium spires and plugs 

  Tufa is the stone formed when calcium-bearing freshwater springs bubble up through alkaline lake water that is rich with carbonates. When the two combine, limestone deposits develop, which can, over years, grow into large towers.

  Tufa formations, however, can only grow beneath the lake’s waters. When the lake level falls and the tufa is exposed to air, it ceases to grow.

  A number of interpretive trails lead to patches of tufa formations located around the lake, including a large selection near the Mono Lake County Park, at the northwest end, the Scenic Area Visitor Center in Lee Vining, and the South Tufa Area at Navy Beach (accessible from Highway 120).

  The latter contains some of the largest and most impressive tufa. Dozens of the gnarled, knobbed, and rippled tufa towers line the southern lake shore.

  Visitors can wander along the beach, wandering through the maze of formations, which, depending upon the light and your mood, can assume exotic and mysterious shapes.

  While the lake appears dead, it is actually an alkali soup of strange but fascinating lifeforms. Both the brine shrimp and brine flies flourish on its algae-laden waters.

  Additionally, the lake is popular with many species of birds (who eat the shrimp and flies), including the California gull, the eared grebe and snowy plovers. In fact, 90 percent of the state of California's population of California gulls is born at Mono Lake.

  Swimming is permitted in the lake and, because it is more than 1,000-times as salty as the Pacific Ocean, an interesting experience because you float much easier. However, rangers warn that you should keep the water out of your eyes or any cuts because it will sting.

  When you feel the lake's water you find it thicker than normal lake water. Mark Twain once wrote: "Its sluggish waters are so strong with alkali that if you only dip the most hopelessly soiled garment into them once or twice, and wring it out, it will be found as clean as if it had been through the ablest of washer woman's hands."

  Despite its unique qualities, it's a small miracle that Mono Lake continues to exist. In 1941, the City of Los Angeles began diverting water from four of the five streams that feed the lake.

  During the next few decades, the lake level dropped 40 feet and doubled in salinity. Fortunately, using legal tools, environmentalists and local community groups were able to work with the city to start the process of restoring the flow of water to the lake.

  For more information about these ongoing efforts, go to: www.monolake.org.

How Owens Valley Became a Desert Wasteland

   Driving on U.S. 395, just south of Lone Pine, California, you’ll encounter a big, open largely-alkali valley just east of the highway. The vacant white patch spreads out for miles until reaching the rising Sierra Nevada range. On many days, parts of the valley are so dry, you can see dust devils forming on the flats.

   But it wasn’t always that way out here. In fact, until the early 20th century, this area, known as Owens Valley, was the home of Owens Lake, a prosperous and verdant farming and ranching region.

   What happened to Owens Lake is a story that is interwoven with the development and rapid growth of Southern California in the 20th century. In order for one to grow and succeed, the other had to virtually disappear.

   By the late 19th century, the city of Los Angeles had begun to realize that it simply didn’t have sufficient water to support its future growth. Located in a dry basin that typically receives about 14 inches of rain annually, the city had traditionally relied on the Los Angeles River and wells for its water.

   After identifying the Owens Valley as an ideal source of water, the city began acquiring water and land rights—often using subterfuge and political pressure—in the region. Following the approval of a local bond to pay for the project in 1905, work began on building the system of canals and storage reservoirs to transport and capture Owens Valley water north to Los Angeles.

   The first phase of the project, which encompassed some 233 miles of infrastructure, was completed in 1913.

   While considered an engineering marvel, the Los Angeles Aqueduct, as the project became known, was not without controversy. Once Owen Valley farmers and residents realized the what was happening, they used legal and, in some cases, extra-legal means to stop the water transfer.

   By the 1920s, agriculture in the Owens Valley began to suffer due to the water diversions. In 1924, a group of farmers succeeded in destroying part of the aqueduct, but it was quickly repaired. Two years later, the amount of water being drawn from the valley was so substantial that Owens Lake was completely dry.

   In 1970, a second Owens Valley Aqueduct was constructed to divert even more water to Los Angeles (from surface sources and groundwater pumping). This resulted in nearly all of the Owens Valley springs and seeps to dry up and disappear.

   In response to lawsuits and political influence, in the 1980s and 90s, Inyo County, in which Owens Valley is located, and the city of Los Angeles entered into an agreement designed to provide a reliable water source to Los Angeles while also better managing groundwater pumping in Owens Valley.

   To date, those efforts have not resulted in any substantial changes to the dry valley, which continues to see groundwater pumping at a rate higher than the water resources can be recharged.

   As a result, visitors to the Owens Valley can still see the radical changes that have occurred because of such a massive siphoning of water. Owens Lake remains a barren, alkali flatland, with occasional patches of vegetation. Large dust storms rise from the dusty white lakebed. It is a place that appears out of a dystopian Science Fiction movie. But, sadly, it’s all too real.

   For more information about the history of the Owens Valley and the impacts of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, go to: https://www.inyowater.org/documents/reports/owens-valley-water-history-chronology/.

Early California History Comes Alive at Rancho Petaluma Adobe State Park

   The Rancho Petaluma Adobe is an impressive place. At two-stories and measuring about 200 feet by 145 feet, it was, at the time it was built (1836) the grandest house in Northern California.

   The structure, made of adobe bricks and hand-cut redwood timbers and planks, was the largest privately-owned adobe building in California and remains the largest example of the Monterey Colonial-style of architecture popular during the Californios era (roughly 1769 to 1846), when the area now known as California was under Spanish and Mexican rule.

   Even today, despite being only about half its original size (portions of the complex disintegrated over the years), the adobe, located on Adobe Road on the east side of the city of Petaluma, is worth a visit.

   Visitors can wander the cool adobe buildings, with their large overhanging roofs, and imagine a time when it bustled with activity as one of the largest agricultural enterprises on the West Coast.

   The adobe traces its origins to 1834, when Alta California Governor José Figueroa granted then-Lieutenant Mariano Vallejo a large tract of land that became known as Rancho Petaluma (the name, Petaluma, is taken from the native Miwok language for the places, which roughly translates as “flat back” or “backside of the hill.”).

   Figueroa wanted Vallejo to occupy and develop the land in order to keep it from being claimed by the Russians, who had established a fort (Fort Ross) on the coast.

   Vallejo soon began construction of the large adobe house, which boasted walls that were three-feet thick. It was designed to serve not only as a home but as Vallejo’s offices and as a fort, if necessary. With the latter in mind, the structure had iron grills and shutters on the windows.

   Over time, Vallejo enlarged the compound (it was never fully completed) and added a tannery and a blacksmith shop. At its peak, the rancho was more than 66,000 acres, with some 50,000 head of cattle, 24,000 sheep, and acres of fields of wheat, grains, and grapes. In addition to being supported by cowboys (known as vaqueros) and field workers, the rancho employed more than two-thousand Native American workers, who were generally paid with food, clothing, and other goods.

   In June 1846, a group of American settlers began what became known as the Bear Flag Revolt, a movement to create an independent republic in Northern California. The ragtag rebels succeeded in capturing Sonoma and imprisoning Vallejo. The revolt lasted only 25 days, after which the rebels were absorbed by U.S. government forces. The U.S. had declared war against Mexico in May 1846.

   When the conflict ended, in 1848, the U.S. had won control of California. The old Mexican ranchos, including Vallejo’s vast holdings, were eventually broken up as the former owners were forced to provide proof of title, which was often difficult (and expensive to prove) because of the imprecise maps of the time. Additionally, the California Gold Rush brought thousands of new residents, who homesteaded or simply squatted on land. Owners often lacked the financial resources to legally evict squatters.

   In 1857, Vallejo sold the adobe complex and surrounding 1,600 acres to William Whiteside for $25,000, who became the first of several owners over the next few decades. In 1910, the Native Sons of the Golden West Petaluma chapter purchased the decaying adobe compound with the intention of restoring what it could and, eventually, making it a public park.

