Tag: Mineral County

Mineral County, Nevada, is a tranquil and sparsely populated region nestled in the western part of the state. Known for its rugged terrain and expansive desert landscapes, Mineral County boasts a rich history tied to mining and frontier settlement. The county seat, Hawthorne, serves as a hub for its small but close-knit community, offering amenities amidst a backdrop of mountain ranges and open plains. Outdoor enthusiasts are drawn to the area for its opportunities for hiking, exploring old mining sites, and enjoying the serene beauty of Walker Lake. The area embodies a blend of natural beauty, historical intrigue, and a peaceful rural lifestyle.

Aurora Nevada – Mineral County Ghost Town

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Aurora, Nevada is a ghost town in Mineral County about twenty eight miles southwest of Hawthorne, near the California border. Aurora is often mentioned as a footnote to larger better preserved town on Bodie, CA located just a few miles away.  Like most unprotected ghost towns today the town site is a just a remnant of its past, having lost much through heavy damage from vandals over the years.

The road leading into Aurora was once a 4×4 road and difficult to make it back into Aurora. Often the winter snows and spring rains rutted out the road leading to the town.

Aurora, CA photograph from the 1930's
Aurora, CA photograph from the 1930’s

Aurora was founded in 1860 by J.M Corey, James N Braley, and E.R Hicks while prospecting south west towards Mono Lake.  The “Eureka” moment came when gold and silver quartz was found while searching for water and game. Soon the word was out, and a migration of miners came up from Monoville and several other California towns.  Like many boom towns, Auroras population reach about 1,400 by 1861 and just one year later was almost 6,000.  Aurora boaster an 8 position stamp mill and the ore was hauled from the town via Wells, Fargo and Company. The town was constructed mainly from brick, as wood is a scare and finite resource in the area.

Aurora, Nevada as it existed in the 1800s
Aurora, Nevada as it existed in the 1800s

The Esmeralda Star was the town paper when the town reach is maximum population of 10,000. Life is town was rough and conditions were very harsh.   The territories of both California and Nevada tried to lay claim to the newly prized Aurora and in the spring of 1861, Mono County was founded by California, which fixed the seat of the county in the little town of Aurora.  Not to be outdown, in November of 1861, Nevada setup the head quarters of Esmeralda County in Aurora.  This dual county seat arrangement lasted for two years during which time both California and Nevada maintained two different county and exercised jurisdiction concurrently.

Aurora after 1910, when the town was first connected to electrical power.
Aurora after 1910, when the town was first connected to electrical power.

To settle the issue, Nevada and California jointly commissioned a survey to finally settle the issue and established the location of the border.  During the elections held in September 1863 Aurora had the distinction of voting in two elections.  The Mono County voting was held in the police station and voters could walk over to Armory Hall to vote in the Esmeralda county elections for Nevada.  Three weeks after the election, the survey results came in and Aurora was officially 4 miles inside the state of Nevada.  The Mono County Officials loaded up their records and assets into Wagons and moved the seat to Bodie, CA some 10 miles to the south west.

Samuel Langhorne Clemens September 1-2, 1867, Pera, Constantinople
Samuel Langhorne Clemens September 1-2, 1867, Pera, Constantinople

1862 found a young Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) in town for several months looking the make his fortune.  During his stay he worked as a laborer in the stamp mill for $10 a week including board.  The young Mr. Clemens quickly gave up mining and sent several lively sketches to the Territorial Enterprise located in Virginia City.  Several weeks later Samual Clemens was hired by the Enterprise where he adopted his pen name, and Mark Twain was born.

Today there is not much standing at Aurora
Today there is not much standing at Aurora

In 1863 Aurora is pictured as a cluster of huts made of stone, sheltered by canvas or tin roofs, with streets of wooden buildings , and many substantial brick structures near the center of town, and uncountable tents and dugouts in the surrounding hils. About 5,000 persons lived in these makeshift shelters and in the 700 houses, and enjoyed the services provided by the hotels , churches, 20 stores, 22 saloons and 16 quartz mills .

