October
18, 1998
Virginia City, Nevada
Taking a slight
detour off Highway 395 in Nevada, we turned west at Carson City and headed
north into the mountains on Highway 341. The narrow road rises gradually
at first, and then climbs sharply up the steep grade. At Silver City,
a truck route veers off to the right, and a strongly-worded sign directed
RVs to take it, too. A few miles later, the Phoenix One crawled into Virginia
City.
A more unlikely
place to build a city never existed. The ridge below Cedar Hill and Mount
Davidson is narrow, dry, and a fault line runs through it. Such a spot
would never inspire urban development today.
But back
in 1859, when two prospectors discovered a quartz outcropping larded with
gold on the side of Sun Mountain, things were different. By the time Henry
Comstock had given his name to the richest ore body ever discovered, Virginia
City was well on her way to becoming a boom town.
By 1876,
the town had seen glory days of a kind the world will never know again.
Virginia City was renowned the world over for her wealth. The Comstock
had financed the end of the Civil War and brought Nevada statehood. Over
a quarter of a billion dollars worth of gold and silver had been mined
from under her streets, and 25,000 people still called the place home.
Even a devastating fire in 1875 didn't end the bonanza days, and many
of the town's lavish buildings were replaced with structures even grander.
Who knew at the time that Virginia City's boom was on its downhill slope,
and that by the turn of the century, her residents would number less than
six thousand?
It was a
fast rise to glory, and an even faster fall. Geothermic activity had always
been a major challenge for Comstock mining engineers, and ultimately hot
water, hot mud, and steam won the battle. Geologists today estimate that
as much as 80% of the Comstock Lode still lies untouched, but the cost
to reach it exceeds the current price of gold and silver. For more information
about the Comstock Lode, visit the Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology
online: www.nbmg.unr.edu.
Fewer than
a thousand residents call Virginia City home these days, and many of them
consider it their privilege and duty to preserve the history and heritage
of their remarkable community. Their whole city is a museum, the kind
of place where you might find Mark Twain's money belt in your attic. In
fact, Tom and Becky Purkey did just that when they were restoring their
Victorian home on B Street. Samuel Clemens, who arrived in Virginia City
during her heyday, assumed the pen name Mark Twain while he was working
for the Territorial Enterprise newspaper.
Pat
& Peggy Whitten |
Our
first stop was at the Virginia
City RV Park, not only because we planned to stay there,
but also because it's owned by friends we met on our fist
visit, Peggy and Pat Whitten. It's hard to imagine an RV park
having historical value, but in Virginia City, the unlikely
is the norm.
The campground
is built near the site of the Ophir Mill, one of the first and most lucrative
of the Comstock. Our campsite overlooks the historic cemetery and has
a spectacular view down Seven-Mile Canyon.
Pat and Peggy invited us to join them at the Delta
Saloon for "locals night." The Delta, a popular tourist
destination, is open every day for lunch, but serves dinner only on Wednesdays.
"We'll introduce you to everybody," they said, and they weren't
exaggerating. By the time we'd finished our last bite of prime rib, we'd
met "Sweetwater John," who delights tourists on C street by
making rounds with his mule Jenny, and Sandy Radford, who owns a local
haberdashery. We'd chatted with Doug Walling, who manages the coin press
at the Marshall Mint, and we'd shaken hands with a passel of colorful
"locals," including a woman who rides camels in the annual races
at the rodeo ground and a chili cook-off champion.
Edw
Martinez |
In the morning,
we took Marvin for a perambulation
around the historic cemetery, and as we were leaving, we met Edw Martinez,
who lives in Virginia City and teaches art at the University of Nevada
at Reno. Edw showed us how to decipher vintage Nevada license plates,
many of which are still in circulation even though an old county numbering
system has been replaced with a statewide one. His plate reveals his Storey
County residency.