   During the next three decades, the Native Sons raised funds to restore the buildings. In 1951, the site was turned over to the State of California, which made it the centerpiece of the Petaluma Adobe State Park.

   In addition to housing a small museum that describes the adobe’s history, the park hosts living history demonstrations and other events throughout the year. Located at 3325 Adobe Road in Petaluma, the park is open daily from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., except on Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Day. Admission to the park, which allows you to visit the structures, is $3 for adults (18 and older), $2 for children 6-17, and free for children 5 and under.

   For more information, go to: https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=474.

Exploring General Vallejo's Sonoma Home

   Once upon a time, General Mariano G. Vallejo was one of the most powerful men in what would become the American West. In 1834, Vallejo was sent by the Mexican Governor in Monterey—at the time California was part of Mexico—to establish a community and military outpost at Sonoma, located 30 miles north of San Francisco.

  The settlement was intended to discourage Russian settlers and adventurers at nearby Fort Ross from expanding into the region. By 1836, Vallejo’s Sonoma Pueblo had become the chief military base for the Mexican government in Northern California. To support the post, the community of Sonoma formed around it and, by 1845, the settlement had a population of about 300, including 45 houses.

  In the early 1840s, however, American settlers began streaming into the region, overwhelming the Mexican government, which had unsuccessfully attempted to prohibit them for owning land or holding office.

  In June 1846, a group of disgruntled settlers seized Sonoma, including the base, imprisoned its leader, Vallejo, and declared the creation of the independent Bear Flag Republic.

  The crisis was resolved about a month later, when the Bear Flag group withdrew, taking down their flag, which was replaced by an American flag—signifying that the United States was assuming control over Northern California.

  As for Vallejo, he was soon released and remained one of Sonoma’s most prominent citizens. While Vallejo originally owned 175,000 acres in Sonoma and Petaluma, including vineyards and a quarry, he gradually lost influence (and his land) after the region became part of the U.S.

  In 1851, however, he decided to build a home for his family—he and his wife had 16 children, of which 10 survived—in Sonoma, which is still standing today and open for tours.

  Known as “Lachryma Montis” or “Tears of the Mountain,” after a nearby spring, the Vallejo home was unique because it was a “kit house,” meaning it was ordered from a catalog and the pieces were shipped from New England to Sonoma, where it was assembled.

  Vallejo, however, modified the plans to reflect his Mexican heritage. While the home has a New England-style Gothic Revival Victorian exterior, the interior is lined with stucco, a material usually associated with Mexican buildings.

  The result is a clever marriage of the two influences. The white, two-story home has the classic appearance of an ornate Victorian with the insulating qualities of adobe, meaning it is generally cool and comfortable inside regardless of how hot it is outside.

  Visitors touring the Vallejo house, which is now operated as a state park, will find that most of the elegant furnishings inside the home are original.

  The guided tour of Lachryma Montis begins in the Vallejo front room on the first floor. There, you can see the family’s piano, draperies, wall paintings and overstuffed chairs and sofas, all of which reflect the designs of the Victorian era.

  The next stop is in the dining room, which boasts a magnificent marble fireplace as well as a large dining room table covered with fine china (a British “Willow” pattern) and other utensils. Cooking was done by servants in a separate building at the rear of the house.

  Nearby is the study room with wall-size bookshelves, a fireplace, secretary, lamps and end tables.

  From here, the tour moves upstairs to the family bedrooms. The master bedroom has a massive walnut bed and other furnishings, including a large portable toilet—the house had no indoor plumbing or toilets.

  The grounds of the Vallejo estate are also quite lovely. In addition to the kitchen and servants building at the rear, there is a separate one-room Victorian “doll house” adjacent to the main house, which served as a private reading room for Vallejo and his wife (after all, they did have all those kids).

  Additionally, the grounds boast several original fountains and a large Swiss Chalet building, now a museum filled with exhibits about Vallejo’s life, which was originally used for wine and olive storage.

  Following Vallejo’s death in 1890, his 15th child, Luisa Vallejo Emparan, owned the house. Although the state of California acquired the property in 1933, she continued to live in it and served as a tour guide and caretaker until she died in the mid-1940s.

  The Mariano Vallejo home is directly west of the main part of downtown Sonoma at Spain Street and Third Street West. The home is open for tours on weekends. For more information go to https://www.sonomaparks.org/location/general-vallejos-home/ or https://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=479.

History and Beauty Found at San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts

 

     It’s a mistake to overlook San Francisco’s Palace of Fine Arts. Originally built as part of the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition, which celebrated the completion of the Panama Canal, the Palace of Fine Arts is a magnificent edifice that continues to delight visitors who stroll the shaded grounds surrounding its scenic lagoon.

   The structure was designed by famed California architect Bernard Maybeck, who said it was inspired by an etching depicting a Roman ruin reflected in a pool by 18th century Italian artist Giovanni Piranesi.

   The domed palace housed art exhibits and was one of eleven pavilions constructed for the exposition, which was built on 635 acres of land reclaimed from the San Francisco Bay.

   Like the rest of the structures, the Palace of Fine Arts was originally supposed to be a temporary building that would be removed once the exposition was over. However, a prominent San Francisco socialite, Phoebe Apperson Hearst, was so taken with its classical beauty that she founded the Palace Preservation League while the fair was still ongoing to save the building.

   Her efforts were successful and for several years the palace housed art exhibits. During the 1930s, the Works Progress Administration commissioned several artists to replace deteriorating murals on the rotunda ceiling and, later, the building housed eighteen lighted tennis courts.

   By the 1950s, however, it was clear that the Palace needed to be completely reconstructed. Built of wood covered with a mixture of plaster and a burlap-type fiber, the colonnade and rotunda had deteriorated over time and were considered unsafe.

   In 1964, the original Palace was demolished with the exception of the steel structure of the exhibit hall. The buildings were carefully rebuilt in concrete with steel beams installed to support the rotunda dome. The structure was retrofitted in 2010 to ensure it would survive an earthquake.

   Since it was built, the Palace has become a beloved San Francisco landmark; in recent decades it has been particularly popular as a setting for weddings. It’s also a lovely spot for a picnic or a walk around its scenic lagoon, which is surrounded by towering Australian eucalyptus trees.

   Additionally, a variety of wildlife have taken to living in and around the latter including ducks, geese, swans, frogs and snapping turtles that can be seen sunning themselves on partially submerged tree roots.

   Not surprisingly, the Palace’s photogenic setting in San Francisco’s Marina District has served as a backdrop for a number of films, such as “Vertigo,” “The Rock” and “Bicentennial Man.”

   The Palace’s exhibition hall became home of the Exploratorium from 1969 to 2013, an interactive hands-on science museum for children. In April of 2013, the Exploratorium relocated to Piers 15 and 17 on San Francisco’s Embarcadero. The exhibit hall is now primarily used for special events.

   The Palace of Fine Arts is located at 3301 Lyon Street near San Francisco’s Marina District. For more information, go to https://palaceoffinearts.com/.

The Historic Southern Nevada Town with the Peculiar Name: Searchlight

Old mining remnants can still be found around Searchlight.

   There are several explanations behind how the southern Nevada mining town of Searchlight got its name.

   According to one version, the town was name after a miner named Lloyd Searchlight. Another claimed it was named after a popular brand of matches. And a third is that one of the town’s founders once said it would take a searchlight to find any gold in the place.

   All three stories, in fact, have appeared in various history books over the years, although the latter is the one many historians believe is true.

   In his book, “Searchlight: The Camp That Didn’t Fail,” the late U.S. Senator Harry Reid, who was born in Searchlight in 1939, examined the town’s origins and concluded that the last story was the most believable version.