National Register of Historic Places Inventory – Nomination Form – July 30, 1974

As with many gold towns, Aurora life was bright and short. Shallow mines could not support the town of 22 saloons and 20 stores and mismanagement and poor investments doomed the small town.  There was virtually no family life in the town. Prostitutes made up over 50% of the female population and by 1870 the gold and silver was gone, and the town soon faltered officially closing the post office in 1897.

A resurgence of Aurora started in 1906 when mining resumed in the area.  A post office was again opened to serve several hundred people, and a weekly called the Aurora Borealis was the paper of record.  During the revitalization of Aurora, the Aurora Consolidated Mining Co. claimed 1.8 million dollars in gold during World War I.  However, in 1919 the post office closed again and the town faded into history.  After World War II much of the brick town was demolished to satisfy the demand for the used brick market in 1946.

Remains of Aurora bricks found deep in the undergrowth.
Remains of Aurora bricks found deep in the undergrowth.

The site of Aurora is all but gone and consisting of little more than a cross roads, a cemetery and a few foundations.

Aurora Town Summary

NameAurora
LocationMineral County, Nevada
Latitude, Longitude38.2871421, -118.9006963
GNIS858760
Elevation7400 feet
Post Office – 1919
NewpapersEsmeralda Star May 17, July 5, Sept 20, 1862; Nov 18, Dec 30, 1863
Aurora Daily Times Nov 27, 28, 30, Dec 1, 9, 11, 12, 1863; July 11, Oct 7, 1864
Esmeralda Daily Union Mar 23, 1864 – Mar 15, 1865; Nov 27, 1867 – Oct 3, 1868
Esmeralda Herald Oct 20, 1877 – July 29, 1882; Aug 18, 1883 – Apr 19, 1884
Aurora Borealis Dec 3, 1905

Aurora Trail Map

Aurora Personalities

Samuel Langhorne Clemens September 1-2, 1867, Pera, Constantinople

Samuel Langhorne Clemens – “Mark Twain”

Before he wrote American classic novels as Mark Twain, Samuel Langhorne Clemens was a miner and newpaper reporter in Mineral County, Nevada. Prior to picking…

Further Reading

Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960: Mining Camp, Frontier City, Ghost Town

This expanded Second Edition of Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960 chronicles the history of one of Nevada’s earliest and most important mining boomtowns. It is a reference-oriented…
Nevada Ghost Towns and Mining Camps - By Stanley W. Paher

Nevada Ghost Towns and Mining Camps

Nevada Ghost Towns and Mining Camps - By Stanley W. Paher Nevada Ghost Towns and Mining Camps is a wonderful book written by Stanley W.…

Resources

Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960: Mining Camp, Frontier City, Ghost Town

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Aurora Nevada Mining Camp

This expanded Second Edition of Aurora, Nevada 1860-1960 chronicles the history of one of Nevada’s earliest and most important mining boomtowns. It is a reference-oriented book, which includes hundreds of edited and annotated newspaper clippings and other firsthand accounts about Aurora’s buildings, businesses, major mines, social life, Paiute citizens, ghost town days, and final destruction over the entire length of its century-long history. This new edition has 98 additional pages with a new section on violence at Aurora during 1863 and 1864, more information about the Daly gang, complete directories for the boom years 1864, 1880, and 1915, and an annotated list of residents from 1861-1864 and 1880. The book now includes 14 maps and over 200 photographs.

Author’s Note

A “Second Edition” (ISBN 978-1979848862) and newer hardcover “Second Color Edition” (ISBN 979-8507081967) of this book are now available on Amazon., Despite a century of history, and the valiant efforts of all those who believed the town would last forever, Aurora, Nevada, is now and forevermore a “Colossal Wreck” slowly returning to its beginnings-a sagebrush and pinyon pine covered valley home to jackrabbits and a few ghosts from the past. While Aurora is gone, its historical record remains, thus providing us the opportunity to reconstruct the town and its society if only in our imagination. Most historical accounts about Aurora have focused on the town during its early 1860s mining boom. However, Aurora’s rich and colorful history deserves a closer look. This new reference-oriented publication includes hundreds of edited and annotated newspaper clippings and other firsthand accounts about Aurora’s buildings, businesses, major mines, social life, Paiute citizens, ghost town days, and final destruction over the entire length of its century-long history. It also includes directories for the boom years 1864, 1880, and 1915, as well as 6 maps and over 150 photographs, many of which are “then and now” comparisons of the same view., Author’s Note: This book is the original edition but there is also a new revised and expanded “Second Edition” (search ISBN 978-1979848862) of this book now available on Amazon for the same price on a different Amazon page. The Second Edition has 98 additional pages that include 50 new photographs, 6 more maps, an expanded 1864 directory, and a new list of Aurora residents from 1861-1864.

