Dan De Quille

“ With the returns of the assays came a rush from California. The assays were made at Nevada City, California, and the result so astonished the assayer that he could hardly believe his figures or his eyes. But other assays verified those first made, and the immense richness of the ore in both gold and silver could no longer be doubted. A few men were let into the secret, they let in a few more, and at once the great news spread far and wide. Soon miners, speculators, and adventurers of all kinds came over the Sierras to the silver mines in swarms. ”

“ Hawthorne, 100 miles from Mound House, is situated about 31⁄2 miles beyond the foot of the lake. Although only a little more than eight years old, the town is beginning to present a comfortable appearance. It stands on a plain the soil of which at the time the town was laid out seemed to be nothing better than pure sand, yet on such a foundation has been conjured an oasis of shady groves, blooming grounds, and productive gardens. The town has a population of about 600. There are many small veins of gold and silver-bearing quartz in the surrounding mountains that are rich and easily worked. ”

“ Once people became convinced of the richness, extent, and permanency of the ore deposits on the Comstock, towns were built up on the lode and at points in the valleys as if by enchantment. Machinery was brought over the Sierras under all manner of difficulties by teams, and soon mills for working the ores were built by scores. In 1859 the Americans, as a people, knew nothing about silver mining. At that time there were probably not a dozen American miners on the Pacific Coast who had ever even seen a sample of silver ore. ”

“ In the limited space at command in a small book such as this it is not possible to more than give to the agricultural and horticultural resources of the State a passing glance, as has been done in the case of the mining and mineral products and resources. Although until within a very few years past Nevada has never been thought of outside of the State as being anything else than a region of mines, of metals, and beds of minerals, it is now evident that she has agricultural advantages and resources long unsuspected. Nevada is well calculated to become a great stock-growing State. ”

“ Having now given the reader some idea of the topography and physical aspect of the State, with a hasty general view of its mineral and agricultural productions and resources, we shall give a more particular account of the Comstock Lode, in which the first discovery of silver was made; where the deepest shafts have been sunk, and where mining for the precious metals is to be seen on a grander scale than anywhere else in the United States, or anywhere in the New World, taking into consideration the power of the machinery used and the examples of scientific mining engineering to be seen. ”

“ Already Nevada holds a high place as an agricultural and stock-growing State, though for nearly the whole term of her existence mining for the precious metals has been the all-absorbing business of the majority of her people, and has been the business which has attracted the attention of nearly all the wealthy men of the country. The State annually produces immense quantities of hay, and the beef cattle of Nevada are the finest and fattest to be found on the Pacific Coast. A great part of the beef supply of California is obtained from Nevada. ”

“ In speaking of the Comstock Lode, after giving an account of its discovery and something of its early history, it has been necessary in noting the progress of our towns and the improvements made in mining and milling operations and methods to go up into the Sierras to trace our water supply to its sources. It is also from the great pine forests of the Sierras that we derive our supply of lumber and timbers, and the Sierras are our natural sanitarium—it is to the lakes, valleys, and wilds of the “High Sierras” that our summer pleasure trips are made. ”

“ Seated in a boat on the lake in a calm, one may see the stones and pebbles at the bottom, with trout cruising about, where the sounding line shows seventy-five feet of water. The whole dome of the sky, with every fleecy cloud, is there perfectly reflected. ”

“ At first the word of the Mexicans was law in the new silver mines, both as regarded ore and the methods of mining and working it. Every American miner endeavored to secure a Mexican partner, or at least a Mexican foreman to take charge of his mine. Mexican methods, however, soon proved to be too slow for the Americans. Their arastras, patios, and little adobe smelting furnaces were the primitive contrivances of a non-mechanical people, and of a race of miners working as individuals, and on a very small scale at that. ”

“ The place was named Truckee, and began to build up in 1865, with the construction of the Central Pacific Railroad at that point. It is a brisk and thriving place, and, besides its lumber and ice industries, has a good trade with an extensive farming and grazing region. It is wonderful that so large a town exists as is now seen, in view of the fact that since 1868 it has seven times 129 been swept by terrible fires, and by two or three of these it was, in different years, almost wiped out of existence. ”

“ Even when no more large deposits of rich ore are to be found on the Comstock, there are immense and almost inexhaustible areas of low-grade ore upon which to fall back. In working these small bonanzas are sure to be encountered—scattered plums in the pudding—which will assist in sending up the average. New processes for working and concentrating ores are constantly being discovered, new methods in mining are being introduced, and new labor-saving machinery is almost daily being invented. Water-power, steam, compressed air, and electricity are fast taking the place of muscle. ”

“ The Sierra Nevada Mountains are a towering, rocky range, which constitutes a natural dividing line between the regions of country on either side. All on the east side of the Sierras partakes more of the general character of Nevada iv than of California—is characteristic of the Great Basin region. Although Owens River, Independence and Owens Valleys, Owens Lake and Mono Lake, are within the boundaries of California, yet they are essentially parts of that region the whole of which is known as the Great Basin. ”

“ The Salt Lake and Los Angeles is a proposed railroad on which surveying parties have been engaged for nearly a year. It is intended to start at Milford, on the Utah Central, pass through Lincoln County, Nevada, and connect with the railroad system of Southern California at Barstow. This road would tap a rich mining and a fine agricultural and grazing region in Southern Nevada. It would give life to an immense region of country that has long lain as dead. ”

