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Great Basin College (GBC) does not discriminate on the basis of race, religion, color, age, sex, sexual orientation, military status, disability, national origin, gender identity or expression, or genetic information. For inquiries, 775.738.8493.
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Lois
Whitney
Great
Basin
Indian
Archive
GBIA
026
Oral
History
Interview
by
Lois
Whitney
May
2011
Elko,
NV
Great
Basin
College
•
Great
Basin
Indian
Archives
1500
College
Parkway
Elko,
Nevada
89801
hDp://www.gbcnv.edu/gbia/
775.738.8493
Produced
in
partnership
with
Barrick
Gold
of
North
America
�GBIA 026
Interviewee: Lois Whitney
Interviewer: Norm Cavanaugh
Date: May, 2011
W:
Okay. My name is Lois Whitney. I was born and raised right here in Elko, as were my
children, my mother—who was born up on the hill, next to the smoke shop. So we have
strong ties to Elko. But, my dad is from Owyhee. His name was Dale Dick. And there’s a
large family of Dicks in Owyhee. We’re related to many people, including the
Whiterocks. And the family is big. But anyway, on my grandfather’s side—he’s from
Austin, the Austin area, and he’s a tekkotekka [1:31], and we’re also, I’m part of the
Tosawihi, too, because of my dad, moving from the Paradise Valley, Owyhee, the
Golconda, that area there, as they were pushed into Owyhee. So… And then, I’m also
indirectly related to the Marshs, and the Caskeys. My grandmother is a Caskey. Or, she
was a Marsh, actually, Ollie Marsh. So, I come from a big, big family. And I’m just
really glad today to hear each and every one of you tell a little bit about yourself, which is
a lot. We don’t do that anymore. And as a way of introduction, if you came into a room
where there were other Shoshone people, generally you would have to say, “I am So-andSo, this is my grandfather, this is my grandmother,” and you give them this long list of—
and then they finally say, “Oh, I guess we can sit down and listen to this person talk.”
Otherwise, if they can’t validate who you are, they look at you with a little suspicion.
And anyway… I am doing a small presentation, and I am picking up for Katherine
Blossom. I am not a prayer person, or a healing person, but I do know some about the
medicines that we do have. And so—and I know that that’s what Katherine does. She
does prayers. But that’s not to say that prayer wasn’t always something that was a part of
our lives, because every morning, my grandmother, Judy Jackson—[Judy] Johnson
Jackson, who was from the Beowawe area—she would not be carrying one of these
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bottles, but she would have a cup of water. Water was very critical to our way of life as
Native people. And I wish more and more people would recognize the importance of
water. And I’m just going to go off and tell you a little bit about water. Grandfather said a
long time ago, one day we’re going to be paying for our water. And that’s before he
understood about airplanes, and cars that ran by themselves, or windows that went up and
down by themselves, and everything else that’s going around. But he also said that one
day, our water would be on fire. We would not be able to see it. We would not be able to
taste it. But our water would be on fire. And I believe what he was talking about was the
nuclear fallout that we’re getting really close to being subjected to, especially after what
has happened in Japan. So value your water. My presentation today is to talk a little about
the physical, the emotional, and the spiritual healing of our Native people. Water was
critical for that. If a child fell, or if somebody fell, and they were knocked out or
whatever, feeling bad, water was used to bless them. It was taken and their, the area
where they fell was usually, water would be sprinkled on them, or their head. Water was
sprinkled on them, and prayers were made, and prayers always went up in that direction.
But yeah—and for little children, they always says, [Shoshone at 4:55] “Ma
mappuisinneh.” [“Bless him/her.”] And that means if a child fell, and wasn’t coherent,
then they would put the water on the child and bless the child until the child was feeling
good again. So water is very important to your physical, your emotional, and your
spiritual health. Don’t forget that. So we have to take care of water. Okay. I’m going to
start at the physical part. We did water. Sagebrush. Sagebrush was taken internally by our
people almost daily. Maybe two or three times a day. It was either chewed on—if you
had a cold or were coughing, you would take a leaf and chew on the leaf—or it was
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boiled into a type of a tea, and many of our people would drink this tea throughout the
day. Maybe at morning and in the evening. And those people, according to some medical
information we’ve gotten, have verified that, apparently the properties in the sagebrush
have helped them in their cleansing and their healing, and it was very useful to them. If
you got a bee bite, what’d you do? Go take the sagebrush and rub it on the area that you
were bitten. That helped soothe. So we had all of our medicine at hand, we didn’t have to
go out looking. And sagebrush—I consider sagebrush in this area to be our rainforest.
And they cut my rainforest down pretty quick. So I might throw a little bit of activism
here, but that’s kind of how I feel. So the sagebrush was used to—was ingested, and it
was also used in part of the offering that they made when they made the little bit of
tobacco. And they drank it, they chewed on it. The other item we have here is what we
call totsa. The totsa grows usually in areas where it’s higher, rocky—kind of hard to get
to. And it grows like a big tube, tubular. It can probably can get as—I’ve seen it get that
big. [Indicates roughly six inches or more.] And it looks like, probably, a great big
sugarbeet. But it grows into the ground. It’s related a little bit to the parsley family,
because it grows tall. It’ll grow tall, and then the tops have like a little poofy spiral type
of flower. It’s not really a flower, but when it’s dry, and usually you can smell the totsa
when you’re out in the mountains, you know you’re nearby. But you really have to dig
for the totsa. The totsa is in—per our family, and I see Norman has done the same
thing—the totsa is cut in circles, very much like Norm has done here. And then it’s
strung, he strung it through wire to hang it up to dry. It also is good for colds. You can
smoke this, you can drink it, you can chew on it. You can put it on the stove—for those
of us who have wood stoves, or even if you’re out, you’ve got a campfire going. I
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wouldn’t put it on your gas burner, but I would put it in a pan maybe on your gas burner.
But this has the properties of healing for our colds, allergies probably. A lot of our people
have allergies nowadays. And I know Leah, my sister, drinks totsa almost daily because
she has tons of allergies; she’s always got a cough, something going on with her. But the
totsa is then shaved, and I see Norm has done that right here. This is your totsa, and he’s
shaved it to where it’s really fine. And this is really nice. This is really nice. And that can
be rolled along with other—tobaccos, or whatever else you might have—and it can be
smoked. And when we smoke, it’s not the same as when a person—I mean, I’m not a
smoker, but I will smoke for my own cleansing. Giving up a prayer, and the smoke
carrying my prayer up into the sky, up to where it needs to go. That’s generally what our
people do. Most native people are smoking, too, for that physical, for that emotional, for
that spiritual release and healing. If I go too fast, stop me. Headaches. I’m a willowweaver, and these are willows. These are natural, the willows from this area. These are
native. We have a lot of invasive species right now, so they, you can’t use as much of the
invasive species as we can of our traditional willow, because of the bitter taste, and it
leaves a funny film in your mouth. But we split the willows with our teeth, and with our
fingers. And this has the properties of getting rid of headaches. And as a matter of fact,
that’s what aspirin is made of, is the willow. So this is natural. Let’s see here… And then
we have over here—you said you thought this was antapittseh kwana. Actually,
papohovi. It’s this one here. That one there? This is antapittseh kwana—oh! Am I not
supposed to move around too much? Well, this is—maybe I’ll get Norm to help me. Then
I won’t run around so much. This is antapittseh kwana. This antapittseh kwana came
from the Owyhee area just above the rodeo grounds, up on—there’s couple, oh—you
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know where they have, the water comes naturally, this kind of marshy place there?
Virginia Jones’ dad did that for me. And then, it also grows in Lee, Nevada. Usually, it’s
ready by June, I believe. And it’s a plant that grows about that high, and it’s pretty
delicate, because apparently, whoever collected this just rolled it into a little braid here,
and that’s what it’ll look like. But the leaves, the property of the antapittseh kwana is
great for taking out infection. If you have a sore, infection, and it needs to be cleaned out,
you take that antapittseh kwana, and it’s put between cloth—it’s wet—you make a
compress out of it, and it has to be wet, and you put that on top of the infection, and it
helps draw out the infection. And it has this sweet smell. Too bad we didn’t get any seeds
with it, because I would have tried to plant it to see if I can get some growing. But most
of our plants, they’re used to a certain area. They don’t just grow everywhere. It’s just
like the different zones of the growing season. You can’t plant something delicate in the
real cold area. I mean, these, they all have their own properties, the way they survive, and
many of our plants were very delicate. I am certain that there—and so have our people
felt—that there was more of the plants here at one time. And that disappeared when we
had that rush of people coming through the Humboldt River and exhausting all of the
plants that were in that area. So there were very few plants that survived. These are just
some of the plants that we have now that we’re still able to collect. And so, we didn’t
have the doctors that we’re used to. But we did have doctors. We had prayers, people that
did prayers, and we had people that did hands-on healing. There are very few that are left
now. I think the last doctor that I was fortunate to get prayed for and doctored was when
Alec Cleveland—he was from Owyhee—when he did the doctoring for me when I lost
my two girls. And that was quite an experience. It’s just too bad we don’t have that kind
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of strong people anymore that are taken care of from the time they’re real small to the
time they’re starting to practice. And I don’t recall him ever using anything more than
just water and prayer, when I was doctored. But it was an incredible experience for us—
for me at that time, because I was at that point where the outside world looked really
attractive to me, all that glitter and glamour of the new society, the things that were
happening, you know. So I was already married, and had children probably in the
[19]50s—no, it was in [19]68, was when Alec Cleveland doctored me. And I still, it was
an incredible experience. You have to be—for somebody that had to learn the doctoring
from the time he was real small to the time he became an adult, that was his life. And it
was a very humble life. So, not very many people will brag about being a doctor. As a
matter of fact, these people never say anything. They are always just sought out because
it is known by the communities that these people with special gifts are the ones that you
go to when you need the special healing, the hands-on. Or even the physical. And also,
these doctors—which I’ve come to realize, too—spoke a language that was different
from our language. Because they always had a helper that they spoke to, and then the
helper was the one that interpreted to the patient what they were supposed to do, to go
about this healing process. So it was an incredible experience. I’m hoping that at some
point, we’ll get some young people who have that gift, and those people will be nurtured
and brought forth so that they can share what they do know. Okay. They ingested—and
this, too. This is called papohovi. Most often, this grows in the area where there’s water.