Book Summary

TitleAurora, Nevada 1860-1960: Mining Camp, Frontier City, Ghost Town (Second Edition)
Author Clifford Alpheus Shaw
PublisherCreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform 
Edition2nd Edition
Pages488 Pages

Samuel Langhorne Clemens – “Mark Twain”

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Before he wrote American classic novels as Mark Twain, Samuel Langhorne Clemens was a miner and newpaper reporter in Mineral County, Nevada. Prior to picking up his pen, Clemens moved from his birthplace in Hannibal, Missouri and found himself in the silver state. After his time in Nevada, he left to become the most loved American author, Mark Twain.

Samuel Langhorne Clemens September 1-2, 1867, Pera, Constantinople
Samuel Langhorne Clemens September 1-2, 1867, Pera, Constantinople

It is a well known fact that Samuel Clemmons first work was as a river boat pilot on the Mississippi river. This occupation was lost to him with the start of the Civil War. In 1861, Samuel followed his brother Orion to Nevada when his brother is appointed as Secretary of the Nevada Territory. Not long after his arrival in Carson City, Clemens is “Smitten with the silver feaver.” He and his brother started purchasing shares of mining operations in the Esmeralda Mining District. The principal town in this district was Aurora.

Filled with optimism, Samuel moved to Aurora in 1862. Upon his arrival he setup a camp and began working some of the claims he and his brother purchased. Despite his optimism, his work as a miner and investor did not produce and Clemens lives off an stipend set to him by his brother to cover the $10 per week living expenses. This failure was all too common among the hopeful people who travelled west.

Higbie and I were living in a cotton-domestic lean-to at the base of a mountain [Lover’s Leap]. It was very cramped quarters, with barely room for us and the stove – wretched quarters, indeed, for every now and then, between eight in the morning and eight in the evening, the thermometer would make an excursion of fifty degrees. We had a silver-mining claim under the edge of a hill [Last Change Hill] half a mile away in partnership with Bob Howland and Horatio Phillips, and we used to go there every morning, carrying with us our luncheon, and remain all day picking and blasting in a our shaft, hoping, despairing, hoping again, and gradually but surely running out of funds

Mark Twain, Roughing It

A picture postcard showing the exterior of Mark Twain's cabin in the mining town of Aurora, Nevada. The cabin and ground are covered with snow. - University of Nevada, Las Vegas University Libraries
A picture postcard showing the exterior of Mark Twain’s cabin in the mining town of Aurora, Nevada. The cabin and ground are covered with snow. – University of Nevada, Las Vegas University Libraries

Ironically, his failure in mining started his career which produced some of the most important books in American history. While in Aurora, he started sending stories about a miner’s life to the Virginia City newspaper, the Territorial Enterprise, using the penname “Josh”. These stories opened a door to greatness, and he was appointed to a job as a local reporter by Joseph Goodman.

After leaving Aurora for Virginia City, Clemens starts down his road to success and becomes a popular newspaper reported. He submits his humorous and satirical stories using the name Mark Twain. Five years later, the man from Missouri wrote the story, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calavarous County” and Mark Twain became the American Story Teller.

I learned then, once and for all, that gold in its native state is but dull, the ornamental stuff, and that only low-born metals excited the admiration of the ignorant with an ostentatious glitter. However, like the rest of the world, I still go on underrating men of gold and glorifying men of mica. Commonplace human nature cannot rise above that.

