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CarsonChris

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Carson City, NV
This week I've been researching James W Nye the first territorial governor of NV and one of Nevada's first Senators. While researching this political figure of the past I learned Mark Twain was his secretary and that Nye asked Twain to write back to some of Nye's Nevada constituents to dissuade them from things they want. The responses from Mark Twain are hilarious.

https://americanliterature.com/author/mark-twain/short-story/my-late-senatorial-secretaryship
 
This guy shot his wife and then himself. I found a bunch of horse tack items on his property as he was a horse salesman.
Full news article
 

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I took this name tag around town and ask about it and everyone eyes lit up because they remembered him from their youth.
 

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A farmer by the name George Brooks was killed when he got run over by some horses. His wife was pregnant with his son when he died. The picture is of his last son. The stone says, Father, they smile once filled my heart with gladness. I found nothing on the farm because is was converted to a junk yard for several years back in the 80's. It was impossible to detect.
 

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This guy shot his wife and then himself. I found a bunch of horse tack items on his property as he was a horse salesman.
Full news article

There is a homestead/ranch 3 miles from Carson City. While researching it I discovered that one of the family members kept getting notes on his door saying they knew what he did. After a couple weeks of this the kid committed suicide. I did find a 1928 peace dollar at the ranch!
This is the article.

https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn86076354/1914-06-14/ed-1/seq-4/
 
Research has taught me how much local history can be wrong. Here is a good example. Local history holds that since 1541 when Coronado was led through Kansas, that a crossing was used by their Indian guides called an old ancient trail used by their ancestors. History has Coronado Crossing about 4 miles east of Dodge City where a cross monument marks where they think Coronado held the first Christian Service in North America. See pictures. In 1821 William Becknell, dubbed the Father of the Santa Fe Trail, was also led by Indian guides across the Arkansas on a trail they called ancient and used by their ancestors. History has it "around where current 2nd st. crosses the Arkansas today". They also camped on a hill after crossing the river.

What history missed is the obvious connection to a familiar crossing by all who dared cross the Arkansas on the Santa Fe Trail to Santa Fe. This cutoff was called "La Jornada" (The Journey) by the Spanish, because it left the safety of the Arkansas River where they had access to water, but cut two days off the trip to Santa Fe. Why historians never put these travelers crossing together is beyond me, but my research shows they were one in the same. This same crossing had been used since before Coronado's crossing in 1541, and is right in the middle of downtown Dodge City.

Also shown in the pictures is the crossing as it looks today. I always wondered why Sunnyside street was not North & South, but on an angle from 2nd St. researching, I found that Sunnyside followed an old trail that crossed the Arkansas at 2nd st. and headed straight towards Santa Fe.

So, Coronado crossed at the same ancient trail in 1541 that William Becknell used in 1821, and the first Christian Service was held on what later became Boot Hill.

I have tried to get them to change this misinformation, but they have a Coronado Bridge east of dodge and the Coronado Cross on a hill east of dodge. Still there today.

Take that ameture historians LOL.
 

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Research has taught me how much local history can be wrong. Here is a good example. ....

This is a great post ! Yes, sometimes we md'rs end up knowing more than the archies and historians. Amazing post.
 
I was researching my home, and found out a lot. The family was on this area in 1850, I'm not sure where. They purchased the land at the county Sheriff's auction in 1867, the man passed in 1876. They had three parcels of land, 200 acres each. The woman lived here in the house afterward until she passed. They have a small family cemetery right around the corner, about 100 feet from the house, him and her are buried there. There was a son that joined the war in 1861, but died of typhoid fever at training camp that was here in town, he is also buried in the cemetery. There was a small town a few miles down the road, that is nothing more than a store, and some houses now. The boy joined the town militia, called Ringgold's Raiders. I also found out my great-great grandfather came to our town, to train at the camps in 1862.
 
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