It’s a sweeter type of a sage—it’s a sage. And it can be boiled into a tea. It can be used as
a compress as well, as can the sage. That can be used as a compress. Let’s see. Now,
we’ve been—oh, and now we’ve come to this. You’ve seen this plant a lot. And this red,
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and when it’s ripe it’s just real, just real deep red, almost this color right now. I had to
collect this, because I didn’t have any. But right now, it’s growing, because the leaves are
starting to, they’re just starting to come up. They’re starting to, they’ll grow probably
about three, four feet high, and they’ll be in tight clusters. Now, if I’m not mistaken, this
is for diarrhea, and also for—it’s boiled to help combat diarrhea, and there’s the other,
and I can’t think of the other condition that the person had to boil to drink this. But if I
think of it, I’ll try to come back to it. Okay. Now, we’ve talked about all the ones that can
be ingested—the totsa, the sagebrush—oh. Oh! Yes. And then, we have this root, which
is—I’m not really certain the name of this root, but what you do is when you have a cold,
you’re not feeling good, you just chew on it. And it’s like just keeping a toothpick in your
mouth, you just suck on the item, and… Now, I believe this came from Pyramid Lake,
this came from some of my husband’s family from the Pyramid Lake area, and I wasn’t
quite sure what he called this plant.
C:
Bear root. They call it bear root.
W:
Bear root. Okay, this is what they chewed on. So. And I’m not sure that I’ve ever seen the
bear root in this area that I could pick it. It has to be probably in the California area,
Pyramid Lake, Alturas and that area there. And I’m only speaking of plants that are from
this area here. And most of these can be, you can pick this up here. Also, to be ingested.
This white rock is called pisappin. Pisappin is used by scraping it into water. And it can
be drank. It goes along with prayers. Pisappin is used for, also going into—when you’re
going to be doctored, it’s basically ground up, either to use as a powder, or with a little
bit of water. And it’s the face, or the areas of the body are marked. This is called
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pisappin1. Also, I was surprised that I found the pisappin in—these were given to me by
Robert Burton from the Battle Mountain area. And when I scraped it, it was, the rock
seemed a little bit pink. But most often, it’s white. It’s like a chalk—it looks like a chalk.
But, my understanding, it’s good for stomach ailments as well. And again, for drinking it.
Usually when you’re going into a sweat, sometimes when you’re doing a ceremony. Even
a gathering of people. It’s mixed with the water that you’re going to drink, and everybody
drinks it. Everybody drinks part of this water, and that’s part of the healing. If I’m going
too fast, slow me down. Okay? Now… Those are the medicines that can be used for the
physical. Now, for the emotional, would be—again, the sagebrush, for prayers. The
sagebrush here, you see I picked it up from the root. For those people that do prayers,
that’s how you collect this sagebrush, for praying with, and to use in some of the
ceremonies. And also, then, we use—the cedar is very, very important, too, in the
spiritual and the emotional. It’s, again, mixed with other tobaccos or similar native plants
that can be smoked, put on the hot rock, or the fire. Mixed smoke. And usually, the cedar,
the sage, the rabbitbrush, they’re all used to ward off bad energy. And generally, when
our people talk about the emotional, that’s that bad energy. The spiritual, they’re having
trouble with the spirit side of them. They would bless themself with the smoke from the
cedar. This is rabbitbrush. This is also for the emotional and the spiritual. In our family, if
a child had, or family member was being bothered by bad spirits, or just felt really bad—
nightmares, whatever—towards the evening, just before the sun goes down, this bunch of
rabbitbrush would be lit until it creates like a smoke. And the person that was going to be
blessed would be placed in the immediate area of a room where they’re going to be
1
Actually
aippin;
LW
corrects
herself
further
on
(see
p.
17,
or
42:50
in
the
audio).
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sleeping, and they were covered with a cloth of some sort, just to keep the burning
embers from getting on them. But this was burnt, and then they were blessed. Prayers
were given, said, throughout their whole body. And I remember Grandma doing this.
Grandma just prayed, she was not a healer. But this is the things you did for your
immediate family, when there were no doctors around. So, this is the emotional and the
spiritual use of this rabbitbrush. And also, when the rabbitbrush’s flower turns bright
yellow, that’s when it’s time to go pick your pinenuts. That’s when you knew that
pinenuts were ready. I brought with me, as well, for the—this should have been the
physical part. And this is also spiritual. This is the wild rose bush, native to our area.
Some of the prayer people, as part of the—they each have their own use of particular
items. So not one [skip in audio at 24:03] always use the same one, they had their own
choices. But I understand that this here, the wild rose bush, was boiled, and it was given
to the person that was having problems, the ailing party. And usually, at least our custom
in our family, is that when we have a family member that is deceased, this rose bush was
put into the coffin, or the burial garment, or whatever they were wearing, so as to protect
the family so that the one that was deceased would not come back and bother the family.
That was what was used for the wild rose bush. But I think that the wild rose bush flower
is much more fragrant than what they have in the market today, because I make potpourri
out of the little pink flower that I gather. And I mix the potpourri with the cedar, with the
sage, with the grandfather sage, with the sagebrush, and with some of the willow. Now,
that takes care of the physical and the emotional. And now we’re going to come back
over here to the spiritual. Again, water was very critical to the spiritual. Always cleansing
yourself, blessing yourself. I understand—this here is actually the shavings, it’s the inner
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membrane that I’ve scraped away from the willow. I take the bark off first, and then
between the bark and the actual rod itself is a membrane, and that’s what this is, where
I’ve scraped it. And I’ve kept this because there is a gentleman that uses this for his
sweats. He smokes this with his mixture. So, and I didn’t know of that. And I’m not
sure—I think the man was from the Pyramid Lake area. Also, the sweetgrass. You can
pass it around. I think a lot of you have smelled the sweetgrass. You can take some of
this, here, too. Smell that, and… Sweetgrass is burned for the emotional and the spiritual,
again with prayers. It also helps when you’re having a bad time in warding off that bad
energy, to smoke your house. I say “smoke your house,” other people say “smudge.” But
that’s what it’s used for. And then, this here is grandfather sage, or white sage. This does
come from California, from the California area. Bishop, Lone Pine area. And it’s a
bundle, and it burns really well, and it smells so nice. It’s all different. And again, that’s
for part of the prayers. And then, I just have a mixture of tobacco, and this is papohovi. I
haven’t put any of the willow on it. Or the totsa, that could use a bunch of totsa with it,
too. Does anybody have any questions? Because this is just a little bit of what we have. I
wanted to talk a little bit about, not only do we use the white rock, but there’s also a red
rock, and that’s called aippin2, and it’s for women that wear rouge, it sort of has that
property. It’s powdery, and it’s really red. But that was also to ward off bad energy. If
you were going into a gathering of people that you weren’t familiar with, the individual
would put the red on the forehead, behind the head, wherever they felt that if anybody
struck them with bad energy, that it would protect them. And it was a powder, too, very
2
Actually pisappin; LW corrects herself further on (see p. 17, or 42:50 in the audio).
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much like this. Let me just kind of pass this around, so you can see what this is here.
Does anybody have any questions?
U1:
Well, I do, I guess. So, all of these are native to Nevada, pretty much?
W:
All of them are native to Nevada, yes.
U1:
Would there have been any other things used that might have been traded, or prized,
or…?
W:
Well, I think probably, if anything would have been traded, it might have been this root
here. Also, the stick with the grandfather white sage. I had some camas seeds, too, that I
intended to plant; this gentleman said that his last name was Camas, but camas was
eaten, the camas bulb was eaten in the Idaho area. And that was part of trading. Our
people used to make jerky out of deer meat, and also antelope. And I’ve seen that, we
don’t go on antelope drives anymore, so antelope has not been used as much in our area.
But from the Fort Washakie area, they traded some antelope jerky with us. And it was
really quite good.
U1:
[__inaudible at 29:43__].
