Historic Site Studies

PREFACE

“For them, no more, the blazing hearth shall burn, nor busy housewife ply her evening care….” (anon.)

This little refrain seemed to be quite apropos to many past recollections as I had stood, in late evenings, in such early day mining camp sites as Belleville, Poker Brown, Eastgate City, Phonolite or Casket.  This being true because I can relate to these long deserted places in that such scenes as are experienced here bring back stark memories of evenings in my own long ago village.

All of the miners walking through town after a 12 or 14 hour shift, past the ancient trees and by the wood frame houses with their picket fences buried under fragrant flowers and vines.  The pungent odor of the smoke from the wood burning cookstoves and the pleasant rectangles of orange colored light falling gently across yards from the countless coal oil lamps.  The only thing on their minds now was a hearty supper and rest.

Apposite to this, I suspect, is the fact that my own ancestors were wagon train pioneers who settled in the area of the Big Bend of the Sacramento River near Red Bluff, California in the mid-1800s.

On another tack, I have spent many years exploring, researching and recording archaeological sites here in Nevada.  Most of my efforts have been directed to the environs of Churchill County yet many were found in surrounding counties which turned out to be of great interest.  Some of these sites are addressed in this work.  Also, over a long period of time, I have worked for major contract archaeologists here in northern Nevada.  e.g., Archaeological Research Services, Kautz Environmental Consultants and R.K. Vierra and Associates.  In this respect, I have worked on some of the biggest archaeological projects that have taken place here in recent years.  Projects of archaeological evaluation and documentation such as the Tuscarora Pipeline Project, the Alturas Powerline Project and 17 sections of land evaluated archaeologically in Railroad Valley for the Apache Oil Company and the Foreland Oil Company.

Of more immediate interest would be my long standing desire to locate, investigate and record as many of our fast fading historic sites as possible against the fast approaching time when they will no longer exist.  Most of these historic mining camp and townsites have their origins in the late 1800s to the early 1900s.  There are exceptions, of course.  Many of these sites, if not most, no longer exhibit standing structures.  Innumerable features have long since been burned to the ground or they have been physically carted away.  Speaking from a practical and an obvious point of view, in my own firsthand experience, all extant sites have been seriously dug and collected over the past 50 years at minimum.

In the late 1980s I finally set up a solid mission for myself.  I decided to work independently and voluntarily, as time and finances permitted, upon locating, researching and then documenting as many historic sites as possible.  This would go into the official archives and data bases for use of historic researchers of the future; our western mining heritage made available for future generations that will no longer have direct access to these intriguing sites.

This more or less encapsulates my vision and motivation for the subject matter at hand.  The following pages may well prove to be exciting as well as informative.