Tuscarora

Tuscarora boomed twice and emptied once. John and Steve Beard found placer gold here in 1867; then in 1871 the rich Mount Blitzen silver lodes touched off a real rush, and the camp swelled past three thousand. When the transcontinental railroad was finished in 1869, hundreds of Chinese laborers came to work the Tuscarora placers, forming one of the largest Chinese communities in the mining country. The silver gave out, the people left, and Tuscarora dwindled toward ghost-town quiet northwest of Elko. A handful still live there, and a pottery school now draws artists to the old silver camp.

What the plaque says

This colorful historic camp originated with 1867 discovery of placer gold by John and Steve Beard. In 1871, W.O. Weed discovered the rich Mount Blitzen silver lodes, two miles northeast of the Beard Claims. The camp was named by C.M. Bensen, who had served on the Civil War gunboat Tuscarora, namesake of a tribe in the Iroquois Confederation. Tuscarora's first boom, 1872-1876, boosted its population to three thousand whites, and a like number of Chinese. Hordes of the latter had swarmed here on foot from Elko in the summer of 1869. Abandoned by the Central Pacific Railroad after its completion. They started extensive placer operations at the Beard discovery site, later called Old Town, to differentiate it from the main camp two miles distant on Mount Blitzen. Estimates of silver and gold production during the camp's lifetime, 1867-1915, ranged from 10 million to 40 million. Principal silver mines were the Navajo, Belle Isle, Argenta, Commonwealth and Grand Prize. The only gold mine, The Dexter, opened after the principal silver strikes and operated continuously until 1898, Toll roads, crowded with stage coaches and long strings of heavy freight wagons, serviced the camp from railheads at Elko, Carlin, Battle Mountain and Winnemucca.

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Dinner Station — 18 mi