W:
Yeah. It’s really quite good. Yes. Well, actually, when you’re going to smudge a room,
you’ve got to open all your windows, and all your doors. Because the smudging is to get
rid of that negative energy that—so, what you would do is, either you would burn that
smudge stick there, or you would make a smudge stick out of your sage. And you would
smoke the whole house, go through the whole house, filling it with smoke. Your fire
alarms will go off, but that’s what needs to happen, because it has to be really thick. And
then, when you open up your windows and stuff, all of that is just blown out. The bad
energy goes out. And some of our people today still have problems with the houses on
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12
the top, because they’ve been visited by—not our people. I think they’ve been visited by,
probably, there were Chinese people that came through and had little encampments in
different parts of this area here, and I believe that the top Colony, from the information
that I’ve gathered, the top Colony has several places where they might have disturbed the
resting place of an oriental person. I know in my daughter’s house, they see this little tiny
man. They see him often. He’s in the house. So, every once in a while, when they start
feeling really bad, or when they’re at a bad point in there lives that that’s when it bothers
them, then they go and have the house smoked and prayed for. And my uncle passed
away in my house. And my house was a new—I consider it a new house, they were built
in the [19]70s. Or, [19]68 and [19]70s. And I’ve never had him bother me, but my
children see him there. And sometimes it’s the little guys that see things, not the older
people. The little ones are more in tune as to what’s going on. And when you see, when
that starts happening, you know, get somebody to come pray for you. And we have
several people in our community do the prayers, do the smudging. I think among those
people are Chet Stevens, Katherine Blossom, Sean Marsh… These are some people that
can help. But generally, your elders know how to smudge, and they can come and take
care of that for you. And I’m real fortunate to know that [audio cuts out at 32:22] Gerry is
a prayer person. And she did a lot of prayers for my mom when my mom was sick, and
we lost mom last year. But she’s always been great about standing up and giving the
prayers for us, and putting us in a good place before we start our meetings. That’s always
really, really important. And think, when your uncle—her husband—was really sick, he
had cancer of the throat, I believe it was her prayers that really helped him. And he’s
giving me a bad time all the time, he gives me a lot of grief! [Laughter] But, does
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anybody have any other questions, or something that, you know, you would like to share
that your family does? Because not everybody does the same thing. There’s a general
thing we do, and then there’s the things that are reserved for families. So, even though we
are all Native American, we’re all as different as we are similar, in the way we believe
and the way we do things, the way we present ourselves, and so forth. And so—and I am
Shoshone, from this area. And my grandparents are Shoshone, from this area. And even
though there’s paperwork that says that my grandfather, the Dicks that came from the
Paradise Valley area, are—the papers say they’re Shoshone, but I believe that they’re
Paiute. So, I’m a mixture, too. And Whitney is a Navajo name. [Laughter] My exhusband was Navajo. Navajo and Paiute. And so, Whitney would not have been a
common name among the Shoshone people. But, and Norm is right, you know; we all
had, many women had Indian names, Native names, and they might’ve been given a
nickname that was built on, or they might’ve been named after a rancher. But these are
basically the same medicines our people would have used then, that I’m hoping our
people will use today. Continue to use it. If you don’t use it, you lose it.
U2:
You lose it, yeah.
W:
You lose it. Because, as, even though we think there’s an abundance of sage, it’s not the
abundance of sage as it used to be. And if you don’t pray for your medicines, your
plants—I don’t think we do a lot of planning, but if anything is going to be passed on, it
should be done in the family, you know, the same way with the language. If you’re going
to speak your language, it should start in the family. And that’s where we keep things
going. Oh! Chokecherry!
C:
Explain how [Shoshone at 35:24].
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W:
Oh, okay. I can do it. This is a chokecherry patty. This is chokecherries that have been
mashed—because they’re, the seeds are not broken—and made into a patty, like a
hamburger patty, and dried for storing for later use. So, if you were going to use it, you
take what you need, you boiled it, and you mixed it with other things. I just like it plain,
just plain chokecherry pudding. And I’m going to be providing chokecherry pudding,
buckberry pudding, and tepakwini [36:05]—pinenut gravy—during the reception on the
11th of July, for visitors. As a matter of fact, we’re going to get a lot of stuff. We’re
getting three elk, seven deer, groundhog from Owyhee, deer from Owyhee, deer from
South Fork, and we’re trying to get more groundhog from the Yomba Tribe. And we
have squirrels running around here, but nobody wants to eat the squirrels in this
neighborhood because we don’t know what they’re eating! [Laughter] But, the
groundhogs, yeah. I was raised on groundhog. And my birthday always fell on Memorial
Day. And that was always a sad time, but I always looked forward to having groundhog
during Memorial Day! [Laughter] And our groundhog, just like the—there was a tribe, a
group of people that came here, the ones that live in yurts. What are they called?
U3:
Mongolians.
W:
Mongolians. They eat groundhog too. And they prepared their groundhog here, we
prepared our groundhog, and we shared.
U3:
Was it similar? Or was it different?
W:
Theirs was different. Our groundhog was, after you’ve gutted the groundhog, you singe
the hair, you’ve pretty much laced up the area that you took the intestines from, laced it
up. And some people might have packed it with some type of an herb or whatever. But
we just laced it up, and burnt the hair off. And then you’re left with this sort of crust,
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nice, thick crust. Black, burnt crust, which is like foil, and then the groundhog is cooked
underground. And it’s cooked until it’s done, and it’s pretty rich. You can’t eat too much.
It—
U3:
It’s kind of a dark, darkish meat, isn’t it?
W:
No, it’s not. Well… Well, it is darker—well, I would say, it is darker than chicken.
U3:
Tastes just like chicken! [Laughter]
W:
It’s different! [Laughter] You’re going to have to try some. It’s a little bit different. It’s
like with anything that you never had before, you have to acquire a taste for it. Just like a
lot of people don’t like pinenut pudding, and all it is is ground-up pinenuts that have been
roasted and charred and dried and ground into a thick paste, just with water. And a lot of
people don’t like that taste, and I just love it! [Laughter] It’s good for you! Very, very
healthy. But you know, you can only eat a little bit. Too much of a good thing is not
good, as we’ve come to find out as a people. And two, because of the food that we had
was sparse, our people were not big. Our people were thin, they were strong, they had
endurance, they could run a long ways, they traveled for long distances, and they ate just
a little bit of whatever they could put in their hand, you know? That’s, and now we’ve
become excessive with everything that’s good, and I think we show it. You know? Okay.
Norman says I can go ahead and touch this. He says this is not eagle, but this is—this is
just a dreamcatcher? The dreamcatcher didn’t come from the Shoshone people, it came
from the—is it from the Sioux tribe, or other tribes? Their thoughts were that if you hung
up this dreamcatcher, that your bad dreams would be caught, and the good dreams would
come through the hole. And there’s usually a hole in the center. But, and then it’s
adorned with the plumes, and the feathers. The feathers are earned. When you earn your
�GBIA
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feather, then you can wear your feather. And that’s talking about an eagle feather. And
it’s very respected. The eagle takes our prayers. It is the mightiest bird. And I wanted to
say, too, about prayers—when the person that’s giving a prayer gives a prayer, it covers
everything. Yourself, your family, all the little children, all the relatives, those that are
getting old, those whose hearts feel heavy, those who feel good, those who are traveling
that they get to their destination in a safe way, but their families are going to be fine, the
four-legged ones, the ones that crawl, the ones that live under the water, that live under
the ground, the ones that walk upon the land, that fly upon the land, the mountains, the
water, the food. That’s what you give thanks to. You name everything, and sometimes
our prayers do go on and on and on. But, that’s the spiritual part. Well, I want to thank
you for letting me do this, and I also would like to invite each and every one of you to the
reunion. Even share. I mean, this is part of the healing, we’re having a difficult time,
many of our people right now. We’re losing a lot of our culture, we’re losing our ties to
our families, when that’s what it used to be about, is that if our family was together, we
were all together. We were happy. But different occupations, experiences, take us
different places. But we never forget who we are. We’re still here, and we’re still using
some of our plants and our animals in a good way. Okay. I think I can. This one was
papohovi. This one is totsa. This one here is tontsiah, which is—tontsiah is like, the
blooming, there’s girls that are named tontsiah. But this is tontsiah. I’m not sure what
they call the rabbitbrush again—
C:
Sippapin.
W:
Sippapin? Okay. And… help me.
U4:
What is that, cedar?
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W:
Cedar.
U4:
I don’t know. In Paiute, we just call it waap.
W:
Waap3? Okay. This sehepin is willow. Pardon?
U4:
Saawaapi? In Paiute, sagebrush. Saawaapi.
W:
Mmhm. And that’s it. I’m not sure what they call this. And this was called pisappin. Or
no, this epi. Epi is the white one, pisappin is the red one. And pah is water. We all know
water. Yeah.
U5:
Real quick question: do you say dotsa with a “d” or totsa with a “t”?
W:
I say with a “d,” dotsa. Even—other people will put “t” in front of it, but I say “d,” dotsa.
And, but, we’re all mixed, now, too. So it’s okay. And what’s really interesting about our
language is the different dialects. You can tell when somebody’s talking—I know when
somebody’s talking that came from Duckwater, because they speak different than Ely.
And what’s really different is to hear the Timbisha Shoshone speak. They—but they
speak in Shoshone. But here, the Comanche speak Shoshone. Or the Eastern Shoshones.
We’re all the numic-speaking people. And the Utes! I couldn’t believe it! I could hear the
conversation of the two Ute people that were talking in Ute, and I thought we weren’t
related! You know? But Shoshone and Paiute are so close, closely related. And that’s all I
have.
[End of recording]
3
Waappin
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Western Shoshone Oral Histories
Subject
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Oral histories of Western Shoshone elders collected by the Great Basin Indian Archive.
Description
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Oral histories compiled
Creator
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Great Basin Indian Archive, in partnership with Barrick Gold of North America
Source
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GBIA Oral History Collections
Publisher
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Great Basin Indian Archive
Contributor
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2006-2015
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Interviewer
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Norm Cavanaugh
Interviewee
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Lois Whitney
Location
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Great Basin College Campus (Elko, NV)
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DVD and VOB format
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00:44:00
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http://humanities.gbcnv.edu/omeka/admin/files/show/572
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Lois Whitney - Oral history (05/2011)
Subject
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Oral history interview with Lois Whitney, Western Shoshone from Elko, NV, on 05/2011
Description
An account of the resource
<p>Lois Whitney was born in Elko, Nevada along with her children and mother “Liz” Brady. Her family hails from all over the Western Shoshone territory. Her presentation goes over the different types of plants that are indigenous to the Great Basin area, and how they were used by the native people in the area. As Lois says, her presentation was to “talk a little about the physical, the emotional, and spiritual healing” characteristics of the plants as well as how they were used by the Native peoples. She also speaks a little about other items within her presentation as well.</p>
Video Pending <br /> <a title="Lois Whitney Oral History Transcript" href="/omeka/files/original/8c894abc984f242d04cc980bd9b50207.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Read Lois Whitney Oral History Transcript [pdf file]</a>
Creator
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Great Basin Indian Archives
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Great Basin Indian Archives - GBIA 026
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Great Basin Indian Archives
Date
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05/2011 [May 2011]; 2011 May
Contributor
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Norm Cavanaugh [interviewer]; James Hedrick [GBIA/VHC]; University of Utah SYLAP [streaming video]; Great Basin College; BARRICK Gold of North America
Rights
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Non-commercial scholarly and educational use only. Not to be reproduced or published without express permission. All rights reserved. Great Basin Indian Archives © 2017.