   Reid said he could find no evidence of any miner named Lloyd Searchlight. He wrote that the tale of the town being named after the Searchlight brand of wooden matches was most likely the fanciful concoction of a descendent of one of the town’s founders.

   His research, however, did show that Searchlight was most likely named by one of the town’s first residents, a prospector named George Colton, who apparently once remarked that there is gold in the area—but it would take a searchlight to find it.

   The story of Searchlight began in about May 1897, although there is some disagreement about the exact date, with the discovery of gold in the area, which is located about an hour south of Las Vegas.

   By July 1898, the Searchlight mining district had been formed and a small camp was established in the desert. By 1902, Searchlight had a post office, a 15-mile long narrow-gauge railroad linking the mines to a mill on the Colorado River, a newspaper, stores, and saloons.

   In 1907, the population crested at several thousand people, although exact numbers are difficult to determine because of the transient nature of mining towns.

   In 1908, Searchlight made a run at being named the seat of newly-formed Clark County but lost out to Las Vegas, which was actually smaller than Searchlight at the time.

   Searchlight’s fortunes, however, were intertwined with the state of its mining industry and when the ore began to fade after 1916, it, too, started to decline. By the 1930 census, only 137 people still lived in Searchlight.

   Today, about 445 people live in the community, many retirees or refugees from the hustle and bustle of bigger cities. The main reminders of the town’s mining past are a handful of slowly-decaying wooden mining headframes still standing on the hills surrounding the town.

   The best place to learn about Searchlight’s rich history is the Searchlight Historic Museum, one of the best small museums in the state, and a branch of the Clark County Heritage Museum in Henderson.

   The museum, located a few blocks from the main street, is easy to find because of the large wooden headframe out front. The headframe was originally constructed in 1904 and stood for many years at the Ruth Elder mine.

   Around the derrick-like structure are other mining artifacts such as a large smelting pot, an ore car, and an arrista, which was a horse-drawn device that was used to crush ore.

   When you first enter the museum, which shares its building with the Searchlight Community Center, you trigger an audio message that welcomes you and begins telling the town’s story.

   The first exhibit you encounter contains a nice collection of Native American baskets and pottery, made by members of the Southern Paiute and Mojave tribes, the region’s original inhabitants. There is also an interesting display of Indian grinding tools, and a unique ring and pin game once popular with Native Americans.

   Citing historic documents and photos, the museum’s displays detail Searchlight’s rise to become the largest community in southern Nevada at the start of the 20th century.

   One display contains photos of the first post office as well as scenes of the town’s newspaper offices and a place known as “the Big Store,” a kind of early 20th century Wal-Mart.

   Adjacent is an exhibit filled with old bottles, an early 20th century rodeo program, a miner’s candlestick, and other items.

   Another exhibit shows minerals found in the region such as quartz, feldspar, and, naturally, gold.

   One of the most unique displays in an old player piano, upon which is the sheet music for a Scott Joplin song called the “Searchlight Rag.” It turns out that while Joplin never visited Searchlight, he wrote the music in 1907 as a tribute to two friends, Charles and Tom Turpin, who once owned a mine in Searchlight.

   The Turpin brothers apparently didn’t stay long in Nevada but did share their mining experiences with the famed ragtime composer, who was inspired to write the rag in their honor.

   Another exhibit profiles noteworthy people who were born, raised or lived in Searchlight, including Senator Reid and Academy Award-winning costume designer Edith Head, who spent a few years there as a girl.

   Additionally, in the 1930s and 40s, movie cowboy star Rex Bell, who later became Nevada’s lieutenant governor, and his wife, actress Clara Bow, had a large ranch near Searchlight. Both occasionally participated in local events such as holiday parades and rodeos.

   The Searchlight Historic Museum is open Monday through Thursday, 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday by appointment. There is no admission charge but donations are welcome.

  For more information about Searchlight, go to https://www.clarkcountynv.gov/government/departments/parks___recreation/cultural_division/musuems/searchlight_musuem.php.

Early Las Vegas Gambling History Still Found at the El Cortez Hotel

  When it comes to finding the history of Las Vegas’s gambling industry, few places reflect that story as well as the El Cortez Hotel in the city’s downtown core.

  In fact, the El Cortez, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, is the longest continuously running downtown hotel-casino in Las Vegas.

  Built in 1941, the El Cortez hasn’t changed its appearance much over the decades. In fact, that’s a big reason the hotel is kind of a living historic landmark that offers a glimpse of the era in which it came into being.

  At the time the El Cortez opened, there was no Las Vegas Strip and downtown Las Vegas was the center of the city.

  Its original owners were Marion Hicks and John C. Grayson, the former a Los Angeles-based developer. The two spent about $325,000 constructing the property, which included 59 rooms, a 125-seat dining room, a casino, a cocktail lounge, bar and a beauty parlor.

  Designed in a Spanish/Colonial Revival/Western influenced architectural style, the hotel, the city’s largest at the time, quickly became known as one of Las Vegas’ finest lodging houses.

  In September 1943, Grayson sold his share of the hotel to Thomas Hull, who earlier had built the Hotel El Rancho on Highway 91 (which eventually became the Las Vegas Strip). Three months later, Hull sold out to Hicks.

  The mid-1940s saw the hotel enter what was perhaps its most fascinating and notorious phase. That’s when Hicks sold it to a syndicate group headed by Edward Berman and Moe Sedway, two figures connected to organized crime organizations. Berman soon relinquished his ownership share and was replaced by another mob figure, Gus Greenbaum. Additionally, it is believed “hidden” ownership of the hotel included gangsters Meyer Lansky and Benjamin Siegel.

  In March 1946, a new deed of trust was executed that identified the owners as Sedway, Raymond Salmon and his wife, and J.Kells Houssels Sr. and his wife. In July 1946, Sedway sold his interest in the hotel to Salmon and Houssels.

  Between late 1946 and 1962, the El Cortez was managed by Houssels, one of the early gaming pioneers in downtown Las Vegas (he owned the Las Vegas Club and was an investor in the Boulder Club). Additionally, Houssels later invested in the Showboat and Tropicana hotel-casinos on the Strip.

  During Houssels’ tenure, the hotel was remodeled into what the Las Vegas Review-Journal described as “Las Vegas Contemporary” that incorporated hidden lighting, more contemporary furnishings, murals and other decorative touches.

  In 1962, Houssels sold the El Cortez to a group headed by gaming industry veteran John “Jackie” Gaughan,

  For the next four decades, Gaughan was the public face of the El Cortez, actually living in a penthouse in the hotel and regularly playing poker at the hotel’s tables. Even after he sold his ownership of the hotel in 2008, he continued to live on site and play poker until his death at the age of 93 in March 2014.

  While the El Cortez’ exterior is mostly the same as it was when it was constructed, the property has been renovated and enlarged over the years. In 1952, the façade was altered to include the property’s now iconic giant neon and metal sign promoting, “El Cortez Hotel, Free Parking.”

  In 1984, the property was greatly expanded with the construction of a 15-story hotel tower adjacent to the original structures.

  Of course, the best way to understand the hotel’s significance to Las Vegas history is to stop in and check it out. Perhaps a little cluttered and old-fashioned compared to the massive mega-resorts of the Las Vegas Strip, the place shouts out its historic roots.

  In the past decade, the hotel unveiled a memorial—inside the casino—honoring longtime owner Jackie Gaughan. The exhibit offers more than 300 gambling artifacts used at properties once owned by Gaughan, including casino chips, dice, keno tickets, matchbooks, ashtrays and menus.

  Over the years, Gaughan owned or had an interest in a number of Las Vegas hotels or casinos including the Gold Spike, Club Bingo, Las Vegas Club and Jackie Gaughan’s Plaza.

