Saturday, September 28, 2013

Mark Twain In Nevada

Virginia City, NV  High 76  Low 44

On Tuesday (seems like so long ago) we drove up to Virginia City. Jim drove and I got to enjoy the scenery. We had been to Virginia City on our last stopover in Carson City but I wanted to check out a couple of things we didn’t see.

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The first place we stopped was the Mark Twain Museum. Thanks to John's blog post, we decided this was a must stop for us.

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Samuel Clemens was born in Missouri in 1835. In 1861 his brother, Orion, was appointed secretary to the territorial governor of Nevada. Clemens jumped at the chance to go with his brother and spent his first year prospecting for gold or silver but didn’t have any success.

This was the desk he used when he worked for the newspaper.

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Being broke, he accepted a job as a reporter for the Territorial Enterprise in Virginia City. That is when he adopted a pen name, signing his articles with the name Mark Twain.

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He then moved on to California and published his first short story, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County, in 1865.

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The museum is in the basement of the building and so the pictures didn’t turn out all that good. Jim really enjoyed himself because he is fascinated by machinery and printing presses in particular.

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We also stopped by the Bucket of Blood Saloon – famous for their Bloody Mary’s. No we didn’t try them.

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We wandered up and down the main street of Virginia City for awhile. We got there early in the day and were ready to leave before the crowds got too bad.

We also took the time to see the first Catholic Church in Nevada – St. Mary’s of the Mountains. Beautiful church.

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Time for us to move further south. There was a lot more snow on the mountain tops.

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12 comments:

  1. Love Mark Twain ... I've been to several places where he's been... lol... that boy got around!

    Bucket of Blood? man

    love that last photo especially

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  2. Mark Twain was quite the character. Since Terry is from the same home town, we've always been pretty fascinated with him.

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  3. Great post. I remember reading about that in John's blog. It's something I have missed in the past so will plan to see it on our next trip to Nv. Seems like the snow is a bit early this year.

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  4. If I get there, the Mark Twain museum is a must:)

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  5. Looks like a very interesting place to visit. Another place to add to our bucket list!

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  6. There are so many great things to discover in the U.S. why go anywhere else.

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  7. I remember when John was there. What a very cool museum.

    I love visiting churches. That one is a beauty.

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  8. Looks like a nice visit to the old city. We used to ski in Lake Tahoe and made several visits to VC. We were there one Sunday when one of the saloons had a western band and folks came in period outfits to dance the two-step. We had a blast.

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  9. You certainly saw more than we did - thanks for sharing. I've been in Reno several times when the Street Vibrations were going on and am glad I missed it this time...

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  10. Mark Twain museum and a neat church, we have to visit.

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Thanks for visiting today. I look forward to reading your comments. Have a beautiful day.