Nevada's Capitol
Carson City, Carson City, Nevada
Marker Inscription
Nevada’s Capitol. Completed in 1871, Nevada’s splendid Victorian-era Capitol was built of sandstone from the quarry of the town’s founder, Abe Curry. The octagon annex was added in 1907, the north and south wings in 1915. Notable features are its Alaskan marble walls, French crystal windows, and elegant interior.
Erected by Daughters Of The American Colonists
The Story
Completed in 1871, Nevada's Victorian-era Capitol was raised from sandstone quarried by Carson City's founder, Abe Curry. An octagonal annex followed in 1907 and the north and south wings in 1915. Its elegant interior boasts Alaskan marble walls and French crystal windows, a statehouse built to befit a young silver state.
Why it matters
The Capitol embodies the ambitions of newly minted Nevada, a Civil War–era state determined to build a permanent seat of government worthy of its mineral wealth.
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Related people
- · Abe Curry
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
The Warm Springs Hotel And Nevada State Prison
Carson City, NV
Built around 1860 by Abraham Curry, co-founder of Carson City, the Warm Springs Hotel was a grand structure of hand-hewn sandstone from a nearby quarry. Nevada's first Territorial Legislature met here in 1861, and in 1862 Curry leased part of the building to hold prisoners—the seed of the Nevada State Prison, which the state purchased in 1864. For nearly a century, inmates cut the distinctive sandstone that built the State Capitol, the U.S. Mint, and the prison itself.
Bowers Mansion
Washoe County, NV
Bowers Mansion, built in 1864, stands as a monument to the sudden riches of the Comstock Lode. Lemuel "Sandy" Bowers and Eilley Orrum, whose adjoining Gold Canyon claims struck a rich vein, married and became likely the first millionaires the great find produced, raising this house on their new fortune. But misfortune chased fortune: the vein gave out, a mill was destroyed, Sandy died in 1868, and Eilley finally lost the property to foreclosure in 1878, dying in poverty even as the mansion lived on as a popular resort.
The Winters Ranch (Rancho Del Sierra)
Washoe County, NV
Completed around 1864, this large Gothic-style mansion was the home of Theodore and Maggie Winters and their seven children, built with proceeds from the Comstock on land the Winters brothers purchased from earlier Mormon settlers. Theodore expanded the property to some 6,000 acres, breeding outstanding race horses while also running a large dairy and raising cattle, work horses, and sheep. Active in politics, he was elected a territorial representative in 1862.
Nevada's First Gold Discovery
Lyon County, NV
In July 1849, Abner Blackburn, a former member of the Mormon Battalion, made what is regarded as the first gold discovery in present-day Nevada near this spot, followed by William Prouse's find up Gold Canyon in 1850. Convinced California's riches were greater, most emigrants pressed on, but by 1851 some 200 placer miners—among them James "Old Virginny" Finney—were working the canyon. Their continuous presence at Gold Canyon's mouth made Dayton Nevada's first non-Native settlement.