Virgin Valley Heritage Museum Explores Mesquite Area's Rich History

Virgin Valley Heritage Museum in Mesquite

 Few Nevada communities have changed as quickly—and grown as fast—as Mesquite. Once a sleepy Southern Nevada farming community, the town has grown enormously since the 1980s—from about 1,100 in 1984 to more than 23,500 today.

  But while Mesquite has been growing and changing, there is one place that has managed to hang on to a few pieces of the former Mormon colony's past: the Virgin Valley Heritage Museum.

  Housed in an historic National Youth Administration building that was constructed in 1941-42, the museum offers an opportunity to catch a glimpse at the rich history of the Virgin Valley region.

  The museum building itself is unique; it is one of only two NYA buildings in the state (the other is in Fallon).  The seven-room stone structure was originally a library then served as a hospital (35 local babies were born here). After a few years as a boy scout lodge, the building was designated as the town museum in 1984 and opened the following year.

  Inside, the cluttered museum is a vault of local history. A large collection of historic black and white photographs shows the evolution of the town as it grew from a few farms to a roadside stop to a burgeoning gaming mecca and retirement community.

  One of the exhibits displays vintage clothing, including a beautiful turn-of-the-century wedding dress, and another shows off the town's first telephone switchboard and phone sets.

  One corner contains 1930s motion picture theater equipment, while nearby is a recreated turn-of-the-century bedroom, complete with period furnishings, and a 1920s-era parlor.

  A display case holds state basketball trophies from 1915 and 1916; the team had to travel by wagon to Moapa in order to catch a train to Reno, where they won the first-ever state tournament. The museum’s docents are extremely helpful, many having lived most of their lives in the valley.

  The Virgin Valley area was first settled in 1880. But the adjacent Virgin River proved too much for these Mormon pioneers—it dried up in the summer and flooded the farms at other times—so they abandoned the area after a few months.

  In 1882, another member of the Church of Latter-Day Saints, Dudley Leavitt, moved his five wives and 51 children to Mesquite Flats, as it was named. He rebuilt irrigation ditches and, once again, tried farming the area. Another flood, however, destroyed his improvements and he was forced to give up.

  The first sustained settlement was started in 1894 with the arrival of several more families. This time, nature proved more cooperative and the pioneering farmers were able to tame the river by rebuilding and fortifying the dam and canals.

  The town grew gradually during the next three-quarters of a century, then began to sprout with the development of the Mesquite Peppermill in the early 1980s. In 1984, Mesquite incorporated as a formal city.

  Mesquite also holds the distinction of having been part of the Old Spanish Trail.  An historic marker in front of the museum notes that the trail, used from 1829 to 1850, stretched for 130 miles across Clark County and was the first major trading route through the state (it connected Santa Fe, New Mexico to Los Angeles).

  The museum, located at 35 West Mesquite Blvd., is open 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.  For more information go to www.mesquitenv.gov/departments/museum.

National Atomic Testing Museum is a Real Blast

Atomic Testing Museum (Photo courtesy of Travel Nevada/Sydney Martinez)

 Given Las Vegas’ proximity to the Nevada Test Site, it’s appropriate that the National Atomic Testing Museum should be located in the city.

   The Smithsonian-affiliated museum, which opened in 2005, is an 8,000-square-foot facility devoted to educating the public about the nearly 1,000 nuclear explosions detonated at the Test Site between 1951 and 1992.

   Most of the museum’s exhibits are devoted to the Test Site and there is a definite 1950s Cold War vibe to the place, including the sleek, institutional-looking ticket counter. Inside, state-of-the-art displays describe the role that the Test Site, located 65 miles north of Las Vegas, had in the development of nuclear weapons and the impact that "the bomb" had on American life.

   Wandering through the museum, visitors can trace the development of the atomic bomb, including a copy of a letter from Albert Einstein urging President Franklin Roosevelt to investigate the use of atomic technology because the Germans were already researching ways to develop nuclear weapons.

   In "Ground Zero Theater," visitors can sit in a darkened room to watch film about the history of the site and experience a leg-shaking simulation of an atmospheric nuclear test—without the deadly radiation.

   The theater is designed to resemble the concrete bunkers used at the original test site, complete with flashing red lights and long, wooden bench seating.

   Museum docents are often retired test site workers, who earnestly guide visitors through the galleries, which feature audio and video displays, genuine test site artifacts, and items illustrating the public fascination with atomic tests during the 1950s.

   One of the more interesting displays is entitled “Atom Bomb and Pop Culture,” which features artifacts from the time such as a box of Kix cereal promoting the “Kix Atomic Bomb Ring” and an beverage recipe book titled “Atomic Cocktails.”

   Another exhibit allows visitors to use manipulators, which are the mechanical arms used to handle radioactive materials.

   A new addition to the museum is the Spy exhibit, a partnership with the National Security Agency’s (NSA) National Cryptologic Museum in Fort Meade, Maryland. This display highlights the NSA’s gathering of telemetry intelligence, which is using to obtain data on missiles and space-based vessels being tested by foreign governments.

   Nevada’s involvement with nuclear explosions began in 1951 with a test nicknamed “Able.” It involved a B-50D Bomber dropping a nuclear device from an altitude of 19,700-feet onto a barren patch of desert known as “Frenchman Flat.”

   The subsequent explosion generated a brilliant ball of rose-colored fire followed by a blue-purple afterglow for a few seconds and a small, yellow-brown cloud that slowly drifted away until it was dissipated by the winds.

   During the next four decades, the 1,375 square mile test site (larger than Rhode Island and one of the largest restricted areas in the U.S.) hosted hundreds of nuclear detonations. In the early years, the nuclear blasts generated enormous mushroom-shaped clouds that rose high into the sky.

   For a short time, watching the scheduled tests—with their spectacular mushroom clouds—developed into a popular tourist attraction in Las Vegas. After 1962, the tests were moved underground as a result of growing concern about radioactive fallout from the clouds.

   The Atomic Testing Museum is located at 755 East Flamingo Road. Admission to both the museum and the Area 51 exhibit is $29 for adults, $27 for seniors with ID, $27 for military and first responders, $25 for Nevada residents, and $15 for youths aged 7-17. Children under 6 are free. The museum is open daily from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

   For more information, go to https://atomicmuseum.vegas/.

That Time Mark Twain's Cabin was (Allegedly) in Reno's Idlewild Park

 

The cabin that was supposedly Mark Twain's in Aurora.

   Years ago, I read how, in the 1920s, Mark Twain’s former cabin, located in Aurora, California, had been relocated to Reno’s Idlewild Park.

   When I looked into whether it was still there, several accounts said the cabin had disintegrated over the years and essentially disappeared (it was apparently located roughly where the rose garden is today).

   Recently, after writing a book about Twain’s time as a journalist in Virginia City, I thought of the story and decided to dig into it a bit more. It turns out I’m far from the first to want to write about the ignoble fate of the wooden cabin and whether it really been home to Twain.

   One thing that is true is that in the spring of 1862, Samuel Clemens (Twain’s real name), arrived in the mining town of Aurora, California, to check out several mining claims he and his brother, Orion, had purchased. According to historical accounts, Twain (as I will continue to refer to him) began working a few of their more promising claims, including digging and blasting tunnels.

   Unfortunately, that work didn’t bring in any money, so Twain soon took a job at a quartz mill at $10 a week (he lasted a week in the position before quitting). After that, he mainly survived on money sent to him by his brother, who was the secretary to the Territorial Governor in Nevada.

   Until he finally gave up on Aurora and headed to Virginia City that summer, Twain lived in two and possibly three crude mining cabins. Author Clifford Alpheus Shaw, who wrote a well-regarded Aurora history, described the typical miner’s cabin as having rough log walls with a roof made of canvas, sod, tree branches and brush, flour bags, or rough shingles or clip-boards.

