Caliente

Caliente began as a hay ranch feeding the mines at Pioche and Delamar, and might have stayed one if two railroad barons had not wanted the same canyon. For eleven years Harriman and Clark graded competing lines side by side, ignoring courts and marshals, until in 1901 rancher Charles Culverwell settled it with a shotgun and let one grade cross his meadows. The railroad made the town — a division point by 1905, a tent city of Austrian, Japanese, and Turkish workers, and, in 1923, the Mission-style depot that still anchors Main Street.

What the plaque says

Caliente was first settled as a ranch, furnishing hay for the mining camps of Pioche and Delamar. In 1901, the famous Harriman-Clark right-of-way battle was ended when rancher Charles Culverwell, with the aid of a broad-gauge shotgun, allowed one railroad grade to be built through his lush meadows. Harriman and Clark had been battling eleven years building side-by-side grades, ignoring court orders and Federal marshals. The population boom began with an influx of railroad workers, most of them immigrants from Austria, Japan and Turkey. Not understanding the laws and customs of the land, racial conflicts were frequent. A tent city was settled in August, 1903. With the completion of the Los Angeles, San Pedro and Salt Lake Railroad in 1905, Caliente became a division point. In 1906-07, the Caliente and Pioche Railroad (now the Union Pacific) was built between Pioche and the main line at Caliente. The large Neo-Mission type depot was built in 1923, serving as a civic center, as well as a hotel.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Cathedral Gorge State Park — 15 mi
  A drained ancient lakebed eroded into buff-colored spires and narrow slot "caves" — one of Nevada's first state parks, and the gentle, otherworldly counterweight to the Silver Trails' ghost towns.
• Pioche — 22 mi
  The silver camp that, by legend, out-killed the Old West — Boot Hill's boots-on graves, the graft-ridden Million-Dollar Courthouse, and an aerial tramway still slung over Main Street.

More markers nearby

• Union Pacific Depot 1923 — steps away
• Panaca — 14 mi
• Panaca Ward Chapel — 14 mi
• Panaca Mercantile — 14 mi