On Thursday,
Doug Walling gave us a tour of the Marshall
Mint and Museum on C Street. Founded by Hugh Roy Marshall, the mint
is known for its beautiful commemoratives and also for coins depicting
angels. Doug minted a silver one-ounce coin just for us, and now the Archangel
Michael rides in the Phoenix One. The museum houses one of the most eye-popping
collections of naturally occurring gold and silver I've ever seen. One
gold nugget weighs more than five pounds.
One of the
most imposing buildings in Virginia City is the Fourth
Ward School, which was built in 1876 and housed a thousand students.
We visited the day local artists were hosting an exhibit of their works,
and we also wandered through displays illustrating the life and times
of Comstock miners and their families. At the peak of their production,
Comstock mines operated twenty-four hours a day. The Fourth Ward School
had two commencement ceremonies to enable all parents to see their children
graduate.
Carol
& John Tyson |
North of
Virginia City is the Rafter 7 Bar M Ranch, a working ranch
owned by Carol and John Tyson. John Tyson is known far and
wide for capturing the lifestyle and culture of Northern Nevada
and California in television interviews. Carol has founded
a group home for teenage girls at the ranch, and her successful
programs have been emulated in other areas. The Rafter 7 Bar
M Ranch, which boasts Texas longhorns and paint horses, welcomes
visitors.
A vintage one-armed bandit in the Nevada Gambling Museum |
As I've already
said, Virginia City is itself a museum. It's also full of museums, and
specialty stores that look like museums. A walk down C Street reveals
establishments dedicated to gambling, firemen, Mark Twain, mining, general
stores, schools, trains, and red light districts. We're still making our
way through the treasure troves left behind from an era when the best
and most expensive was imported from Europe to outfit "the richest
place on earth" in appropriate style.
One of the
best places in town to step into the past is Mark
Twain Books. Formerly a museum, this store is located in one of C
Street's oldest buildings, and it's owned by Joe and Eleanor Curtis. Joe
is a native of Virginia City, and one of her most knowledgeable historians.
He's often engaged by authors of textbooks and historical fiction as a
consultant on Comstock lore. When he offered to take us on a tour of the
city, we jumped at the chance.
Joe Curtis points out features of the Comstock |
Joe took
us to the knoll that is now the "city yard," a vantage point
from which we could see the neighboring town of Gold Hill and a number
of the old mines. He showed us the old ice house, which was packed with
ice from a reservoir each winter. Temperatures in the mines were so high
that miners had to sit in buckets of ice to cool themselves.
Joe also
showed us the site where the first quartz outcroppings were discovered
to contain gold, and he gave us a map identifying the location of most
of the Comstock mines. "Many people think there was just one mine,"
he said, "But there were really more like two hundred. This place
is honeycombed with tunnels."
One of Virginia
City's treasures is the old Virginia &
Truckee Railroad, the "Queen of the Short Lines." Bob Horton,
the engineer, invited us to ride in the locomotive on its three-mile run
to Gold Hill. I took a lot of pictures, but I'm afraid photography can't
capture the sound and smell of an oil-burning steam engine hauling itself
up a 4 ½ % grade. It's not Disneyland, and after the real thing,
Disneyland will never be enough.
We
spent an evening at the home of Tom and Becky Purkey, who
were hosting a party in support of restoration efforts for
the Fourth Ward School. Becky is a geologist, and the author
of excellent Nevada natural history guide books.
A morning
foray along B Street brought us to the former offices of the Virginia
City Water Company, which is now an antique store managed by Joyce
and Chester Petrocchi. Next door is an old livery stable that has been
transformed into Uncle Patrick's Way Station,
a grocery store operated by "Uncle Patrick" Hanley, who has
lived in Virginia City for nearly three decades.
Marvin on the lookout for deer |
We're still
moseying around the city on the Comstock, still marveling at the remarkable
set of circumstances that created this legendary citadel. New technologies,
and especially new means of transportation and communication, mean that
a town like Virginia will never rise again. Mining towns are things of
history. In the case of Virginia City, we're fortunate that history is
still alive and kicking.
Megan
Click
here to read "Steaming North"