   While Twain only resided in Aurora for a few months, it is where he took pen to paper and began writing letters to the Territorial Enterprise newspaper using the pen name, “Josh.” Those letters led to a job offer and that’s how Twain began his career as a journalist in Virginia City later that year.

   As for the crude cabins Twain lived in while in Aurora, that’s where fact and legend start to blur. According to Shaw, Twain shared cabins during those months with several other miners, including, at different times, Horatio G. Phillips, Calvin H. Higbie, Daniel H. Twing, and Robert M. Howland.

   In Twain’s book, “Roughing It,” which recalled those days, he described one of the cabins he shared with Higbie as a “floorless, tumble-down cabin” and the accompanying illustration showed a structure with log walls and a canvas roof.

   So, what does any of this have to do with Mark Twain’s cabin being relocated to Idlewild Park? Over the years, as Twain became more famous, some of his old companions and other Aurora-ites began to claim that various cabins still standing in the declining town of Aurora had once been home to the writer.

   By the late 19th century and early 20th century, one of the cabins, a two-room building with not-so-rough wooden siding, a window and a shingle-roof, was being promoted as “Mark Twain’s Cabin.”

   Following Twain’s death in 1910, the Twain cabin of dubious origins gained additional fame, so much so that souvenir hunters began tearing off pieces of the structure.

   In early 1924, when Mono Lake, California residents began to investigate moving the cabin to their community to preserve it, the Nevada State Journal began to encourage Reno citizens to claim the artifact.

   “The idea of bringing the cabin to Reno was given birth by the touring bureau of The Journal when it was discovered that citizens of Mono Lake, California, had launched a movement to lure the Twain cabin from Nevada into their state,” the newspaper reported on September 16, 1924.

   The paper reported that the cabin apparently was located on land owned by prominent Reno businessman/banker George Wingfield, who immediately agreed to turn over the title to the cabin to the city of Reno so it could be moved to Idlewild Park.

   In November 1924, the cabin was dismantled into two section and loaded onto two large trucks for transporting to the park to become part of the city’s Transcontinental Highways Exposition celebration.

   Once there, it was placed on a new foundation in the park and properly feted. In the early 1930s, a wall was erected around the structure to protect it from vandalism.

   By 1945, however, the cabin had fallen into sad shape. Journal columnist Gladys Rowley noted “people who appreciate historic landmarks have long been protesting the gradual destruction of the Mark Twain cabin in Idlewild Park.”

   By all accounts, by the early 1950s, nothing remained of the cabin in the park.

  On November 10, 1955, the Reno Evening Gazette noted that a request from a student in St. Louis, Missouri for a photo had proven futile because, “As late as 1934 WPA crews erected a small stone and cement wall around the cabin, to prevent souvenir hunters [and] picnic lovers seeking firewood from carting away what was left of the cabin.

   “It soon disappeared, however, so that shortly after this time not even the foundation remained,” the article added.

   Interestingly, even as early as 1940, some had questioned the cabin’s authenticity. A letter in the March 12, 1940 Journal written by Alfred Chartz of Carson City, who had worked at the Territorial Enterprise alongside Twain’s contemporaries in the years after Twain had departed from Virginia City, noted, “The Idlewild cabin is probably an imitation of the Aurora cabin [Twain had lived in].”

   Whether it was a priceless artifact or a fake Twain landmark, the cabin was historic and no doubt deserved a better fate.

Explore Reno's Most Haunted Spots

Lincoln Hall at the University of Nevada, Reno in 1900

   While Virginia City has often been called the most haunted place in Nevada, Reno also has its fair share of places where some have claimed to have seen or heard things that can’t be explained.

   Not surprisingly, many of those places can be found in the neighborhoods housing the city’s oldest and most historic buildings.

   A good example of this is the University of Nevada Reno (UNR) campus, which is said to be home to several haunted places. For example, in venerable Morrill Hall, built in 1885-86, and the oldest structure at the university, some have claimed to have seen the ghost of a woman dressed in 1920s attire.

   Additionally, in the DeLaMare Library, housed in the historic Mackay Mines Building, folks have reported seeing the ghost of Clarence Mackay (son of Virginia City mining magnate John Mackay), who apparently has been known to stop clocks and turn lights on and off. The younger Mackay, along with his mother, donated the funds for constructing the mines building.

   Another allegedly haunted UNR building is Lincoln Hall, built in 1895-96. According to Kassandra Andicoechea-Schmaling, writing in the 2022-23 issue of Nevada Magazine, an apparition known as “Foxy” has been seen wandering the first floor and basement of Lincoln Hall.

   The ghost is believed to be that of James A. Champagne, nicknamed, “Foxy,” who died in his room of a gunshot wound. The story goes that the 25-year-old was in the reading room going through his mail when he opened a letter that upset him.

   He returned to his dorm room and then everyone in the hall heard a shot. For years, there has been some debate whether he committed suicide or it was an accident. His final words before expiring were, “I was monkeying with the gun when it went off. It was accidental, Prof.”

   Since then, some Lincoln Hall residents have claimed to felt a sudden coldness in the reading room, and to have heard creaking floorboards, as if someone was walking on them. A figure has also been seen wandering the basement.

   Not too far from the UNR campus is another allegedly haunted place, the historic Hillside Cemetery at 900 Nevada Street. With graves dating back to 1875, the cemetery is said to have been the location of significant spectral activity including electronic voice phenomena and the sighting of two young girls and woman dressed in black.

   Another historic neighborhood that is said to be a hotbed of haunted happenings is the Riverwalk District, just south of the Truckee River. A website, https://www.renoriver.org/riverwalk-haunts/, even provides a walking tour map of ten haunted locations.

   Among the places noted are the historic Levy Mansion on California Avenue, which until recently was the home of Sundance Books. The large white house is said to be haunted by the presence of three children, including an adult man and woman as well as a small boy and two girls. The ghostly family has been seen in the attic, with the adults watching over the children as they play.

   Another Riverwalk place of ghostly interest is the Roy Frisch House at 247 Court Street. Frisch was a banker and a former Reno city councilman, who mysteriously disappeared on the night just before he was supposed to testify in court against two local gangsters, William Graham and James McKay.

   It’s said that on some nights you can hear Frisch’s ghostly footsteps as he climbs the wooden stairs to return home after a night at the movies.

   Not surprisingly, one of the most haunted places in this district is believed to be the Washoe County Courthouse, the place where so many couples untied the bonds of matrimony during Reno’s heyday as the Divorce Capital of the World.

   According to the website, people have reported seeing apparitions moping around the courthouse “presumably troubled spirits who have had unhappy dealings with past courtroom rulings.” Others have said they experienced overwhelming feelings of sadness and hopelessness, along with unexplained coldness, as they walked through section in the courthouse.

   A good source of Reno ghost stories is Janice Oberding’s book, “Haunted Reno,” available in local bookstores or online. Additionally, Reno Ghost Tours offers regular guided tours of the city’s most haunted places. For more information, go to: https://usghostadventures.com/reno-ghost-tour/.

What Happens in Las Vegas, Stays There for Eternity

 

At the Westgate Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, some have reported seeing the ghost of Elvis.

When it comes to ghost stories in Las Vegas, there is no shortage of books devoted to telling the tales of specters and spooks in the glittery neon city.

   Among the most prolific is Virginia City-based writer Janice Oberding, author of “Haunted Nevada” and “Haunted Las Vegas” (and about 50 other books).

   Others who have also explored ghostly sightings and other things that go bump in the night in Las Vegas include Heather Leigh, author of “Ghosts and Legends of the Las Vegas Valley” and Paul Papa, who wrote, “Haunted Las Vegas: Famous Phantoms, Creepy Casino, and Gambling Ghosts.”

