Online Nevada Encyclopedia

Transportation and Exploration

White Pine County

White Pine County embraces 8,877 square miles in eastern Nevada, in the White Pine Range adjacent to the Utah border. The state legislature established the county in 1869 as a result of the mining boom at Hamilton, its first county seat. The boom ended after less than three years, but the community continued to serve as the center of government until the courthouse burned. Ely became the county seat in 1887.

White River Narrows

The White River Narrows Archeological District, approximately 90 miles south of Ely, Nevada, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1976. The area is especially scenic because of its rhyolite cliffs on which much of the Archaeological District's rock art is situated.

William A. Clark

William Andrews Clark, a one-time United States senator and railroad magnate, is the namesake for Clark County in recognition of the rail line he owned and built that extended through the Las Vegas Valley, and the 1905 land auction that is considered the birth of Las Vegas.

William Chapman Ralston

William Ralston was a California investor who assembled the means to monopolize the Comstock Lode during the 1860s. Born in Ohio in 1826, Ralston moved to San Francisco in 1854 and became a rising star as part owner in a steamship company. Beginning in 1860, he turned his attention and his investments to Comstock mines.

Winnemucca

The site of modern-day Winnemucca has been important to Nevada since the first explorers traversed the region in the late 1820s. It later became a critical place for early settlers, and marked the point at which the immigrant trail headed south toward the Sierra Nevada passes. Winnemucca became a major distribution point for the Central Pacific Railroad, established itself as the center of commerce in north-central Nevada, and was the site of a major bank robbery that remains controversial to this day.

Donner Party: Frequently Asked Questions

How many people were in the Donner Party and how many died?

Donner Party

Part 1: The Picnic

The Donner Party was a group of families that set off overland for California in ox-drawn covered wagons in 1846. They planned a two-thousand-mile, five-month walk across the continent to new opportunities, but were trapped in the Sierra Nevada Mountains by the terrible winter of 1846-47.
About half died, and some of the survivors resorted to cannibalism to stay alive. Their story has become a tragic icon of the American West.

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