Carson City

Eagle Station and Curry’s Plaza

The state capitol, built in the Neoclassical Italianate style between 1869 and 1871, stands in the plaza Curry left at the center of his planned town and had reserved for it.^4,5 Carson City is an independent city, treated as a county-equivalent for census purposes, and in 2017 it was home to 54,216 people.¹

In 1851 Frank and Warren L. Hall, George Follensbee, Joe and Frank Barnard and A.J. Rollins set up Eagle Station, a trading post and ranch on the Carson Branch of the California Emigrant Trail.⁴ The station and the valley around it took their name from an eagle skin stretched on the wall of the trading post.⁴ In 1858 Curry travelled from Downieville, California, to Mormon Station, now Genoa, and when the owner of vacant lots there refused to negotiate a fair price, Curry reportedly said, “Well I’m going to create a town of my own.”⁶ He rode about 13 miles north, and he and his three partners bought the Eagle Ranch for $500 and horses.^4,6 With John Musser, Frank Proctor and Ben Green, Curry platted a town he called Carson City, named, according to the University of Nevada Extension, after the mountain man Kit Carson.^1,2

Pony Express and the Capital

The Pony Express kept its office here for its entire 19 month history, and the first westbound trip, which left St. Joseph, Missouri on April 3, 1860, arrived on April 12 at 3:30 P.M.⁷ The marker reckons that Carson City was then only 9 days from receiving Eastern correspondence.⁷

Congress created the Nevada Territory in March 1861, and that November Carson City became its capital through the efforts of Curry and William M. Stewart, a lawyer.⁴ The town has been the capital of the state since statehood in 1864.¹ The Supreme Court met in the capitol until 1937 and the Legislature until 1971, and the building still serves the Governor, with historical exhibits on the second floor.⁵ Until 1969 Carson City was also the county seat of Ormsby County; that year the county was dissolved and its lands consolidated into the present 157 square mile municipality.¹

Abe Curry’s Mint

The state markers credit the output of the Comstock Lode and the high cost of shipping bullion to San Francisco for a branch mint, and date the act of Congress to March 3, 1862, while the U.S. Mint gives March 3, 1863.^3,8 Curry lobbied for Carson City over Virginia City, sold the government the site, organized the 1866 cornerstone ceremony, won the building contract, and was appointed the mint’s first Superintendent.⁶ The two-story building, of sandstone quarried at the Nevada State Prison, was completed on December 13, 1869.^3,8 On February 11, 1870, Seated Liberty dollars with the CC mintmark came off the single coin press, Press No. 1.³ Residents said the CC stood for “Compliments of Curry,” because he often handed the coins out as souvenirs.⁶

Coin operations closed in 1893 after coinage of $49,274,434.30, and mint status was withdrawn in 1899 as mining on the Comstock declined.^3,8 The building worked as an assay office until 1933 and was sold to the state of Nevada in 1939 for $10,000.³ In 1940 the Federal Writers’ Project guide reported the Old Mint being converted into a museum with an art gallery, and it is now the Nevada State Museum.^3,9

Comstock Freight and the V&T

The Comstock Lode kept Carson City busy from 1859 into the 1880s as a freight and transportation center, though as the capital it never depended entirely on mining.¹ The Warm Springs Hotel served as a meeting hall for the legislature and was also leased out as a prison.¹ The Virginia & Truckee railroad was completed in 1869, the same year as the mint, and ran through 1950.¹ At Lakeview, overlooking Washoe Lake at the end of a nine-mile lumber flume, the railroad set up ten sidings in August 1872 to load timber and cordwood for Comstock mines and mills.¹⁰ Near Carson City, Empire City, a milling town established in 1855, milled lumber for the underground workings of the Comstock Lode.¹¹ On April 15th, 1951, the Mills family of San Francisco gave the city the 52-acre tract called Foley’s Woods, at the eastern end of the old V&T yards, for a park.¹²

Prizefight, First Flight, and the Stewart School

The town hosted the world heavyweight championship in 1897, and on June 23, 1910, the first air flight in Nevada took place there.¹ South of town, the Stewart Indian School operated from 1890 to 1980, and when Superintendent Frederic Snyder arrived in 1919 its wooden buildings were deteriorating.¹³ Under Snyder, with Hopi and Italian stonemasons guiding them, students learned masonry and built over 60 buildings, mostly from 1922 to 1942, out of multi-colored rocks collected locally.¹³ Listed in the National Register of Historic Places as a Historic District in 1985, the campus of about 110 acres is managed by the State of Nevada.¹³