Mound House
Lyon County, Lyon County, Nevada
Marker Inscription
Moundhouse. Mound House was located one-half mile north of this point. Originally constructed in 1871 as a station and siding on the Virginia and Truckee Railroad, it served for some time simply as a wood and water stop. In 1877, a post office was established. Mound House came into its own in 1880, when the V & T began construction of a narrow-gauge railroad from here to the mining camps of western Nevada and the Owens Valley region of California. Named the Carson & Colorado, it turned Mound House into a booming shipping point.The Southern Pacific Railroad purchased the C & C from the V & T 1900, just prior to the Tonopah silver strike. In 1905, the Southern Pacific built a short line from its new station at Hazen, on the main line, to intersect the C & C at Fort Churchill. The Hazen cutoff took most of the booming Tonopah-Goldfield business away from the V & T.From 1900 to 1920, extensive gypsum mining and milling operations, to produce plaster, were carried on immediately northwest of Mound House.The narrow-gauge line was abandoned from Mound House to Fort Churchill in 1934 and the V & T track from Carson City to Virginia City in 1938. Within a few years, Mound House had disappeared.
Erected by Julia C. Bulette Chaptere. Clampus Vitus
The Story
Mound House started in 1871 as a modest wood-and-water stop on the Virginia and Truckee Railroad, gaining a post office in 1877. It came into its own in 1880 when the V&T launched the narrow-gauge Carson & Colorado toward the mining camps of western Nevada and the Owens Valley, turning the junction into a bustling shipping point; from 1900 to 1920 nearby gypsum mines and mills produced plaster. Once the narrow gauge was pulled back in 1934 and the V&T lifted in 1938, Mound House swiftly faded away.
Why it matters
Its rise and disappearance mirror how the fortunes of countless Western settlements were dictated entirely by the coming and going of the railroad.
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Related events
- · Construction of the Carson & Colorado Railroad, 1880
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
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