Category: Destination4x4

Genoa Station – Pony Express

Posted on by

Originally part of the Utah Territory, Genoa is a former Pony Express Station and unincorporated community in Douglas County, Nevada. The settlement was first founded in 1850 by Mormon Settlers when they founded the Mormon Station as a trading post for travelers bound for California. The original trading post operates in a roofless log enclosure built by H.S. Beatie and other Mormon settlers.

Simpson expedition, Genoa, Nevada, 1859
Simpson expedition, Genoa, Nevada, 1859

Travelers along the Carson Route to California could purchase supplies such clothing, tobacco, meat, canned goods, coffee, beans, sugar, flour and bacon. In 1852, the settlement hosts heavy emigrant traffic and a supports a post office, sawmills and blacksmith.

Pony Express

Most historical sources agree on the identity of Genoa as a station as well. However, James Pierson also identifies the site as the Old Mormon Station. The old post office also served as the station, which seems rather on point. The livery stable across the street supplied riders with fresh horses.

Much of Genoa, including the original fort, station, and hotel, was destroyed in a fire in 1910, but a replica of the fort was built in 1947. In 1976 the post office site was a vacant lot, and a picnic area occupied the livery stable location.

Nevada's first permanent building, Genoa trading post, established 1850
Nevada’s first permanent building, Genoa trading post, established 1850

Cheers

Genoa is home to the oldest bar in the state of Nevada, which opened in 1853

Genoa Station Summary

NameGenoa Station
LocationDouglas County, Nevada
Latitude, Longitude39.0044, -119.8472
Other NamesMormon Station
GNIS859807
Post Office1852 –
NewspaperTerritorial Enterprise (1858 – 1860)
NPS Station Number165
Next Westbound StationVan Sickle’s Station
Nest Eastbound StationCarson City Station

References

Van Sickle’s Station – Pony Express

Posted on by

The Van Sickle’s Station is the second Pony Express Station encountered when traveling east from Friday’s Station at the California/Nevada State Line. The Van Sickle Station is located at the bottom of Old Kingsbury Grade in Carson Valley.

Van Sickle's Station 1870
Van Sickle’s Station 1870

In 1857, rancher Henry Van Sickle built a two-story hotel to server traveler’s on their way to California. The building contained with a bar, kitchen and a store. The location is well suited as a rest stop before the climb over the high Sierra Nevada. The location served as a Pony Express in 1860, where the riders could stop to change horses. The National Park Service does not list this station on their website, so it’s active participation in the Pony Express could be in doubt. The National Pony Express Associate does list this location as a station for the pony express. This station may be on some lists as the riders would travel near the location, and it could serve as a navigation point.

Henry Van Sickle killed the outlaw and murderer Sam Brown on July 6th, 1860. Van Sickle is fully exonerated on July 8th, 1860, when the coroners jury found “Death by a just dispensation of an all-wise providence at his own expense”.

Over time, the hotel fell into disrepair and was eventually torn down in 1909.  Today, much of the history surrounding this property has been preserved in the current residence which was re-constructed in 1944 from the still standing stone store, warehouse, bar and blacksmith buildings of the original station, using the original hand-hewn beams and stone from the old quarry

Van Sickle’s Station Trail Map

Location Summary

NameVan Sickle’s Station
LocationDouglas County, Nevada
Latitude, Longitude38.9415, -119.8382
Next Westbound Station Friday’s Station
Next Eastbound StationGenoa Station

References

Friday’s Station – Pony Express

Posted on by

Friday’s Station is Union Army Military Post and Pony Express Station located near Lake Tahoe, in Douglas County, Nevada. The two story building is originally built as an inn and pony express station in 1860. The station is designated as a home station, where extra horses, firearms, men and provision are kept.

Friday's Station was a Pony Express station at Lake Tahoe - (Nevada Historical Society
Friday’s Station was a Pony Express station at Lake Tahoe – (Nevada Historical Society

Originally, the buildings are intended for the Union Army in the District of California. The location is chosen for the pony express due to its proximety to Lake Tahoe and the state line. Becuase of its location, the station is refered to as the “Lakeside Station” by some. In April, 1860, Robert (Pony Bob) Haslam made the first ride and shipment of mail from Sacramento at Friday’s Station and made his first run to Buckland’s Station, a distance of seventy five miles to the east.

