Description
This collection consists of four account books. The first two of these
were created during the early 1890s by a Washoe Valley, Nevada general
merchandise store--possibly that operated during the 1880s by C.A. Lee of
Franktown. The third account book was owned by William Morris, who worked as a
blacksmith during 1856-57 and was later Justice of the Peace of Township #3 in
Contra Costa County as is evidenced by the presence of Justice's Minutes (1865)
in the same volume. The fourth book was created by a blacksmith in Uniontown
(Lotus), El Dorado County, Calif. (1860-1863).
Background
During the late 19th c. the Washoe Valley, located half way between
Carson City and Reno, was a quiet agricultural region.A generation earlier the
three principal villages in the valley--Franktown, Washoe City and Steamboat
Springs--had been booming,due to the need for lumber and other goods and
services at the nearby Comstock Lode in Virginia City. In 1866 Washoe City is
said to have featured seventy stamp mills! During the 1860s, Washoe City was
the county seat of Washoe County and Franktown, as the site of a large saw
mill, was the principal supplier of timber to Nevada's silver mines. When the
Central Pacific Railroad was completed in 1869, however, Reno--which lay on the
route--became the county seat. Soon afterward a spur line linked Virginia City
with Reno. By 1881 Washoe City was "But the mournful relic of its former
greatness," according to Thompson & West's History of Nevada.