“ In Lincoln, Nye, White Pine, Lander, Elko, and Humboldt Counties, there are hundreds of mining districts in which this is the case, and in these hundreds of districts are lying unworked thousands of quartz veins, all showing more or less of the precious metals at the very surface, and even in the croppings above the surface.
A thousand years of mining will not exhaust the mineral treasures of the mountains of Nevada. ”

“ Permanency and ultimate value being considered, the discovery of silver undoubtedly deserves to rank in merit above the discovery of the gold mines of California, as it gives value to a much greater area of territory and furnishes employment to a much larger number of persons. It has given wealth and population to all the vast region lying between the Sierra Nevada and the Rocky Mountain Ranges. ”

“ Prominent among these stands out Bald Mountain, just north of Lake Tahoe, and within plain view Mount Lincoln, Job’s Peak, Silver Mountain, and many other peaks that have names. Twenty miles to the northward are to be seen the green pastures and alfalfa fields of the Truckee Meadows, while to the southward we have the Sierra Range and Eagle and Carson Valleys. Carson City is hid by intervening low hills. To the eastward are the same deserts and mountains that compose the landscape viewed from the city, but from the top of the mountain the eye ranges over a vastly wider field. ”

“ Cheaper and cheaper means of mining and reducing ores will continue to be found, and presently it will be possible to work the mines of common metals 28 which cannot now be touched. Besides gold and silver the mountains of Nevada contain veins of copper, lead, iron, antimony, nickel, zinc, and many others, as cobalt, graphite, and the like. Not only are the mountains of the State rich in all kinds of metals, but the lower lands are also filled with valuable mineral treasures. ”

“ Most of those in the country at that time were engaged in farming and cattle growing, in trade with the emigrants, or in gambling and running off stock; only about 200 were engaged in mining, and all these were working gold placers. A number of ranchers from surrounding valleys took up claims on the line of the lode when they heard that it was a silver vein, but neither the placer miners, the ranchers, nor any one else that was in the country at the time the great discovery was made, ever got more than a few hundreds or thousands of dollars out of it. ”

“ All visitors to the Pacific Coast who are lovers of the beautiful and picturesque in natural scenery, will endeavor to spend some time at Lake Tahoe. Taking into consideration the surroundings, there is nowhere in the world a more grandly beautiful mountain lake. The lake lies between the eastern and western summit ridges of the main ridge of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, at an elevation of 6,247 feet above the level of the sea. Its length is a little over twenty-one miles, and its width about twelve miles. ”

“ A number of huge water tanks were constructed high above the town on the side of the mountain, with a proper system of mains and hydrants extending through all parts of the city. The pressure is so great at these hydrants that the firemen are able to throw a stream over the flag-staff of the tallest building in the city through a nozzle of the largest size. A few paid firemen now fight all the fires that occur in the city. As the hydrants are always ready the firemen have only to get to them, attach their hose, and at once they have powerful streams steadily playing on the fire. ”

“ Year by year the city grew in area, population, and wealth. Building went on both summer and winter, and at times was pushed almost day and night. As the mines were opened and worked their immense richness attracted hundreds and thousands of persons from California, and all parts of the Atlantic States and Canada. Money was more plentiful and the prices paid for skilled and all other kinds of labor were far higher than anywhere else on the American continent; all articles of merchandise also brought greater prices than could anywhere else be obtained. ”

“ At first the water with which the Comstock miners had to contend was cold, but it was not long before the deeper workings cut into parts of the vein where were tapped heavy flows of hot water—water actually hot enough to cook an egg, or to scald a man to death almost instantly. Several miners have lost their lives by falling into large tanks, or sumps, of this water, hot from the vein. The hot water called for fans, blowers, and all kinds of ventilating apparatus, as men working in heated drifts had to have a supply of cool and fresh air sent in to them. ”

“ In 1857 some of these Johntown miners struck paying gravel in Six-mile Canyon. This canyon is about five miles north of Gold Canyon, for the greater part of its course, but the heads of the two canyons are only about a mile apart, and both are on what is now known as the Comstock Lode. The pay found on Six-mile Canyon began only about a mile below the massive croppings that tower above the Comstock; still these early miners never once thought of going up to the head of the ravine to look for and prospect the quartz veins; all they thought of was free gold in deposits of earth and gravel. ”

“ The interior mountains, rugged and timberless as they are, have their uses. From the summits of many of the ranges flow springs and small streams that afford a supply of water for the irrigation of the valley and bench lands below. They are also conservators of a supply of moisture. On the summits of the higher ranges snow falls in winter to a great depth, and from the melting of this in spring and summer is derived a considerable supply of water for use on the arable lands on either side. ”

“ Nevada has within her borders no large rivers. In the Middle and Western States, her so-called rivers would be rated as large brooks or creeks. In England and some other European countries her streams might pass for rivers. The largest river we have is but a rill in comparison with the rivers of the West and South. Our Nevada rivers, too, are peculiar in that they nearly all remain in the State. But one goes outside of our boundaries to wander away in search of the great ocean. ”