Friday's Station with five freight teams and a prairie schooner arriving.
Friday’s Station with five freight teams and a prairie schooner arriving.

After the pony express failed, the property operated as a resort known as the “Buttermilk Bonanza Ranch.” Today, the original buildings still state and recognized as California Historical Landmark #728 and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Location Map

Location Summary

NameFriday’s Station
LocationDouglas County, Nevada
Other NamesLakeside Station
Park Cattle Company Residence
Buttermilk Bonanza Ranch
Latitude, Longitude38.9639,  -119.9347
Elevation6,324 feet
California Historical Landmark728
National Register of Historic Places86003259
NPS Station Number166
Next Westbound Station
Next Eastbound StationVan Sickle’s Station

References

George Benjamin Wittick – Photographer

Posted on by

George Benjamin Wittick was born in Pennsylvania and later moved to Illinois, and then out west in 1878 to pursue frontier photography. He served in the Civil War for the union using the name “Benjamin Wallace” in Company A of the 1st Minnesota Volunteer Cavalry and Company D of the 2nd Minnesota Volunteer Cavalry, from 1862 to 1865. He first worked for the Atlantic and Pacific Railroads before establishing his first photography studio in Gallup, New Mexico.

George Benjamin Wittick
George Benjamin Wittick

During his career, he photographed many subjects to include the railroad; southwestern landscapes such as Canyon de Chelly, the Navajo Reservation, and Pueblo scenes; and the Native peoples mostly the Apache, Navajo, Hopi, and Zuni. Wittik was the first person to photograph the Hopi Snake Dance. An elder warned him at the time that he would die from a snake bite for witnessing the ceremony and not being an initiated member.

His photographs from this event brought the Hopi religious ritual great attention. 

George Benjamin Wittick - Self Portrait
George Benjamin Wittick – Self Portrait

He carried with him a collection of props for his photographs to include rifles, pistols, blankets, pottery, and more. Most of his photographs were taken outside using the natural sunlight against backdrops.

Geronimo (Goyathlay, 1820–1909), a Chiricahua Apache; full-length, kneeling with rifle, 1887 - Photograph George Benjamin Wittick
Geronimo (Goyathlay, 1820–1909), a Chiricahua Apache; full-length, kneeling with rifle, 1887 – Photograph George Benjamin Wittick

Billy The Kid

Easily, Wittick’s most famous photograph is of Henry McCarty, AKA Billy the Kidd, in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. The image is the only known image of the outlaw to be identified by those who knew him. The image It shows the outlaw dressed in a rumpled hat and ragged clothes, which include a bulky sweater. He’s is holding a Winchester carbine on his right side and a Colt revolver holstered on his left side. Two of these tintypes were produced. One is given to Paulita Maxwell, the kids girlfriend, and the other to friend Dan Dedrick. The last time this original is auctioned, it sold to William Koch for 2.3 million dollars.

Henry McCarty - AKA Billy the Kid - Fort Sumner, New Mexico, 1879 - 80 Tintype by George Benjamin Wittick
Henry McCarty – AKA Billy the Kid – Fort Sumner, New Mexico, 1879 – 80 Tintype by George Benjamin Wittick

It was taken by a traveling photographer who came through Fort Sumner [New Mexico] in 1880. Billy posed for it standing in the street near old Beaver Smith’s saloon. I never liked the picture. I don’t think it does Billy justice. It makes him look rough and uncouth. The expression of his face was really boyish and very pleasant. He may have worn such clothes as appear in the picture out on the range, but in Fort Sumner he was careful of his personal appearance and dressed neatly and in good taste.

Paulita Maxwell Jaramillo, the Kid’s girlfriend – 1920’s

In 1900, he established his last studio at Fort Wingate. In 1903. he decided to return to visit the Hopi Snake Dance. As a gesture of friendship towards the Hopu, he captured a rattlesnake to bring to as a gift. While handling the snake, he is bitten on the thumb on August 8, 1903 and died three weeks later at Fort Wingate, New Mexico, just as the Hopi elder had predicted many years earlier.

References

Camillus Sydney Fly – Tombstone Photographer

Posted on by

Camillus Sydney Fly was a photographer and eyewitness to one of the most notorious gunfights in western history. Camillus Sidney Fly was born in Andrew County, Mo., in 1849. Later that same year, Boone and Mary Fly crossed the prairie to Napa County, California with their infant son. On September 29th, 1879 he married Mary “Mollie” Goodrich, a photographer in her own right, and just a few months later, arrived in Tombstone Arizona.

