Eeerrrkkkk! Slow down
Venzaliner, take a left here. I love it
when I’m driving along and suddenly obscure objects appear…even Eminem Can't Hold Me Back. My thought, we are
being invaded by giant Coneheads or giant beehives…not sure which one; and, if it’s
Coneheads, maybe they would have mass quantities of consumables!
Not Coneheads or beehives…Charcoal Ovens! Here I am in the
Egan Mountain Range, a high desert environment, at the Ward Charcoal Ovens State
Historical Park. In the Silver boom years, late 1800s, the area was a major
stopover for settlers traveling the Cave Valley road from Paoche to Toano
Nevada. My one-night stopover was interesting, quiet and relaxing; I wandered around the Ward charcoal ovens, cemetery, mining district and town
site.
There were six charcoal ovens made of tertiary volcanic and
quartz latite tuff rock and each 30’ high and 27’ in diameter at the base with
20” thick walls. Each oven held 35 cords of wood and produced 1,750 bushels of
charcoal according to Nevada Division of State Parks. FYI, sorry to report, no
consumables!
The highlight of the cemetery was the obelisk-style headstone
of Martin Gleeson, murdered by his mining partner John Roach over a mining
claim dispute. Even back in the days, people killed people…hmm?!
The town site is nothing but a few rock foundations with tin and broken glass. One-third of the town was wiped out by a fire in 1883
and the town died in 1888 when the US Post Office closed its doors. Hmmm? Makes
one wonder what will happen to those little towns of today where the US Post
Office is closing its doors.
A neat little place hidden in the Egan Mountain Range where the sheep roam the hillsides (very noisy) and the free range cattle stir up the dust...
Good sights, good eats, good day...only problem, I left my Nevada DeLorme atlas on the picnic table…oh which way do I go?
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