Virginia City, NV

 August 22, 2024

I didn't expect to do another blog so soon, but here it is.

We went with Bill to Virginia City, NV today.  It's been a few years since we've been there and it was fun!  We went to the "The Way It Was" museum.  It was very interesting, and had a lot of nice displays.  I would recommend it if you go there.  You'll get a good background of the history of the city.  Here are some (a lot of) pictures.

How about a porterhouse steak for 22 cents!  Yum!  Or maybe stewed tripe, stewed liver, or Spanish calves head?  Yuck!

Adolph Sutro built a tunnel from the Savage mine, starting in 1869.  It was to drain the water from the mines and made an escape route in case of fire in the mines, which had happened in the Yellowjacket mine where many men were killed.  The first water was released from the mines in 1879, but by that time most of the mines were not as productive.  Sutro sold the company but stayed on as a board member.  He moved to San Francisco and later became the mayor, as well as building Sutro Baths.

This is a model of all the different mines.  Each color represents a different mine.  Some of them went to a depth of 2,450'.  Mostly mined were silver, some gold, copper, and lead.

Can you imagine having your own personal stamp mill - and letting your family and friends play with it?  Actually I think it would have been fun.

Input into hopper (above) and output (below).

Anyone recognize this?  Every Sunday night we would hurry home from church so we could watch Bonanza on TV.  They used to have part of the set (or a replica) from the show in Lake Tahoe, but it's been gone for years.

Pretty smart of them!

The noise from the stamp mills must have been deafening.

I didn't know this about mules.

After going to the museum we walked along the boardwalk.  Of course we had to stop at the Silver Queen Saloon and take pictures of the Silver Queen.

We went into several shops where I bought some earrings, John bought a t-shirt, and then we went and had lunch.  Afterwards we looked in some more shops and I bought a can coozie that has Lake Tahoe on it.  I couldn't find one with Virginia City.  I collect the can coozies because they are lightweight, don't take up much room, inexpensive, and I use them!  They're a nice souvenir but sometimes hard to find.

That was our day!  A lot of fun!

Soon we'll be roving on...

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".

Genesis 1:1