Consent form on file (administrator access only): http://humanities.gbcnv.edu/omeka/admin/items/show/352
Language
A language of the resource
English; some Shoshoni
Community
Crossroads
Elko
GBIA
Great Basin
medicinal plants
Shoshone
Story
traditional medicines
traditions
-
https://humanities.gbcnv.edu/omeka/files/original/c71b3a3aee9aeea2816e98f393b80932.pdf
b70dbf1e9506908786b2b751ee0ce831
PDF Text
Text
10/22/13
Elko County Place Names
HOWARD HICKSON'S HISTORIES
[Index]
What's in a Name?
Elko County Place Names
Following are selected places most of us know. If any reader wants
to know about a place not listed, please email me and I will check my
sources and get back to you by email.
Adobe Summit: (On the road from Elko to Mountain City and
Tuscarora) A small ranch and road station were maintained on the
summit for freight wagons and stagecoaches. Its name was derived
from the adobe mud that packed the wheels of the vehicles. Some
present day maps call it "Doby" which is incorrect.
Angel Lake: (East Humboldt Range southwest of Wells) A beautiful
recreational lake which can be reached by automobile. Warren M.
Angel came to Elko County is 1878. He had a ranch in Clover
Valley.
Carlin: Construction crews of the Central Pacific Railroad settled
Elko County's oldest community in 1868. It was named for Captain
William Passmore Carlin, a Civil War volunteer who was once
stationed there.
Carlin's principal street in 1911
Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko
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Charleston: Named for Tom Charles. The area was originally called
Mardis after George Washington "Old Allegheny" Mardis. There was
placer mining at a site four miles north of 76 Creek and the place
became a lively camp with three schools, several stores, a hotel, ice
house, saloon and other buildings.
China Ranch: (In Elko) In the area of the city park and where the
Northeastern Nevada Museum are located, local Chinese used the
place as a garden for raising vegetables they sold in town. Their farm
was irrigated by a ditch they dug from the Humboldt River near Osino
to the gardens in Elko. They also supplied water to Elko from the
ditch for a time.
Clover Valley: An abundance of clover grew in the valley. It was
called the Valley of Fifty Springs by the ill-fated Donner Party when
they passed through.
Contact: (Northern Elko County) Also known as the Salmon and Kit
Carson mining districts, the area was discovered in 1870 and first
worked on a commission basis by Chinese miners. Contact is mining
term meaning the meeting of granite and porphyry.
Currie: A town on the Nevada Northern Railroad between Cobre
and McGill. Joseph H. Currie had a ranch on Nelson Creek in 1885.
Deeth: (Between Elko and Wells) Settled in 1868 and named after a
man called Deeth who ran a small store on the banks of the Humboldt
River some two miles below the present town.
Diamond A Desert: (Northern Elko County near the Idaho line) The
brand of the Dan Murphy cattle outfit running cattle from Gold Creek
to the desert was the "Diamond A."
Dinner Station: (Twenty miles north of Elko) On the freight road
from Elko to Tuscarora and Mountain City. It was first known as
Weilands Station, named for the man who built the place. It here that
stage passengers, teamsters, horses and mules rested and were fed.
The name Dinner Station is obvious.
Duck Valley: (At Owyhee) Indian reservation in northern Elko
County established by Congress in 1877. Named for the ducks found
in the area before the reservation was established.
Elko: (County seat of Elko County) Elko County was formed from
part of Lander County in March, 1869 and named for its principal
community. There are three versions of the naming of the town: (1)
The most believable is that Charles Crocker of the Central Pacific
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Railroad, who had a passion for naming stations after animals, simply
added an O to Elk. (2) A small white girl was stolen by Indians from a
party of emigrants. The Indians called her Elko which some say is an
Indian word for White Elk. The child died near the Hot Springs off
Bullion Road and the Indians referred to the area as Elko. (3) When
surveyors were laying out the town site a party of Indians watched the
proceedings with considerable interest and, when the stakes were
being driven, one of them asked what the surveyors were making.
One told them that there would soon be a town here like San
Francisco and New York. The Indian exclaimed, "Elko!," said to be,
in early accounts, an Indian word of disgust. The boss of the survey
party said that was as good a name as any and wrote the name on
board and nailed it to a post. Editor: Since these accounts were
published I have been told there is no such term as Elko in the
Shoshone language. So, we are back to the first account of naming the
town...simply an O added to Elk which is not nearly as romantic or
exciting as numbers two and three.
Fort Halleck: Originally called Camp Halleck the post was
established by Captain Samuel P. Smith in 1867. General H.W.
Halleck was the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army at the time. On the
western slope of the Rubies it existed until 1886. The fort was
established to protect emigrant groups and the railroad.
Fort Ruby: (Ruby Valley in northern White Pine County) Established
in 1862 by Colonel Edward P. Connor with 600 men who marched
all the way from Stockton, California. A reservation of six square
miles was laid out and given the name Camp Ruby. Its name came
from the nearby mountains where pioneers found "rubies" and "ruby
sand," actually garnets, in the gravel of the streams.
Grindstone Mountain: (West of Dixie Creek and the South Fork of
the Humboldt River) Called Moleen Peak on contemporary maps,
one side of the mountain resembles grindstones. Its elevation is 7,377
feet.
Harrison Pass: (Ruby Mountains) Thomas Harrison, a native of
England, came to Elko County in 1865 and established a ranch in
Ruby Valley.
Humboldt River and all the other Humboldt names: Originally called
the Barren River, then Paul's River in honor of one of Pete Skene
Ogden's men who sickened and died on its banks. For a while it was
called Ogden's River then was designated Mary's River, perhaps after
the Indian wife of Ogden. Explorer Charles Fremont, in 1845, ignored
the existing name and called it the Humboldt. Friedrich Henry
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Elko County Place Names
Alexander, Baron von Humboldt, was a famous naturalist and
explorer in the 19th centry.
Jarbidge: The word Jarbidge comes from an Indian word, "Tsawhaw-bitts," a name for a human-eating giant Indian thought to roam the
canyon. Miners twisted the spelling to Jahabich and then to Jarbidge.
Often referred to as Jarbridge which is incorrect.
Jarbidge was a booming tent city in 1910
Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko
Jiggs: Its name comes from the popular comic strip of the time,
"Maggie and Jiggs." The town was called Skelton from 1884-1922,
from Cynthia Skelton, the mother of Valley Paddock who raised
horses in the vicinity. The place was then named "Hylton" who was a
prominent figure in the town, finally, to Jiggs.
Kittridge Canyon: C.B. Kittridge settled in Elko in 1871. Water
from the canyon was used in Elko for many years.
Lamoille:(Town, Valley, Canyon, Lake, and Creek) Thomas A.
Waterman, one of the original settlers in Lamoille Valley, was a native
of Lamoille County, Vermont. Lamoille is another twisted name.
Originally it was "la Moutte," French for a gull. It might have been a
map engraver's mistake of not crossing the t's.
Lee: Named in honor of General Robert E. Lee by J.L. Martin who
came to South Fork Valley in 1869.
Maggie Creek: (Near Carlin) On early maps the stream was called
Robin's Creek or Martin's Fork. A Scotch family, on their overland
trek to California in 1849, camped near the stream and named it
Maggie after one their little girls.
Metropolis: (Twelve miles northwest of Wells) A land promotion
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scheme of the Pacific Reclamation Company. Using a name denoting
a large city and prosperity, the company started the place in 1911.
Drought, water rights litigation, high interest rates, jackrabbits and
Mormon crickets contributed to the demise of the town and
surrounding farms.
Midas: First called Rosebud, then Gold Circle, because mines
encircled the town. Its name was changed to Midas because Postal
officials felt there were too many towns beginning with "gold" and
would not establish a post office there unless the name was changed
to Midas, a mythical king. Everything he touched turned to gold.
Montello: An Indian word meaning "rest." The place was a small
station on the Central Pacific Railroad. The watering place called
Montello is actually eight or so miles from town.
Oasis: (Between Wells and Wendover) Named after the Oasis Ranch
of E.C. Hardy, a horse raiser in the Toana area in the late 1880s.
Owyhee: Peter Skene Ogden of the Hudson's Bay Company first
called the river the Sandwich Island River when two Hawaiians in his
group were killed there by Indians. Captain James Cook visited
Hawaii in 1776 and name the largest island in the group "Owyhee."
American missionaries in the islands later reduced the native language
to a written form and changed the spelling to "Hawaii."
Pilot Peak: (Eastern Elko County) Name by John C. Fremont in
1845 because it served as a guide for emigrants in their western
migration.
Pleasant Valley: Named by the Seitz brothers, Edward and George,
as a descriptive name for the valley nestled at the foot of the Ruby
Mountains.