   Among the places identified as haunted are: 

   • The Redd Foxx house at 5460 South Eastern Avenue. This ranch-style structure, once the home of the star of the 1970s television show, “Sanford and Son,” is reportedly haunted by Foxx’s spirit (he died in 1991). Foxx apparently lost title to the property as a result of unpaid taxes.

   It is claimed Foxx’s ghost roams the house, still angry at the Internal Revenue Service for kicking him out. Later owners have reported seeing lights mysteriously turn on and off, doors opening and closing and the sound of someone running down a hallway. No one, however, has reported hearing any dirty jokes (Foxx was famous for his X-rated humor).

   • The former Carlucci’s Tivoli Gardens Restaurant at 1775 E. Tropicana Avenue. The entertainer, Liberace, a former owner, is said to haunt this once-popular eatery. According to some accounts, Liberace, who died in 1987, often entertained guests in the restaurant and enjoyed himself so much that he continues to return.

   Interestingly, the wandering spirit of Liberace is also said to occasionally visit his former home at 1812 S. 15th Street (a sprawling complex known as the White House) as well as the defunct Liberace Museum on E. Tropicana (adjacent to the restaurant).

   • Fox Ridge Park at 420 Valle Verde Drive in Henderson is considered one of the most haunted places in southern Nevada. According to several sources, visitors can observe a swing in the park begin to move back and forth, despite the absence of any wind or other motivation.

   The story goes that the spirit of a young boy pushes the swing, although no one has been able to find any reason for why he would want to do so. Some ghost hunters have reported that their EMF meters register significant activity in the park and many have reported photographing white orbs around the swing.

   • Westgate Las Vegas Resort & Casino at 3000 Paradise Road. According to a number of sources, the ghost of singer Elvis Presley has been seen in various locations in the hotel, which opened in 1969 as the International Hotel and later was known as the Las Vegas Hilton.

   In July 1969, Presley began playing the showroom at the hotel and continued to perform there for more than seven years. He died in 1977.

   Allegedly, one of the spots he likes to visit is a backstage elevator that leads to a greenroom. Additionally, a maid reportedly saw him backstage one day and said he spoke to her.

   • Horseshoe Las Vegas at 3645 South Las Vegas Boulevard. According to Oberding, this high-rise hotel-casino, called Bally’s Las Vegas until 2022, was also the site of the MGM Grand Hotel-Las Vegas, which suffered a tragic fire in 1980. Eighty-five people died in the blaze, considered one of the worst high-rise hotel disasters in history.

   Oberding has written that some guests have heard sobbing and screams in the hotel’s upper-floor hallways, while others have seen strange green lights or shapes.

   “Haunted Nevada,” “Haunted Las Vegas,” “Haunted Las Vegas: Famous Phantoms, Creepy Casinos, and Gambling Ghosts” and “Ghosts and Legends of the Vegas Valley” can all be found online and in local bookstores.

Book Explores the Historic Cemeteries of Carson City and Carson Valley

Empire City Cemetery

   It’s pretty clear that Nevada historical writer Cindy Southerland has a thing for cemeteries. For nearly more than three decades, she has studied several of northern Nevada’s historic cemeteries, which, according to her online biography, is because she considers them as outdoor museums.

   That point is obvious in her book, “Cemeteries of Carson City and Carson Valley,” published by Arcadia Publishing. Chapters in the lavishly-illustrated work examine such topics as the dying art of cemetery symbolism and what can we learn from tombstones.

   In examining the cemeteries of the Carson City/Douglas County region, she explores not only the larger and more familiar burial grounds, such as Carson City’s Lone Mountain, but also the often-overlooked or forgotten ones, like Empire City, the Pioneer Cemetery, Stewart Indian School, and the Ormsby County Poor Farm.

   For Douglas County, she takes a look at the cemeteries in Genoa, Gardnerville, Mottsville, Jacks Valley, Glenbrook and Fredericksburg.

   In the first chapter on the meaning of tombstones, Southerland reveals why she is so fascinated with cemeteries by nothing they are “often the only record or artifact remaining to share the story of a community and the individuals who shaped it.”

   With that in mind, she notes that a tombstone is more than a slab of marble or a wooden plank because each provides important details about the life of the buried person, such as biographical information, historical events, ethnicity, religious and fraternal affiliations and, in some cases, cause of death.

   “Tombstones are considered an outdoor archive and may be the last surviving document to record the existence of the person buried there,” she says, adding that they also often reflect the values of the people of past regarding such matters as death, mourning, and a proper burial.

   To make her point, Southerland provides images of a handful of tombstones and interprets the information that was inscribed on each. Thus, we learn that while a tombstone tells us that James Cook, son of David B. Cook was killed in Gold Hill by the Virginia and Truckee Railroad on August 3, 1873, Southerland’s additional research reveals that the 32-year-old man died while attempting to jump onto a moving train car and falling under the wheels.

   In other parts of the book, Southerland enhances the images of tombstones with reproductions of items that appeared in newspapers of that time regarding the deceased. For example, when telling readers about the famed stagecoach driver Hank Monk, who is buried in Lone Mountain Cemetery, she includes his 1883 funeral notice and the cover of sheet music that had been written to honor Monk by Carson City composer, John P. Meder.

   The chapter on the cemeteries of Carson City provides not only a look at Lone Mountain Cemetery, which remains an active burial ground, but others no longer in use. She points out that over the years the boundaries of various cemeteries have sometimes been forgotten so that when new developments crop up they can accidentally intrude on final resting places.

   This occurred in 2000, during excavation work for a new office building in Carson City on a triangular piece of land that had once been part of Lone Mountain, but had been forgotten and abandoned. A construction crew dug up the remains of a forgotten Chinese cemetery.

   She notes that the remains were removed, with authorities announcing their intent to have them reinterred at Lone Mountain.

   The book concludes with a chapter entitled, “Those They Bury With Most Ceremony,” which describes a number of noteworthy burial sites, including John “Snowshoe” Thompson, a legendary 19th century mail carrier who carried letters between Genoa and Placerville, California, Jennie Clemens, niece of writer Mark Twain, who died of spotted fever in 1864, and Nellie Verrill Mighels Davis, owner of the Carson City Morning Appeal and the first woman to cover the Nevada legislature.

   Cemeteries of Carson City and Carson Valley is available online and in many local bookstores.

   Southerland, who resides in Carson City, was interviewed in a recent article about the Lone Mountain Cemetery that appeared in the Nevada Appeal. It can be read at: https://www.nevadaappeal.com/news/2025/jan/07/this-is-carson-city-layers-of-history-at-carsons-lone-mountain-cemetery/.

Grass Valley is the Mother Lode of Gold Country History

 

  One of Northern California's most historic and scenic routes is Highway 49. Winding through the heart of the state’s gold country, the road passes through several fascinating 19th century mining towns—including Grass Valley.

  The community, in fact, is an important part of the northern mining region of California’s rich “Mother Lode,” the name given to the area because, according to legend, it was the mother of all gold discoveries.

  To reach Grass Valley, head east of Reno via Interstate 80 to Auburn. Exit onto Highway 49, then continue north for 24 miles to Grass Valley.

  The drive alone is worth the trip. Along the way, the two-lane highway passes through some beautiful countryside filled with stately oak trees, thick bushes of mountain mahogany, lush meadows and tall pines.

  The first significant gold discovery was made in Grass Valley in 1850 by George Knight. Local legend has it that Knight was chasing a cow one night when he stubbed his toe on an outcropping of rock. He decided to test the hard stone and found it to be high quality gold-bearing quartz.

  Within a short time of Knight's discovery, the area was overrun with gold miners. Like Virginia City, the ground beneath Grass Valley and nearby Nevada City eventually became a labyrinth of mining tunnels.

