Bowers Mansion

Sandy Bowers and Eilley Orrum were probably the first millionaires the Comstock ever made. Strangers who happened to hold adjoining claims in Gold Canyon, they married, struck a rich vein, and in 1863 built the grandest house in the territory on Eilley's Washoe Valley land—touring Europe to furnish it. The fortune did not hold. The vein gave out, a new mill failed, Sandy died in 1868, and in 1878 Eilley lost the mansion to foreclosure—fittingly, to Reno's Myron Lake. She died in poverty in 1903. The restored mansion is now the centerpiece of a Washoe County park.

What the plaque says

BUILT— 1864 RESTORED —1967 Bowers Mansion recalls the wealth of the Comstock Bonanza. Lemuel S. “Sandy”& Eilley Orrum Bowers were probably the first millionaires produced by the famous find in Gold Canyon. As strangers, they had adjoining claims. After a rich vein was struck, they were soon married and had this mansion built. Misfortune followed fortune and soon all was lost. The richness of their vein gave out, a new mill was destroyed, financiers balked, and then Sandy died in 1868. Maneuvering to make the property self sustaining, Eilley struggled on. Finally, in 1878, she lost the property by foreclosure to Myron C. Lake. After that, the properly had a succession of owners including Henry Ritter, who managed it as popular resort from 1903 to 1946. Eilley Orrum Bowers died in poverty and unwittingly, she and Sandy left a legacy to Nevada.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Sand Harbor — 7.8 mi
  The crown of Lake Tahoe's Nevada shore—car-sized granite boulders standing in water so clear the boats above them seem to float on air, on a beach the Washoe kept for thousands of summers
• The Flume Trail & Marlette Lake — 8.3 mi
  The other thing the Comstock took off Lake Tahoe—not its trees but its water, hauled over a mountain range through the highest-pressure pipeline on earth, on a flume grade that is now one of the country's great mountain-bike rides
• Carson City — 9.2 mi
  The capital one man platted before there was a territory—where the Comstock's silver became coin at a U.S. Mint and a small sandstone city that has run Nevada ever since
• Chollar Mine — 10 mi
  A real Comstock silver mine you can still walk into—four hundred feet of original timbered tunnel under C Street, where the work that built a state was done by hand, in the dark

More markers nearby

• Franktown — 0.9 mi
• The Winters Ranch — 2.0 mi
• Mount Rose Weather Observatory — 3.6 mi
• Galena Creek Fish Hatchery — 4.8 mi