Mark Twain, Roughing It

Nevada State Historic Marker #28

100 years ago, in 1864, Samuel Clemens left the territorial enterprise, moving on to California and worldwide fame.  He was a reporter here in 1863 when he first used the name, Mark Twain.  He later described his colorful adventures in Nevada in “Roughing It.”

NEVADA CENTENNIAL MARKER NO. 28

PLACED BY

JAMES LENHOFF, 1960

EDITOR AND PUBLISHER

TERRITORIAL ENTERPRISE

Hevada State Historic Marker Summary

Nevada State Historic Marker28
NameMark Twain
LocationVirginia City, Storey County, Nevada
Latitude, Longititude39.3102, -119.6497

References

Francis Marion Smith – “Borax Smith”

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Francis Marion "Borax" Smith
Francis Marion “Borax” Smith

Francis Marion Smith, also known as “Borax” Smith was a miner and business man who made a fortune in the hostile deserts of Nevada and California. He was born in Richmond, Wisconsin in 1846. He went to the public schools and graduated from Milton College. He left Wisconsin seeking his fortune in the American West. and set off for Nevada.

In 1872, while working as a woodcutter, he discovered a rich supply of ulexite at Teel’s Marsh, near the future townsite of Marietta, Nevada. Seeing his opportunity, Smith staked a claim started a company with his brother Julius Smith. The brothers established a borax works at the edge of the marsh to concentrate the borax crystals and separate them from dirt and other impurities.

In 1877, Scientific American reported that the Smith Brothers shipped their product in a 30-ton load using two large wagons with a third wagon for food and water drawn by a 24-mule team for 160 miles (260 km) across the Great Basin Desert from Marietta to the nearest Central Pacific Railroad siding in Wadsworth, Nevada.

Building upon his success, Smith grew his operations and purchased claims at Fish Lake and Columbus March. He bought his brothers shares in the venture in 1884. As he closed down his operations in Teel’s Marsh, Smith purchased the Harmony Borax works from William Tell Coleman who was financially over extended.

Smith then consolidated all of his mining operations with his own holdings to form the Pacific Coast Borax Company in 1890. The Pacific Coast Borax Company then established and promoted the 20-Mule-Team Borax brand and trademark.

In his later years, Francis Marion “Borax” Smith expanded his interest in railroads and charitable work in his hometown of Oakland, California.

References

Christian Brevoort Zabriskie

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Christian Brevoort Zabriskie was a vice president and general manager Pacific Coast Borax Company located in Death Valley National Park. Zabriske served teh Pacific Coast Borax Company for some thirty six years, and due to this activity is honored by the naming an Zabriske Point.

Christian Brevoort Zabriskie
Christian Brevoort Zabriskie

Christian Brevoort Zabriskie (1864–1936) was born at Fort Bridger in the Wyoming Territory. After schooling, he worked for the Virginia & Truckee Railroad located in Carson City, Nevada. For a time, he relocated to Candelaria, Nevada at work for the Esmeralda County Bank. He briefly venture into the mortuary business with a partnership formed with a local cabinet maker. His lack of knowledge in the art of embalming was not considered a liability as burial speed was a huge priority.

In 1885, at the age of twenty one, Zabriske was hired by Francis Marion “Borax” Smith to supervise the Chinese laborer’s. These men worked for the Pacific Coast Borax Company is the Columbus Marsh located near Candelaria. During his thirty six year tenure with the Pacific Coast Borax Company, the company closed up Candelaria operations and relocated to Death Valley to increase production. The company also expanded into the Calico Mountains and Trona, California

Zabriskie Point named for Christian Brevoort Zabriskie - Photo by James L Rathbun
Zabriskie Point named for Christian Brevoort Zabriskie – Photo by James L Rathbun

Zabriske retired from the Pacific Coast Borax Company in 1933 as Vice President and General Manager. All of his work in Death Valley took place before the area was designated National Monument. He passed away just three years later, on February 8thm 1936 at the age of 71. He is buried in Carson City, Nevada.

Zabriske Point is named to honor the man for his many years of service to the Pacific Coast Borax Company.

References