Spanish Ranch: (Independence Valley, Tuscarora area) This cattle
kingdom was put together by Bernardo and Pedro Altube, Spanish
Basques who came to Elko County from California in 1870. Pedro,
who stood six-feet, six inches in his stocking feet was known as Palo
Alto, or "tall pine," and it is said that the California town takes its name
from him. Pedro was elected to the Cowboy Hall of Fame as
Nevada's candidate in 1960.
Spring Creek: From the springs on a ranch known as the McKnight
Ranch.
Starr Valley: (Between Halleck and Wells) Lieutenant Augustus
Washington Starr came with Captain S.P. Smith to established Fort
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Halleck in 1867. After leaving the army Starr bought land in the valley
and is credited with being the place's first settler. By 1870 he had left
the area.
Te-Moak Indian Reservation: (Lee) Formed in the late 1930's by
the government from established private cattle operations on the South
Fork near Lee. The Bureau of Indian Affairs purchased several
ranches and located Native American families of the Shoshone tribe of
Te-Moak Indians on them. Named for Chief Te-Moak of Ruby
Valley. The name means "rope." He was named that because he
braided rope. Te-Moak rose to power among his people through
personal influence, not hereditary lineage. He is remembered for the
treaty he negotiated with the government to allow emigrants to pass
through this region unmolested by the Indians.
Thomas Canyon: (Branch of Lamoille Canyon, Ruby Mountains)
Raymond Thomas, an Elko County High School teacher, took a trip
into Lamoille Canyon on a beautiful day with ten other persons on
October 1, 1916. In his effort to help other members of the party
caught in a surprise snowstorm, the high altitude and severe storm
conditions resulted in the death of Thomas.
Tobar: (Southeast of Wells) A town on the Western Pacific tracks. A
story is told that a saloon keeper in 1909, painted a sign reading "To
Bar" and pointed it in the direction of his establishment. Railroad
officials looking for a name for their new town, saw the sign and
promptly named the place Tobar.
Tuscarora: Two stories; (1) Steve and John Beard named the place
after the Indians living in their home state of North Carolina and (2)
When the mining district was formed one of the miners had served on
the U.S. Gunboat Tuscarora. The name of the boat also came from
the southeastern seaboard Indians.
Union gunboat "Tuscarora,"
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Elko County Place Names
named for an Indian tribe in North Carolina
Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko
Twin Bridges: (Lower South Fork, Humboldt River) Two bridges
are in the area, one spans Smith Creek, the other the South Fork.
Wells: Originally a rest stop for wagon trains, the community was
settled in 1869 with the name Humboldt Wells after the river and
springs that marked the beginning of the Humboldt Trail. Elko County
Commissioners, on May 6, 1873, shortened the name to Wells. The
town was incorporated in 1927.
Main street of Wells c.1911
Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko
Wendover: An eating place run by John Cooley served the men of
the sheep trails in the area and was so named because the men and
flocks wended their way over this route to other grazing ranges.
Wild Horse Reservoir: A dam was built in 1938 to store waters on
the Owyhee River, which was replaced with a new structure in 1971.
Wild horses were found in the area at one time.
Wilkins: (Between Wells and Contact) Sometimes was called
Thousand Springs Trading Post. Russell Wilkins was once the owner
of nearby Winecup Ranch.
Edited by Howard Hickson
September 14, 1998
I give my sincere thanks to my longtime friend, Edna Patterson, who
is, without a doubt, the premier historian of northeast Nevada. In
1964 she compiled a small book of local place names published by
the Elko Independent. In 1977 the Northeastern Nevada Historical
Society published parts of the original book in its Quarterly.
�1998 by Howard Hickson. If any portion or all of this article is used or quoted proper
credit must be given to the authors.
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Elko County Place Names
[Back to Hickson's Histories Index]
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�
Dublin Core
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Title
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Howard Hickson Histories
Subject
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Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
Description
An account of the resource
Howard Hickson's Histories are true stories about Northeastern Nevada's colorful past, written with wry humor and keen insight into the sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, sometimes downright eerie lives of cowboys, miners, and gamblers, villains and saints and men and women of both extremes, who've inhabited or passed through the region. The collection is a cultural treasure that Great Basin College is privileged to make available to the world via the Internet. New stories are added as Howard sees fit.
Creator
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Howard Hickson
Source
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Web site of Howard Hickson's Histories. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/index.html
Publisher
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Great Basin College
Date
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07/08/2014
Contributor
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Great Basin College
Rights
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c.2014 Howard Hickson
Relation
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Web site of Howard Hickson's Histories. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/index.html
Format
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Content can be PDF or HTML documents.
Language
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English
Type
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Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
Coverage
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Elko, Nevada, northeastern Nevada, history, articles, Great Basin
Website
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Original Format
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Elko County Place Names <center>
<table width="450" cellpadding="10" border="" bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
<tbody>
<tr>
<td align="left"><center><span style="font-size: medium;">H</span><span style="font-size: small;">OWARD</span><span style="font-size: medium;"> H</span><span style="font-size: small;">ICKSON'S</span><span style="font-size: medium;"> H</span><span style="font-size: small;">ISTORIES</span></center><hr width="100%" /><center><span style="color: #000066;"><span style="font-size: medium;">What's in a Name?</span></span></center><center><em><span style="color: #000066;">Elko County Place Names</span></em></center>
<p><span style="font-size: small;">F</span>ollowing are selected places most of us know. If any reader wants to know about a place not listed, please email me and I will check my sources and get back to you by email. </p>
<hr width="100%" />
<p><strong>Adobe Summit</strong>: (On the road from Elko to Mountain City and Tuscarora) A small ranch and road station were maintained on the summit for freight wagons and stagecoaches. Its name was derived from the adobe mud that packed the wheels of the vehicles. Some present day maps call it "Doby" which is incorrect. </p>
<p><strong>Angel Lake</strong>: (East Humboldt Range southwest of Wells) A beautiful recreational lake which can be reached by automobile. Warren M. Angel came to Elko County is 1878. He had a ranch in Clover Valley. </p>
<p><strong>Carlin</strong>: Construction crews of the Central Pacific Railroad settled Elko County's oldest community in 1868. It was named for Captain William Passmore Carlin, a Civil War volunteer who was once stationed there. </p>
<center> </center><center><img src="http://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/carlin.jpg" alt="" width="169" height="250" /></center><center><span> <em>Carlin's principal street in 1911 </em></span></center><center><em><span>Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko</span></em></center>
<p><strong>Charleston</strong>: Named for Tom Charles. The area was originally called Mardis after George Washington "Old Allegheny" Mardis. There was placer mining at a site four miles north of 76 Creek and the place became a lively camp with three schools, several stores, a hotel, ice house, saloon and other buildings. </p>
<p><strong>China Ranch</strong>: (In Elko) In the area of the city park and where the Northeastern Nevada Museum are located, local Chinese used the place as a garden for raising vegetables they sold in town. Their farm was irrigated by a ditch they dug from the Humboldt River near Osino to the gardens in Elko. They also supplied water to Elko from the ditch for a time. </p>
<p><strong>Clover Valley</strong>: An abundance of clover grew in the valley. It was called the Valley of Fifty Springs by the ill-fated Donner Party when they passed through. </p>
<p><strong>Contact</strong>: (Northern Elko County) Also known as the Salmon and Kit Carson mining districts, the area was discovered in 1870 and first worked on a commission basis by Chinese miners. Contact is mining term meaning the meeting of granite and porphyry. </p>
<p><strong>Currie</strong>: A town on the Nevada Northern Railroad between Cobre and McGill. Joseph H. Currie had a ranch on Nelson Creek in 1885. </p>
<p><strong>Deeth</strong>: (Between Elko and Wells) Settled in 1868 and named after a man called Deeth who ran a small store on the banks of the Humboldt River some two miles below the present town. </p>
<p><strong>Diamond A Desert</strong>: (Northern Elko County near the Idaho line) The brand of the Dan Murphy cattle outfit running cattle from Gold Creek to the desert was the "Diamond A." </p>
<p><strong>Dinner Station</strong>: (Twenty miles north of Elko) On the freight road from Elko to Tuscarora and Mountain City. It was first known as Weilands Station, named for the man who built the place. It here that stage passengers, teamsters, horses and mules rested and were fed. The name Dinner Station is obvious. </p>
<p><strong>Duck Valley</strong>: (At Owyhee) Indian reservation in northern Elko County established by Congress in 1877. Named for the ducks found in the area before the reservation was established. </p>
<p><strong>Elko</strong>: (County seat of Elko County) Elko County was formed from part of Lander County in March, 1869 and named for its principal community. There are three versions of the naming of the town: (1) The most believable is that Charles Crocker of the Central Pacific Railroad, who had a passion for naming stations after animals, simply added an O to Elk. (2) A small white girl was stolen by Indians from a party of emigrants. The Indians called her Elko which some say is an Indian word for White Elk. The child died near the Hot Springs off Bullion Road and the Indians referred to the area as Elko. (3) When surveyors were laying out the town site a party of Indians watched the proceedings with considerable interest and, when the stakes were being driven, one of them asked what the surveyors were making. One told them that there would soon be a town here like San Francisco and New York. The Indian exclaimed, "Elko!," said to be, in early accounts, an Indian word of disgust. The boss of the survey party said that was as good a name as any and wrote the name on board and nailed it to a post. <strong>Editor: </strong>Since these accounts were published I have been told there is no such term as Elko in the Shoshone language. So, we are back to the first account of naming the town...simply an O added to Elk which is not nearly as romantic or exciting as numbers two and three. </p>
