Osceola Nevada History and Photos

OSCEOLA - (1872-1940)  
is located 3 miles east of U.S. Hwy. 50 & 6, and 8 miles east of their junction with US 93, south of Sacramento Pass; 29 miles east of Ely.  The Osceola mining district was the largest producer of gold in Nevada and the longest lived placer camp in Nevada. 

Hydraulic mining was inaugurated here by using water brought to Dry Gulch by a 30-mile long ditch.  Remains of the ditch can be seen in various places.  Placer mining continues to be done on a small scale here.   

Lode gold was discovered in the Exchange Claim located above Dry Gulch on the northeast slope of Pilot Knob Ridge in 1872. The gold-bearing quartz belt was 12 miles long by 7 miles wide. Placer gold was found in 1877. The Osceola Mining District produced the largest gold nugget ever discovered in Nevada when a 25-pound gold nugget was found in Dry Gulch in 1877. 

Osceola was founded in 1877. In 1881, the town boasted a hotel, restaurant, livery stable, blacksmith shop, school house, butcher shop, a jail, an assay office, several saloons and other stores. 

Ore was milled from over 100 lode claims using arrastras by 1878. In 1878 a 5-stamp mill was built in Dry Gulch. Another was built in 1880 on Mill Creek. A cyanide plant and another stamp mill was built in the early 1900's near Sacramento Pass. Two ditches were dug in 1885 to provide water for more elaborate mining methods.

The Osceola Nugget newspaper started their presses in 1903.  Tungsten was discovered in the area in 1916. Bat Caves produced phosphate rich bat guano.

The post office, a store and a saloon operated until 1920, serving the area cattle and grain ranchers and farmers of the Spring and Snake Valleys. The town was almost completely destroyed by a fire in 1940's.

Chinese workers came to this area in search of work as cooks, laundrymen, wood-cutters, vegetable gardeners, sheep herders, ore and wood haulers, miners and general laborers when lode gold was discovered above Dry Gulch in 1872. The Chinese lived in subterranean dens dug into the hillside overlooking Osceola and practiced their traditional way of life. There was once a separate cemetery for the Chinese residents of Osceola but the bodies were disinterred and returned to China.

Click on the White Pine Public Museum photo below to see an enlarged view of the town.

Osceola had a post office, store and saloons. A cemetery and one original building remains after a fire nearly leveled the town in the 1940's.  See Historical markers

Osceola is now a ghost town, almost nothing remains because of a fire in the 1940's.

Ayers, Joe - A drunken blacksmith, challenged Capt. D. B. Akey, a tunnel driller, to a duel. Ayers lost. Akey was acquitted. No date given but the incident happened in the early days of the town. Nevada Tales From the Past by White Pine Chamber of Commerce 1964, page 30.

Bussy, Charles - of Palestine, Illinois, ca 43, died 31 Oct 1887 + Born December 8, 1943, died October 31, 1887 *

Collins, Inez L. - Daughter of A. O. And I. M. Collins, born April 27, 1908, died May 15, 1908 *

Kathan, Deckros - Born 1841, Cowansville, Canada, died March 24, 1899, Cleveland, NV, age 58 years *

Kiger, Nathan - Born Feb. 22, 1861, died Nov. 3, 1934

Marriott, Alberta Nevada - Born May 17, 1892, died June 17, 1892 *

Marriott, Bertha - Born Jan. 26, 1908, died March 8, 1908 *

Marriott, George Henry - Died July 18, 1890, age 10 months 6 days *

Marriott, James Elma - Born Jan. 7, 1886, died March 31, 1886 *

Marriott, John C. - 1858 - 1922 * Operated the Marriott General Store which was the only business building to survive the fire which burned the town in 1948. The store was a stone structure with tall, narrow iron shutters and doors. The Marriott home, which survived the fire, was near the store across from an iron pipe feeding cold spring water and surrounded by fruit trees and roses. (Ghosts of the Glory Trail by Nell Murbarger page 160.)

Marriott, Mary - 1861 - 1915 *

Marriott, Sarah - Born March 9, 1826, died Nov. 8, 1899 *

Moyer, Stanley H. - Born Oct. 10, 1926, died Nov. 18, 1926 *

Odgers, Charles Henry - Born Jan. 3, 1848, Cornwall, England, died Dec. 11, 1903 *

Schilling, Arthur P. - of Chicago, Illinois, ca 29, died 19 Apr 1906 +

Scott, J. T. - Born in Ohio May 4, 1827, died July 1, 1903 *

Skinner, Julius A. - of South Carolina, 73 years 10 months 12 days, died 18 Jan 1903 + Born March 5, 1829, died Jan 17, 1893

Swallow, George William - Died Jan. 22, 1881, aged 3 years, 11 days. Son of George A. Swallow *

Tilford, Rosa B. - Died Dec. 16, 1887, aged 12 years 6 months, 4 days. *

Unknown prisoner - An unnamed man in the Osceola jail was killed by a Spring Valley vigilante committee who were avenging the attempted killing of a local rancher. June 7, 1883.