C. S. Fly's Photography Gallery, Tombstone, Arizona
C. S. Fly’s Photography Gallery, Tombstone, Arizona
Historical photo of Ike Clanton in 1881 by photographer Camillus S. Fly, Tombstone, Arizona Territory.
Historical photo of Ike Clanton in 1881 by photographer Camillus S. Fly, Tombstone, Arizona Territory.

Fly arrived to Tombstone Arizona in December 1879 and established, Fly’s Photography Gallery, on Fremont Street. Like many new arrivals, his first shelter was a tent, which the couple lived in while the photography studio and 12 room boarding house are built at 312 Fremont Street. Fly did some prospecting in the nearby Dragoon Mountains, but relied on the Gallery and boardinghouse next to it for income.

While in Tombstone, Mollie would take indoor portraits of the townspeople, while Buck’s photographic subjects tended towards outdoor photographs of mills, soldiers, ranchers and scenic panoramas. Regardless of photographer almost at almost all of their photographs were credited to C.S. Fly.

Destiny arrived for the Fly’s about 3:00 pm on October 26th, 1881. A long running feud between the Earp’s and McLaury/Clantons lead to the most iconic gunfight in western history, the gunfight at the O. K. Corral. For students of history, the gunfight actually occurred near the O. K. Corral in a vacant lot next to Fly’s Gallery. Ike Clanton famously hide in Fly’s gallery during the gunfight and Mr. Camillus Sydney Fly disarmed a dying Billy Clanton with a Henry Rifle in the aftermath of the fight.

We four started through Fourth to Fremont Street. When we turned the comer of Fourth and Fremont we could see them standing near or about the vacant space between Fly’s photograph gallery and the next building west. I first saw Frank McLaury, Tom McLaury, Billy Clanton and Sheriff Behan standing there. We went down the left-hand side of Fremont Street.

Statement of Wyatt S. Earp
in the Preliminary  Hearing in the Earp-Holliday Case,
Heard before Judge Wells Spicer – November 16, 1881

Geronimo’s Surrender

Geronimo poses with members of his tribe and General George Crook's staff during peace negotiations on March 27, 1886. - Photograph by C.S. Fly
Geronimo poses with members of his tribe and General George Crook’s staff during peace negotiations on March 27, 1886. – Photograph by C.S. Fly

In March, 1886, General George Cook is notified that the Apache Leader Geronimo agreed to meet. The meeting is arranged at Cañon de los Embudos about eighty six miles from Fort Bowie. Fly learned of this meeting and quickly attached himself to the military column. During the negotiations with Geronimo, C. S. Fly took about fifteen exposures on 8 x 10 inch glass plates. After three days of negotiations, Geronimo agreed to terms of surrender and returned to his camp across the Mexican border.

That night, while in his camp, a U. S. solder who supplied the Apache camp with whiskey, bragged that Geronimo and his followers would be attacked and killed as soon as they crossed the U. S. border. Geronimo and his thirty nine follows left camp that night. The U. S. army pursed Geronimo and his band until September 4, 1886 when, exhausted they surrendered.

Later in life…

In 1887 Fly traveled to Mexico to photograph the aftereffects of an earthquake in Bavispe. The same year, he toured the Arizona Territory to exhibit his photographic works of the area. He and his wife moved to Phoenix in 1893, where they opened another studio. The Flys returned to Tombstone after a year in Phoenix, and in 1895 C.S. Fly was elected to a two-year term as a Cochise County Sheriff.

C. S. Fly's Photography Gallery, Tombstone, Arizona on fire 1912, Photograph by Mary "Mollie" Fly
C. S. Fly’s Photography Gallery, Tombstone, Arizona on fire 1912, Photograph by Mary “Mollie” Fly


When his term as a sheriff expired, Fly retired to his ranch in the Chiricahua Mountains, where he spent his remaining days. He died in Bisbee on October 12, 1901, at the age of 51. His remains were interred at the Tombstone Cemetery.

In 1912, his photography studio burns in Tombstone, Arizona. Ever the professional, Mollie documents the destruction of a warehouse of lost western photographic history, with a dramatic photograph.

References