<p><strong>Fort Halleck</strong>: Originally called Camp Halleck the post was established by Captain Samuel P. Smith in 1867. General H.W. Halleck was the Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army at the time. On the western slope of the Rubies it existed until 1886. The fort was established to protect emigrant groups and the railroad. </p>
<p><strong>Fort Ruby</strong>: (Ruby Valley in northern White Pine County) Established in 1862 by Colonel Edward P. Connor with 600 men who marched all the way from Stockton, California. A reservation of six square miles was laid out and given the name Camp Ruby. Its name came from the nearby mountains where pioneers found "rubies" and "ruby sand," actually garnets, in the gravel of the streams. </p>
<p><strong>Grindstone Mountain</strong>: (West of Dixie Creek and the South Fork of the Humboldt River) Called Moleen Peak on contemporary maps, one side of the mountain resembles grindstones. Its elevation is 7,377 feet. </p>
<p><strong>Harrison Pass</strong>: (Ruby Mountains) Thomas Harrison, a native of England, came to Elko County in 1865 and established a ranch in Ruby Valley. </p>
<p><strong>Humboldt River</strong> and all the other Humboldt names: Originally called the Barren River, then Paul's River in honor of one of Pete Skene Ogden's men who sickened and died on its banks. For a while it was called Ogden's River then was designated Mary's River, perhaps after the Indian wife of Ogden. Explorer Charles Fremont, in 1845, ignored the existing name and called it the Humboldt. Friedrich Henry Alexander, Baron von Humboldt, was a famous naturalist and explorer in the 19<sup>th</sup> centry. </p>
<p><strong>Jarbidge</strong>: The word Jarbidge comes from an Indian word, "Tsaw-haw-bitts," a name for a human-eating giant Indian thought to roam the canyon. Miners twisted the spelling to Jahabich and then to Jarbidge. Often referred to as Jarbridge which is incorrect. <br /> </p>
<center><img src="http://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/jarbidge.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="233" /></center><center><em><span>Jarbidge was a booming tent city in 1910 </span></em></center><center><em><span>Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko</span></em></center>
<p><strong>Jiggs</strong>: Its name comes from the popular comic strip of the time, "Maggie and Jiggs." The town was called Skelton from 1884-1922, from Cynthia Skelton, the mother of Valley Paddock who raised horses in the vicinity. The place was then named "Hylton" who was a prominent figure in the town, finally, to Jiggs. </p>
<p><strong>Kittridge Canyon</strong>: C.B. Kittridge settled in Elko in 1871. Water from the canyon was used in Elko for many years. </p>
<p><strong>Lamoille</strong>:(Town, Valley, Canyon, Lake, and Creek) Thomas A. Waterman, one of the original settlers in Lamoille Valley, was a native of Lamoille County, Vermont. Lamoille is another twisted name. Originally it was "la Moutte," French for a gull. It might have been a map engraver's mistake of not crossing the t's. </p>
<p><strong>Lee</strong>: Named in honor of General Robert E. Lee by J.L. Martin who came to South Fork Valley in 1869. </p>
<p><strong>Maggie Creek</strong>: (Near Carlin) On early maps the stream was called Robin's Creek or Martin's Fork. A Scotch family, on their overland trek to California in 1849, camped near the stream and named it Maggie after one their little girls. </p>
<p><strong>Metropolis</strong>: (Twelve miles northwest of Wells) A land promotion scheme of the Pacific Reclamation Company. Using a name denoting a large city and prosperity, the company started the place in 1911. Drought, water rights litigation, high interest rates, jackrabbits and Mormon crickets contributed to the demise of the town and surrounding farms. </p>
<p><strong>Midas</strong>: First called Rosebud, then Gold Circle, because mines encircled the town. Its name was changed to Midas because Postal officials felt there were too many towns beginning with "gold" and would not establish a post office there unless the name was changed to Midas, a mythical king. Everything he touched turned to gold. </p>
<p><strong>Montello</strong>: An Indian word meaning "rest." The place was a small station on the Central Pacific Railroad. The watering place called Montello is actually eight or so miles from town. </p>
<p><strong>Oasis</strong>: (Between Wells and Wendover) Named after the Oasis Ranch of E.C. Hardy, a horse raiser in the Toana area in the late 1880s. </p>
<p><strong>Owyhee</strong>: Peter Skene Ogden of the Hudson's Bay Company first called the river the Sandwich Island River when two Hawaiians in his group were killed there by Indians. Captain James Cook visited Hawaii in 1776 and name the largest island in the group "Owyhee." American missionaries in the islands later reduced the native language to a written form and changed the spelling to "Hawaii." </p>
<p><strong>Pilot Peak</strong>: (Eastern Elko County) Name by John C. Fremont in 1845 because it served as a guide for emigrants in their western migration. </p>
<p><strong>Pleasant Valley</strong>: Named by the Seitz brothers, Edward and George, as a descriptive name for the valley nestled at the foot of the Ruby Mountains. </p>
<p><strong>Spanish Ranch</strong>: (Independence Valley, Tuscarora area) This cattle kingdom was put together by Bernardo and Pedro Altube, Spanish Basques who came to Elko County from California in 1870. Pedro, who stood six-feet, six inches in his stocking feet was known as Palo Alto, or "tall pine," and it is said that the California town takes its name from him. Pedro was elected to the Cowboy Hall of Fame as Nevada's candidate in 1960. </p>
<p><strong>Spring Creek</strong>: From the springs on a ranch known as the McKnight Ranch. </p>
<p><strong>Starr Valley</strong>: (Between Halleck and Wells) Lieutenant Augustus Washington Starr came with Captain S.P. Smith to established Fort Halleck in 1867. After leaving the army Starr bought land in the valley and is credited with being the place's first settler. By 1870 he had left the area. </p>
<p><strong>Te-Moak Indian Reservation</strong>: (Lee) Formed in the late 1930's by the government from established private cattle operations on the South Fork near Lee. The Bureau of Indian Affairs purchased several ranches and located Native American families of the Shoshone tribe of Te-Moak Indians on them. Named for Chief Te-Moak of Ruby Valley. The name means "rope." He was named that because he braided rope. Te-Moak rose to power among his people through personal influence, not hereditary lineage. He is remembered for the treaty he negotiated with the government to allow emigrants to pass through this region unmolested by the Indians. </p>
<p><strong>Thomas Canyon</strong>: (Branch of Lamoille Canyon, Ruby Mountains) Raymond Thomas, an Elko County High School teacher, took a trip into Lamoille Canyon on a beautiful day with ten other persons on October 1, 1916. In his effort to help other members of the party caught in a surprise snowstorm, the high altitude and severe storm conditions resulted in the death of Thomas. </p>
<p><strong>Tobar</strong>: (Southeast of Wells) A town on the Western Pacific tracks. A story is told that a saloon keeper in 1909, painted a sign reading "To Bar" and pointed it in the direction of his establishment. Railroad officials looking for a name for their new town, saw the sign and promptly named the place Tobar. </p>
<p><strong>Tuscarora</strong>: Two stories; (1) Steve and John Beard named the place after the Indians living in their home state of North Carolina and (2) When the mining district was formed one of the miners had served on the U.S. Gunboat Tuscarora. The name of the boat also came from the southeastern seaboard Indians. <br /> </p>
<center> <img src="http://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/ship.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="207" /></center><center><em><span>Union gunboat "Tuscarora," </span></em></center><center><em><span>named for an Indian tribe in North Carolina </span></em></center><center><em><span>Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko</span></em></center>
<p><strong>Twin Bridges</strong>: (Lower South Fork, Humboldt River) Two bridges are in the area, one spans Smith Creek, the other the South Fork. </p>
<p><strong>Wells</strong>: Originally a rest stop for wagon trains, the community was settled in 1869 with the name Humboldt Wells after the river and springs that marked the beginning of the Humboldt Trail. Elko County Commissioners, on May 6, 1873, shortened the name to Wells. The town was incorporated in 1927. <br /> </p>
<center><img src="http://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/wells.jpg" alt="" width="350" height="145" /></center><center><em><span>Main street of Wells c.1911 </span></em></center><center><em><span>Photo courtesy of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko</span></em></center><center><em><span> </span></em></center>
<p><strong>Wendover</strong>: An eating place run by John Cooley served the men of the sheep trails in the area and was so named because the men and flocks wended their way over this route to other grazing ranges. </p>
<p><strong>Wild Horse Reservoir</strong>: A dam was built in 1938 to store waters on the Owyhee River, which was replaced with a new structure in 1971. Wild horses were found in the area at one time. </p>
<p><strong>Wilkins</strong>: (Between Wells and Contact) Sometimes was called Thousand Springs Trading Post. Russell Wilkins was once the owner of nearby Winecup Ranch. <br /> </p>
<center><img src="http://www.gbcnv.edu/howh/dingbat.jpg" alt="" width="46" height="13" /></center><center> </center>
<div align="right"><em>Edited by Howard Hickson<span style="color: #000000;"> </span></em></div>
<div align="right"><em><span style="color: #000000;">September 14, 1998 </span></em></div>
<p> <br />I give my sincere thanks to my longtime friend, Edna Patterson, who is, without a doubt, the premier historian of northeast Nevada. In 1964 she compiled a small book of local place names published by the <em>Elko Independent</em>. In 1977 the Northeastern Nevada Historical Society published parts of the original book in its <em>Quarterly.</em></p>
<p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica;">© 1998 by Howard Hickson. If any portion or all of this article is used or quoted proper credit must be given to the authors.</span></p>
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What's in a Name? Elko County Place Names
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding Elko County, Nevada place names and their origin.