  Ultimately, more than $415 million in gold was pulled from the ground in Grass Valley, making it the richest of the northern area's mining communities. The town also fared much better than most 19th mining towns in that gold continued to be mined there into the 1950s.

  Today, Grass Valley has plenty of reminders of its rich mining past, including:

  • The Holbrooke Hotel (212 W. Main), considered on the community’s most recognized landmarks. An earlier business, the Golden Gate Saloon, opened on the site in 1851, but it was destroyed in an 1855 fire. The current hotel was erected in the early 1860s and is still in operation.

  • Nevada County Bank Building (131 Mill), which is one of the most impressive of all downtown structures. The striking gold-domed building was erected in 1917 by the Rector brothers, who owned a Nevada City bank. In the 1930s, it was purchased by Bank of America, which operated it until 1975. Today, it has been restored and is owned by an insurance company.

  • The Grass Valley Public Library (203 Mill), which was built in 1916 with Carnegie Foundation funding.

  An informative community walking tour brochure can be downloaded at: https://www.southport-land.com/PDFs/Grass_Valley_Walking_Tour_2005.pdf.

  Another good place to pick up a bit of the region's history is the North Star Powerhouse Mining Museum, just south of the town. The impressive stone power station was the built in 1895 and provided energy to operate the North Star Mine operation.

  Within the old station you will find a fine mining museum featuring large displays of mining equipment and other 19th century artifacts. For more information about it, go to: https://nevadacountyhistory.org/north-star-mining-museum/.

  One of the most colorful characters to live in Grass Valley was Lola Montez. The famed dancer/singer settled in Grass Valley in 1853 and purchased a house at 248 Mill Street.

  Montez, however, tired of life in a remote mining town and a few years later departed the city to resume her performing career.

  Her original house was extensively remodeled over the subsequent years and was demolished in 1975. It was replaced by an exact replica of her original abode and now is the home of the Nevada County Chamber of Commerce and a small museum.

  For more information about Grass Valley, go to: www.grassvalleychamber.com/community/explore-grass-valley/.

Reno: The Biggest Little City of Arches

 

  Reno loves its arches. For more than a century, the community has erected various arch structures over its main streets to commemorate special events or to promote an image.

  In fact, the late Nevada historian Phillip I. Earl discovered several photographs showing an arch built in 1899 atop the Virginia Street Bridge. The span commemorated Nevada troops returning from duty during the Spanish-American War.

  In 1914, Reno erected an arch over Virginia Street, this time greeting visitors passing through the city on their way to the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco. A third arch was temporarily installed over the city’s main street in June 1920 to promote the Reno Rodeo.

  In October 1926, a more substantial steel arch was constructed on Virginia Street at Commercial Row for an exposition celebrating the completion of the Lincoln and Victory highways, the nation’s first transcontinental roads.

  In lighted block letters, the arch spelled out the name, Reno, as well as: “Nevada’s Transcontinental Highways Exposition, June 25-August 1 1927.” Two lighted torches bookended the city’s name.

  Response to the new arch was overwhelmingly positive, so the Reno Chamber of Commerce and city officials decided to conduct a contest to find a new slogan for the city that would appear on the arch.

  The winner, G.A. Burns of Sacramento, received $100 for his suggestion: “Biggest Little City in the World.” Variations of the slogan had appeared in various Reno-related advertising campaigns over the years but placing the wording on the arch made it forever synonymous with the city’s name.

  In June 1929, the arch was renovated with the new slogan, removal of the torches and illuminated for the first time. Three years later, during the height of the Great Depression, the city announced it cold no longer afford to pay to light the arch at night.

  In response, a group of local residents volunteered to pay the electric bill and once again the sign lit up the downtown sky. In 1934, the city replaced the light bulbs on the sign with neon tubing and also decided to remove the famous slogan because some business folks thought it had reached its expiration date.

  In June 1935, however, following significant public outcry, the slogan was returned to the arch, which remained unchanged for the next 28 years. It appeared on postcards, in movies and books, and in thousands of tourist snapshots.

  In the early 1960s, executives of the former Harolds Club casino spearheaded a drive to raise funds to build a new, more modern arch. The new one, erected in 1964, still contained the city’s slogan and name but was constructed of sleek plastic and steel.

  In the meantime, the outdated, neon, 1930s arch was moved to Idlewild Park and later to Paradise Park on the Reno-Sparks border.

  In 1987, the city decided it was time to update the arch again and replaced the 1960s version with the present arch. In 2009, it was further spruced up with its incandescent light bulbs replaced with LED lights that can change color (for special occasions).

  As for the 60s version of the arch, a few years ago it was given to the city of Willits, California. Today, it has been reconstructed with a new message that welcomes people to “Willits: Gateway to the Redwoods.”

  The historic 1930s arch was removed from Paradise Park in the late 1980s and placed in storage while city leaders discussed what to do with it. Despite discussions about putting it back on Virginia Street—making Reno a “city of arches”—it didn’t resurface until 1994, when the city allowed it to be used by a movie company, which wanted to re-create the Reno of the 1930s for the film, “Cobb.”

  The film company restored the old sign and Renoites began pushing the city to find a permanent home for the classic display. In 1995, it was reconstructed on Lake Street, adjacent to the National Automobile Museum, where it still stands today.

Jokes Fly Regarding Nevada's Great Cloud-Rustling Controversy - Part 2

 

  Last week, we learned about the December 1947 claim by Nevada rancher Dick Haman and his partner Freeman Fairfield to all the water inside any clouds that they seeded with dry ice that might fall on anyone else’s property. The two owned a 12,300-acre ranch north of Topaz Lake

  The claim quickly generated considerable attention, much of it with tongue-in-cheek. For example, just two weeks after it was filed, the United Press filed a report about an indignant group called the Arizona Cloud Ropers, Inc.

  “That hombre makes me sore,” said Nick Gregovich, president of the Ropers. “We're goin' right ahead with our plans to fly over to Nevada and California, drops loops over clouds, wrangle them to Arizona and make them give down.

  “Arizona Cloud Ropers, Inc., was organized for the purpose of getting even with California for trying to steal Arizona's share of the Colorado River's water,” Gregovich said. “Nevada had better devote itself to the feudin' and fussin' of its divorcees and its gamblin' and stay out of the Arizona-California ruckus. As for Haman, we'll take him on any time, any place—in court or on the desert. Let him choose his weapons - lawyers or fire hoses at 20 paces. Or he can make it a dog fight over the clouds with exhaust pipes for guns.”

  It wasn't long before other folks began to see the comic possibilities in the brewing cloud-seeding conflict. The Reno Chamber of Commerce jumped into the fray by sponsoring a series of highly-publicized cloud-seeding expeditions over Mount Rose. The chamber hired a plane and sprayed dry ice in the clouds in the hope of creating some snow to attract skiers and tourists.

  Immediately after the cloud-seeding—which had no apparent affect—the Salt Lake City Chamber of Commerce sent a telegram threatening to file a lawsuit in federal court to stop Reno from “milking” clouds before they reached Utah. The Reno chamber responded with a call for a new tax to be levied on clouds passing over Nevada on their way to Utah.

  The fracas even attracted international attention. The London Times editorialized that the United State should probably nationalize moisture-bearing clouds and vest control over them with a “board of nebulous planners.”

  As the cloud war escalated, Reno Chamber President William Brussard packed a 12-inch snowball on an airplane headed to Salt Lake City and enclosed a note saying the snowball was sent “with deepest regrets that this is your share of the snow, at least at present.”

  Upon receiving the snowball, Salt Lake City Chamber leader Gus Backman sniffed that it was “infinitesimal,” and boasted that his city's ski resorts were reporting more than six feet of snow.

