>X-Sender: [log in to unmask]
>Date: Sun, 11 May 1997 19:18:09 -0700
>To: [log in to unmask]
>From: "Brian W. Kenny" <[log in to unmask]>
>Subject: NV Stagecoach Station Destroyed
>Cc: [log in to unmask]
>
>[ AzTeC / SWA SASIG ] :
>
>http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/1997/May-09-Fri-1997/news/5349449.html
>
>Friday, May 09, 1997
>Developer assailed for leveling ruins
>By Martin Griffith
>Associated Press
>
>STAGECOACH -- A California developer is under fire for leveling the ruins
of a historic stage station to make room for a subdivision in this rural
community 25 miles east of Carson City.
>
>Angry Stagecoach residents and Lyon County officials have accused Paul
Thompson                   of Walnut Grove of breaking a promise to protect
Desert Wells Station, a welcome stop                   on the Overland Stage
and Mail Route in the 1860s for thousands of travelers, including Mark Twain.
>
>"It's the classic case of a California developer coming in and having no
regard for Nevada or its history," resident Mary Dreeson said. "It's gone
and you can't bring it back."
>
>The station joins a series of privately owned historic sites that have
vanished in recent decades. The 117-year-old V&T Railroad roundhouse in
Carson City was torn down stone by stone in 1991 for use in a winery in
California's Napa Valley.
>
>Dreeson said she's especially upset because Thompson promised county
commissioners in 1996 he would protect the station ruins.
>
>John Evasovic, county community development director, said Thompson reneged
on his word, but was not required to keep it because no conditions regarding
the historic site were included in commissioners' final motion to approve
the subdivision.
>
>State and federal law provide no protections for historic sites on private
property.
>
>But Thompson is not entirely off the hook because he illegally began site
preparation work without a conference with county building officials and
without an approved set of street and drainage plans, Evasovic said.
>
>"Information has been turned over to (District Attorney Robert Estes) and
it's up to him whether he wants to pursue criminal charges against him," he
said.
>
>Estes didn't return a phone call. Thompson has no listed phone number in
the Walnut Grove area, and attempts to reach him through a business
associate were unsuccessful.
>
>Ed Johnson of Stagecoach said two hand-dug wells, a portion of a rock wall
and a wooden floor of the original station remained at the site before it
was leveled by a blader in April.
>
>The ruins may not have been extensive, but they stirred memories of the Old
West and deserved to be spared, he said.
>
>But Stagecoach real estate agent Mac Calico, broker for Thompson's Desert
Wells Estates, defended the decision to level the site about a half-mile
south of U.S. Highway 50.
>
>The wells probably were original, but posed a safety hazard because of
their depth, Calico said.
>
>Native rock at the site could have been the remnants of the station's walls
or corral, but the floor seemed more modern, he added.
>
>"What's the big deal? There was nothing there," Calico said. "One hundred
years isn't that old in the makeup of things any more. If we start
preserving every 100-year-old building, we won't have room for new buildings."
>
>But Johnson, who is Dayton's justice of the peace, said the ruins were a
rare link to early Nevada history commemorated by a historical marker and
mentioned in many books, including Twain's "Roughing It."
>
>Desert Wells Station began as a trading post for covered wagon pioneers on
the California Trail in the 1850s and became a station on the Overland Stage
and Mail Route in 1861 when Twain passed through on his way to Carson City
to begin a three-year stay in Nevada, according to historians.
>
>Twain chronicled a frightful night he and two companions spent in a
blizzard only to realize at daybreak they were 15 steps away from the station.
>
>Dreeson said county commissioners share the blame for the site's demise
because they failed to require its protection as a condition of approval for
the 23-house subdivision.
>
>As the nation's fastest growing state observes Historic Preservation Week
starting Sunday, Johnson said, the incident points out the need for a state
law to deal with historic sites on private property.
>
>"You can destroy anything if you own it and there needs to be something
done," he said. "We won't have anything left at the rate of development in
Nevada."
>
>But Ron James, state historic preservation officer, said it would be tough
to get such a law through the Nevada Legislature.
>
>"It's my impression Nevadans don't like to be told what they can do on
private property," he said. "Clearly, we're losing historic resources and
it's up to local governments to provide some sort of protection if there's
an appetite for it."
>
>[ See also: <http://www.moore-information.com/overland/ben.html> Overland
Stage ]
>
>
Anita Cohen-Williams
Information Specialist
Auto Club of Southern California
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