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding Elko County, Nevada place names and their origin. The complete article is at the bottom of this page.<br /> <br /><a title="Names article original webpage" href="http://gbcnv.edu/hickson/names.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">View Original Webpage [archive website]</a>
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Howard Hickson
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Great Basin College
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Text
10/22/13
Elko: The First 100 Years
HOWARD HICKSON'S HISTORIES
[Index]
Elko: The First 100 Years
Elko was the end of the tracks laid from the west by the Central
Pacific Railroad in 1868. When CPRR tracklayers moved on east to
meet construction crews of the Union Pacific Railroad at Promontory,
Utah Territory, they left a small tent town on the banks of the
Humboldt River.
When Elko began it was a rough and tumble place populated by
railroaders, miners, gamblers and a few merchants. In 1869 a
newcomer remarked in a letter, "There were all sorts of games and
vices in progress and only two men were killed the day I arrived."
The community soon had a few permanent buildings and its economy
expanded into freighting to area mining camps and became a ranch
supply center. Since then, gambling, tourism, modern gold mining and
its many service groups have added to the economic slate.
The town was probably named by Charles Crocker, superintendent of
the CPRR. He was fond of animal names and simply added an "o" to
Elk.
The state legislature formed Elko County from a portion of Lander
County in 1869. With 17,127 square miles, it is the sixth largest
county in the nation.
From 1869 to 1917 the community was run by Elko County
Commissioners whose motto was: "The best government is the least
government."
Following are the ups and downs of a growing frontier town.
1868: December 29, Elko founded by the Central Pacific Railroad
(later Southern Pacific, now Union Pacific).
Townsite laid out.
1869 Railroad agents sold lots for $300 to $500 each.
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Early in the year the town was made up of about sixty tents.
Earliest existing photograph of Elko. Taken in 1869. Courtesy of Northeastern Nevada
Museum.
March 5, Elko County formed and Elko named the county
seat.
A brick courthouse is constructed at Sixth and Idaho streets
at a cost of $20,000.
First Elko County Courthouse, built on the northwest corner of Sixth and Idaho in 1869. It
was in use until torn down and replaced by the present structure in 1910. Original cost of
this building was $20,000. Photo: Northeastern Nevad Museum.
Humboldt Lodging House (predecessor of the Commercial
Hotel) built.
Elko's first newspaper, the Elko Independent, begins
publication on June 19.
Cosmopolitan Hotel built next to the railroad track, 80
rooms.
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Elko: The First 100 Years
Missouri Flats, in the vicinity of Silver and Ninth streets, is
headquarters for freighters, their animals and rigs.
An opera house in a tent opened. Culture arrived early.
Pioneer Saloon began business on the northeast corner of
Fifth and Railroad.
A resort, White Sulphur Hot Springs, was built near the Hot
Hole off Bullion Road.
Elko's 45 saloons outnumbered all other businesses in town.
1870: The first church was the Presbyterian, built at Sixth and Pine.
First school opened at 421 Court with 70 students, cost was
$3,000. (Site of Chilton Engineering, different building).
First school building was built at 421 Court Street in 1870. It opened with 70 students
and enrollment doubled to 140 by the end of the first year. After a new school was
constructed five blocks east, the building was used as a Knights of Phythias Hall. A new
KP hall was later built on the same site and is presently owned by Chilton Engineering.
Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
Lots now selling from $1,500 to $2,000.
Population estimated at 4,500.
1871: Fire destroys most of the business district.
Elko cattleman, Lewis "Broadhorns" Bradley elected second
governor of Nevada.
1872: A brickworks at Idaho and the road to Mountain City begins
business.
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Elko: The First 100 Years
1873: 1873: Cosmopolitan renamed the Chamberlain (later changed
to Depot Hotel).
Early 1869 photo of Elko showing the Depot Hotel. The lodging place has 80 rooms, a
dining room that seated 112, a billard room, bar and barbershop. Photo: Northeastern
Nevada Museum.
1874: Elko is selected the first site of the University of Nevada. A
building is constructed on the northeast corner of College
Avenue and Ninth. (Where the "old gym" at the high school
presently stands).
Population estimated at 5,000.
First University of Nevada building. Located at the corner of Ninth and College streets.
Now you now where College Streets got its name. After the university was moved to
Reno in 1885. The building was the county hospital for many years. It was torn down in
1928.
1875: Elko Flour Mill, Commercial between Seventh and Eighth,
begins operation and provides the first water system for the
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Elko: The First 100 Years
town.
University of Nevada dormitory built on Ninth and Court.
(Still there).
1877: October 7, two-story brick school building opens on the
north side of Court between Eighth and Ninth.
1882: White Sulphur Springs Hotel burns down, rebuilt.
Population estimate is 600. Area mining curtailed causing a
Nevada-wide depression.
1883: Elko Free Press begins publication on January 5.
1885: University of Nevada moved to Reno.
Population estimated at 1,000.
1886: Elko Flour Mill generates first electricity and supplies power
to a few street lights.
1892: Episcopal Church dedicated at Fifth and Idaho.
Fifth and Idaho Streets in 1896. The Episcopal Church is now the site of the Esquire
Motor Lodge. A cafe, advertising meals for 25 cents, is where Algerio Real Estate is now
located. Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
1896: Elko County High School, the first county school in the state,
opens on Court and Sixth with 43 students, cost is $7,420. It
is a two-story building used until the present high school
buildings were constructed on College. The building, without
its second story, still stands behind the present courthouse
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Elko: The First 100 Years
and is used for county offices.
First county high school in the state at Court and Sixth streets. Opened in 1896, the
operated until the new campus was built in 1918. The building, without its second floor
which burned in 1942, is now used for county offices. Photo: Northeastern Nevada
Museum.
1899: Hot Springs hotel burns again, rebuilt again.
Third Hot Springs Hotel. The first building was constructed in 1869 and burned in 1882.
The second burned in 1899. Notice the little horse-drawn bus that made regular trips into
town to transport guests. Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
1904: Depot Hotel is demolished and the Mayer Hotel (present site
of the Stockmen's Hotel) constructed.
Population estimated at 800.
1907: Chamber of Commerce formed.
1908: Western Pacific Railroad (now Union Pacific) lays track
through town and builds a depot. WPRR tracks ran on Silver
and Southern Pacific rails ran between Railroad and
Commercial. (Present downtown parking area). Both sets of
tracks relocated south to their present locations in 1984.
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Elko: The First 100 Years
1910: New courthouse built on northwest corner of Idaho at Sixth
(same site as first courthouse), cost $150,000.
New grammar school replaces older facility on Court
between Eighth and Ninth.
Commercial Street in 1910 looking east. Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
1913: Elko-Lamoille Power Company provides direct electric
current to Elko.
Nevada Industrial School (boys reformatory) opens four
miles east of town. Now the Nevada Youth Training Center.
Pioneer Hotel building completed. ( Now the Western
Folklife Center.)
1915: Elko-Lamoille Power Company switches to alternating
current.
1916: Catlin Shale Products Company opens an experimental oil
extraction plant southwest of town off Bullion Road.
Operated until 1925. Extraction methods developed there are
still in use today.
Population estimated at 2,500.
1917: Elko incorporated as a city.
J.A. McBride is first mayor.
Elko Municipal Water Works established.
1918: Grammar school on Court burns down on Christmas Day.
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Christmas Day, 1918. The building had been used for only eight years. Freshly oiled
floors were blamed. Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
1919: New elementary school built on same site. The school is
called Number One until it was renamed to honor Kate St.
Claire in 1973. Nevada's first community college was also
housed in the building until it was demolished in 1974 to make
way for the Green Acre apartments.
1920: Elko designated an airmail station on the first transcontinental
route.
First county fair held on the Garcia rodeo grounds located
south of the river.
1921: Elko General Hospital built at the corner of College and
Thirteenth.
Elko General Hospital at College and Thirteenth around 1940. Built in 1921, it was in
use until demolished in 1978 for the present building immediately west of the old
structure. Photo: Northeastern Nevada Museum.
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Elko: The First 100 Years
1926: Elko becomes the terminus of the first commercial airmail
flight in the nation when Varney Airlines (later part of United
Air Lines) completes flight from Pasco, Washington.
County library moved from courthouse to the second floor of
the old high school building at Court and Sixth.
1927: Present County Fairgrounds built on part of old China Ranch
were Chinese once raised vegetables for sale in town.
1929: Henderson Bank Building, tallest in town, opens.
1930: Elko Flour Mill torn down.
First Elko High School Band formed.
1932: Gambling legalized.
1933: Present downtown Post Office Building opens.
1934: Elko attorney Morley Griswold becomes 16th governor of
Nevada when Fred Balzar dies in office.
First street paving program begins.
1939: Elko attorney Edward Carville becomes 18th governor. Later
appointed U.S. Senator.
1941: Big name entertainment begins in Nevada in The Lounge of
Elko's Commercial Hotel with Ted Lewis and his orchestra.
1942: 1942: Fire destroys second floor of the old high school
building. The burned part is removed and the first level is
remodeled to be the home of the Elko County Library until
the new library building was built at Court and Seventh in
1974.
1944: Mayer Hotel becomes Stockmen's Hotel.
On December 8, Marilyn Patterson christens the military
transport ship, S.S. Elko Victory.
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Elko: The First 100 Years
1946: Ranchinn opens with 68 rooms on Idaho between Eighth and
Ninth.
1947: DeLuxe Cleaners building at 511 Railroad collapses killing
three.
1948: City Hall at 723 Railroad opens, remains as city hall until the
new one was built in 1972 at 1751 College.
Famous movie star and crooner Bing Crosby is named
"Honorary Mayor of Elko." He held the post until his death in
1977.
Elko's first radio station, KELK, begins broadcasting.
1951: Former Elkoan, Charles B. Russell, becomes Nevada's 20th
governor.
World premiere of movie, "Here Comes the Groom," starring
Bing Crosby held at the Hunter Theater in Elko.