  Referring to the high-flying snowball, the Nevada State Journal noted that “disposal of the snowball was not announced. But it was generally agreed that it had no more chance of survival than does a snowball in—Nevada.”

  The dry ice dispute finally began to wane after a few months. State Engineer Alfred Merritt Smith wrote in a February 1948 letter to the science editor of the Associated Press that “we have not as yet taken any action and it is quite likely that our attitude will be that this office has no jurisdiction in this matter. As a result of this application, there has been a great deal of comment in the newspapers of the West, some jokingly and some serious. It would seem that the clouds, being interstate in character, would come under the jurisdiction of the (federal) government.”

  The state engineer finally issued a temporary water right of the clouds over the Rocking F after Haman made his claim but the cloud-seeding never produced much water.

  While Haman relished the attention, Fairfield grew tired of the publicity and harassing telephone calls. By 1949, he lost interest in both Haman and the cloud seeding idea, and let his manager go.

  Ironically, it was another of Haman's wild schemes that resulted in finding water for the property, although it came too late for him to benefit from it. Haman hit upon the idea of using oil drilling equipment to find water on the land.

  After Fairfield severed his relationship with Haman, he decided to try the drilling plan. It worked and Fairfield began pumping water from the ground, transforming the previously worthless property into valuable farmland.

  As with many things legal, Haman's cloud claim eventually ended not with a thunderclap but with a whisper. In April 1953, state engineer Hugh Shamberger cancelled the application, saying Haman had failed to show the point where he intended to divert the water, as required by state law.

The Silver State's Great Cloud-Rustling Controversy - Part 1

 

Rocking F Ranch

  About 30 miles south of Gardnerville is a relatively unremarkable swathe of land that was once the center of what might best be described as a thunderstorm of controversy over who can claim the water inside of rain clouds.

  In December 1947, a Nevada rancher named Dick Haman and his partner Freeman Fairfield filed a claim to all the water inside of any clouds passing over their 12,300-acre spread north of Topaz Lake (it’s located adjacent to Holbrook Junction).

  Haman and Fairfield’s claim might not have been the most outrageous water scheme to ever be proposed—that distinction probably would go to the 19th century genius who wanted to drill a tunnel from Lake Tahoe down to Washoe Valley in order to drain the lake—it did show the extraordinary lengths dry-state residents would go in their quest to find water sources.

  In their application with the Nevada state water engineer’s office, the two claimants revealed their plan: “We intend to shoot the clouds by the latest methods known in starting rainfalls and snowstorms. Coaxing clouds to rain has recently been developed, after 300 years of known experiments by individuals, states and countries.”

  While Haman and Fairfield's proposal sounds a bit silly today, it’s important to keep in mind that in the late 1940s, the concept that clouds were some kind of sky bound cows that could be milked wasn’t so farfetched. Also, 1947 was an extremely dry year and most ranchers were willing to do anything to get more water.

  At the time, the 35-year-old Haman was manager of Fairfield's Rocking F Ranch. A handsome, six-foot, seven-inch former University of Nevada football star, Haman had worked as a Hollywood studio artist and a professional boxer before returning to Nevada.

  Haman helped Fairfield purchase the Rocking F Ranch in 1946 and agreed to manage the property. He immediately faced a series of seemingly unsurmountable problems, including the fact the property had virtually no water.

  But Haman wasn't easily discouraged. Not even after he fenced the property and sparked a dispute with local sheepherders who were accustomed to passing through the land during their seasonal migrations.

  In the claim, Haman explained that scientists had been successful in making rain by dropping dry ice pellets into clouds. As he told a Reno Evening Gazette reporter at the time, “We plan to make rain with dry ice over the ranch next spring and we want to make sure we have full legal rights to the water we produce. If the cloud is over our ranch and we drop the dry ice through it to make rain we're certainly entitled to the water.”

  Haman admitted he wasn't sure what to do about rain that might drop on a neighbor's property. "It would still be our water," he said. “But we don't know yet how we could get it back.”

  The story hit the local papers later that week and made the national news. The December 22, 1947 issue of Time magazine noted that, “One Richard Haman, a ranch manager, last week filed a formal claim to the water in all the clouds passing over his 12,000-acre Rocking F Ranch near Reno. He was not cloud-cuckoo-land-crazy. He intends, he explained, to sprinkle dry ice on some of the clouds, and he wants full title to the rain he may bring down, wherever it falls.”

  Next week, we’ll explore what happened next with Haman’s audacious water rights claim.

Old Mining Camp of Rockland is Appropriately-Named

  The late 19th century mining camp of Rockland, located in the Pine Grove Hills south of Yerington, was once a big deal. At its peak, in the 1890s, it had a population of several hundred people. Today, it’s difficult to even find traces of where the old mining camp once stood.

  In fact, just about the only things still found in Rockland are scruffy piñon pine trees, some stone foundations, a handful of ruins of buildings—and lots of rocks.

  According to records, in 1868-69 prospectors from the mining town of Pine Grove, located about three miles away, discovered silver and gold in the area. Within two years, Rockland had grown to include a mill, several hundred residents as well as a post office, saloons and a handful of stores.

  But profits were slow in materializing and the following year, the area mines shut down after workers ceased getting paid in a timely manner. One angry employee torched the local mill, which marked the beginning of the end of the town's first boom. In 1872, even the post office was closed.

  But Rockland wasn't quite finished as a mining camp. New deposits were found in the early part of the 20th century. Within a short time, three mills and another post office set up shop in the little hamlet, which would quietly operate for the next three decades.

  In 1934, the ore was apparently depleted and mining again ceased in Rockland. As with most mining towns, buildings were dismantled, the milling equipment sold, the post office closed for a second time and Rockland Canyon sat silent once more.

  In the late 1960s, small-scale mining was attempted in the Rockland district, but that proved short-lived.

  When you explore Rockland you immediately see how it might have earned its name. Rocks are everywhere. Indeed, the drive to Rockland—on an extremely rocky road, naturally—is part of the challenge of getting to the site.

  To reach Rockland, head 11 miles south of Yerington on State Route 208. The paved road will make a sharp turn west. Ignore the turn and head directly south on an unmarked dirt road (you'll pass a National Forest sign in about a quarter mile).

  Follow the dirt road 11 miles, then turn west on Pine Grove Mine Road (there is a sign). Go about two miles, then turn south on another dirt road (the other road leads to the former mining camp of Pine Grove). Continue for four miles on a very rough road, which leads to the remnants of Rockland.

  A warning: the drive to Rockland should only be attempted with a high clearance vehicle with good tires. Additionally, it’s best to wait until the Spring or Summer to make the journey because the road can be covered with snow and/or muddy during much of the rest of the year.

  The drive up the canyon leading to the former mining camp, while tedious and slow, is quite scenic. Thick green vegetation growing beside the road and beautiful reddish canyon walls make for pleasant surroundings.

  An abandoned pond, probably used in the 1960s for some kind of leaching operation, sits below the site of the old mining camp. Just ahead, a concrete slab embedded with rusted building supports and a discarded round, rusted metal roof, are about all that remain of the most recent mining operations.

  On the hillside above, you can find the substantial concrete and stone foundations of earlier mill sites. Additionally, the ground is littered with assorted metal and wooden debris; other remnants of the turn-of-the-century mills.

  Half hidden in the piñons above the foundations you can spot a wooden ore bin with a narrow chute. Nearby is the skeleton of a storage shed; mounds of some kind of white filtering powder still piled on the floor.

  Wandering through the site, you can also find tailing piles and a few abandoned mine shafts—so be careful where you're exploring.

  For more information about Rockland or Pine Grove, refer to Stanley Paher’s excellent book, “Nevada Ghost Towns & Mining Camps” and to the companion "Nevada Ghost Towns & Mining Camps Illustrated Atlas." The latter shows historic photos of many mining camps and contains useful maps.