1956: 1956: Northeastern Nevada Historical Society formed.
1957: Stockmen's Hotel burns, new hotel and casino built on the
same site.
1959: Grant Sawyer, an Elko attorney, is Nevada's 21st governor.
1966: New high school gymnasium at Cedar and Ninth built.
1967: Elko citizens group forms first community college in the state.
It is quartered in Number One school until its new campus is
constructed at 901 Elm Street. First named Elko Community
College, then Northern Nevada Community College, today it
is Great Basin College.
1968: Northeastern Nevada Museum, 1515 Idaho Street opened in
a small white brick building. New construction and
remodeling was completed in 1982, and 1998 will see the
debut of the new wing. The museum has won numerous
awards, including the highest, the American Association for
State and Local History Award of Merit (twice).
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Elko: The First 100 Years
In the next 20 years to 1998, Elko underwent changes that have
forever altered its personality and looks. The growth came mainly
from nearby gold mines that made northeast Nevada the largest gold
producing area in the nation. With the discovery of microscopic gold
and new methods of extraction came people from all over the world
and Elko's population exploded.
Elko today is the largest community between Salt Lake City (235
miles to the east) and Reno (290 miles west). The community's
remoteness gives the people a certain spirit of independence and it
remains as one of the American West's premier frontier towns. Yet,
there is a special metropolitan spirit because it is the social and
cultural center for an area larger than most states back east.
Times have changed but the place is still a 24-hour town where the
casinos never close. Some say that Elko is an evil place in which to
live with its legalized gambling, drinking, and other vices, but the town
has solid citizens with a strong economy, excellent schools, Great
Basin College, Western Folklife Center, churches, the Northeastern
Nevada Museum, Convention Center, and many cultural activities
lacking in other cities of the same size.
It is a pleasant place to live with clean air, numerous cultural events,
the spectacular nearby Ruby Mountains, people who still have time
to stop and chat for a few minutes, boundless outdoor and sports
activities, ghost towns where one can walk a few moments in the
past...the list is long and it is up to you to decide what you want to do
it. Take some time to enjoy the people and the land.
Howard Hickson
29 March 1998
This piece is from an article, "Elko, Nevada: 1868-1968," I compiled
for the Fall 1983 (83-4) issue of the Northeastern Nevada Historical
Society Quarterly. My thanks are extended today as back in 1983 to
Milo Taber (now deceased), and Terry Reynolds and Jack Sutherland
(both former City Managers) for their assistance in locating some of
the sites.
�1998 by Howard Hickson. If any portion or all of this article is used or quoted proper
credit must be given to the authors.
[Back to Hickson's Histories Index]
www.gbcnv.edu/howh/elkohist.html
11/11
�
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Howard Hickson Histories
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Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
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Howard Hickson's Histories are true stories about Northeastern Nevada's colorful past, written with wry humor and keen insight into the sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, sometimes downright eerie lives of cowboys, miners, and gamblers, villains and saints and men and women of both extremes, who've inhabited or passed through the region. The collection is a cultural treasure that Great Basin College is privileged to make available to the world via the Internet. New stories are added as Howard sees fit.
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07/08/2014
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c.2014 Howard Hickson
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Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
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Elko, Nevada, northeastern Nevada, history, articles, Great Basin
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Elko: The First 100 Years
Subject
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the first 100 years of the city of Elko, Nevada's history.
Description
An account of the resource
Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the first 100 years of the city of Elko, Nevada's history.
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Howard Hickson
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Website for Howard Hickson's Histories and the story, Elko: The First 100 Years. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/elkohist.html
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Great Basin College
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03/29/1998
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Great Basin College
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c. 1998 Howard Hickson
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Website for Howard Hickson's Histories and the story, Elko: The First 100 Years. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/elkohist.html
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English
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the first 100 years of the city of Elko,, Nevada's history.
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Elko, Nevada, northeastern Nevada, history, articles, Great Basin
Community
Elko
Great Basin
history
Nevada
Northeastern Nevada
Story
-
https://humanities.gbcnv.edu/omeka/files/original/25ce2e98f4c107f32222e0d32bb59087.pdf
39e862decfb1cdf46f97a9007da088ce
PDF Text
Text
10/22/13
Halley's Comet
HOWARD HICKSON'S HISTORIES
[Index]
Halley's Comet
Midas, Nevada - April 27, 1910
Residents of Midas, a gold camp in Elko County, were jolted from bed at 3:30
a.m. on April 27, 1910, when a blast rocked the countryside and shook buildings.
Running from their houses and cabins, still in their gowns and nightshirts, they
heard a voice in the darkness, "Everybody up! Halley's comet is about to appear!"
Tousled heads and bleary eyes turned toward a nearby hill just east of town as
a very bright light appeared. They were suddenly awake and watched in
amazement and wonder as the light lit the sky for about twenty minutes. Then it
faded away and the morning star appeared. It was indeed a beautiful sight.
Midas around the time when Halley's Comet visited the place. Photograph
from the Northeastern Nevada Museum collections, Elko.
Everyone was thrilled. Sighting the famed comet was a once in a lifetime event.
It crosses the sky only about once every 75 years, give or take a couple of years.
The great American humorist Mark Twain claimed to have been born during the
comet's last sighting in 1835 and maintained that he would leave this life when it
next appeared.
Wide awake now but hoping to salvage a little sleep, Midas residents went
back to bed. They would learn, when the news reached Midas a couple of days
later, that Twain had passed away on April 21. Close enough, most commented.
Dick Avery, a night shift miner at the Rex Mine, harbored a secret most the of
following day. After getting a snoot full at one of the bars, he told all about the
www.gbcnv.edu/howh/Comet.html
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�10/22/13
Halley's Comet
previous night when Halley's Comet visited Midas.
He had gotten a long pole about thirty feet in length. After fastening a bundle of
waste cloth on one end, he saturated it with oil then detonated a stick of dynamite
to wake the town.
After announcing the comet's coming, he raced to the hill top which was, more
or less, the proper direction for sighting the celestial wonder. He lit the torch and
proceeded to fake the miracle of the heavens. He did such a good job that
everyone, bar none, thought they had seen the famous comet.
Many of those who had walked a half mile or so to view Avery's Comet were
not entirely pleased about the hoax. In fact, some were outright mad. Others
chuckled at the joke played on them. After all, it put some excitement and fun into
a sometimes dull life of a remote mining camp.
Downtown Midas around 1928. Photograph from the Northeastern Nevada Museum
collections, Elko.
On April 28, 1910, the real comet was first sighted by the naked eye and was
seen nightly until the end of June. May 10 was the night it was closest to earth, only
14,300,000 miles away.
Midas was named for the legendary Greek king whose touched turned
everything to gold. Before that it was called Gold Circle and Summit, at different
times, of course.
Midas citizens have put together a museum in the old school there. It is worth
the trip to visit the town. Although there are still mining operations nearby, the
flavor and personality of the old mining camp are still there.
Howard Hickson
April 21, 2001
Sources: Much of the research for this article was done more than twenty years ago by
Claudia Riordan when she was on the staff of the Northeastern Nevada Museum, Elko. An
excellent source for town names and brief histories is Nevada Place Names by Helen S.
Carlson, University of Nevada Press, Reno, 1974.
www.gbcnv.edu/howh/Comet.html
2/3
�10/22/13
Halley's Comet
©Copyright 2001by Howard Hickson. Permission to use is given but, if any portion or all of this article is quoted, proper
credit must be given.
[Back to Hickson's Histories Index]
www.gbcnv.edu/howh/Comet.html
3/3
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
Howard Hickson Histories
Subject
The topic of the resource
Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
Description
An account of the resource
Howard Hickson's Histories are true stories about Northeastern Nevada's colorful past, written with wry humor and keen insight into the sometimes comic, sometimes tragic, sometimes downright eerie lives of cowboys, miners, and gamblers, villains and saints and men and women of both extremes, who've inhabited or passed through the region. The collection is a cultural treasure that Great Basin College is privileged to make available to the world via the Internet. New stories are added as Howard sees fit.
Creator
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Howard Hickson
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
Web site of Howard Hickson's Histories. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/index.html
Publisher
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Great Basin College
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
07/08/2014
Contributor
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Great Basin College
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c.2014 Howard Hickson
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A related resource
Web site of Howard Hickson's Histories. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/index.html
Format
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Content can be PDF or HTML documents.
Language
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English
Type
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Stories of northeastern Nevada history authored by Howard Hickson.
Coverage
The spatial or temporal topic of the resource, the spatial applicability of the resource, or the jurisdiction under which the resource is relevant
Elko, Nevada, northeastern Nevada, history, articles, Great Basin
Document
Documents such as transcripts, pdf files, legal documents, letters, etc.
Original Format
The type of object, such as painting, sculpture, paper, photo, and additional data
The PDF reproductions of the HTML reproductions of the original paper stories.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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Halley's Comet
Subject
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the visit of Halley's Comet.
Description
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the visit of Halley's Comet.
Creator
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Howard Hickson
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Website for Howard Hickson's Histories and the story, Halley's Comet: The First 100 Years. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/Comet.html
Publisher
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Great Basin College
Date
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04/21/2001
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Great Basin College
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c. 2001 Howard Hickson
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Website for Howard Hickson's Histories and the story, Halley's Comet: The First 100 Years. http://www.gbcnv.edu/hickson/Comet.html
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PDF format.
Language
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English
Type
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Story from Howard Hickson's Histories regarding the visit of Halley's Comet.
Coverage
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Elko, Nevada, northeastern Nevada, history, articles, Great Basin
Community
Crossroads
Elko
Great Basin
history
Northeastern Nevada
Story