Nevada Trivia & Tidbits - Page 17

Looking for Nevada trivia? Try our list Nevada little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

One of the largest roller coasters in the world—the Desperado in Primm, south of Las Vegas—takes the hail and hearty over a mile of thrills at a maximum speed of 80 miles per hour. The biggest drop plunges 225 feet down a 55-degree hill.

first appeared: 9/9/2001

High in the East Humboldt Range, near Wells (pop. 1,346), Angel Lake stretches out as a picturesque pool surrounded by mountains. The road to the lake leads through sagebrush before heading into mountain mahogany, aspen, and pine.

first appeared: 9/9/2001

The state’s longest river is the Humboldt, which runs 500 miles from the Humboldt Mountains east of Elko to Humboldt Sink, south of Lovelock (pop. 2,003).

first appeared: 9/2/2001

Hoover Dam, first called Boulder Dam and renamed to honor President Herbert Hoover in 1947, is the highest concrete arch dam in the country, soaring to a height of 726 feet and running 1,244 feet along its crest.

first appeared: 8/26/2001

Lincoln County was named for Abraham Lincoln, who was president when Nevada was made a state Oct. 31, 1864.

first appeared: 8/19/2001

When Orion Clemens came to Nevada in 1861 to serve as territorial secretary, his brother Samuel also came along. Samuel soon became a reporter for Virginia City’s Territorial Enterprise, where he worked under the pen name of Mark Twain.

first appeared: 8/19/2001

A visit to the Grimes Point Archeological Site, near Fallon (pop. 7,536), offers a look at rock drawings created by people who lived in the area between 5000 B.C. and A.D. 1500. Later works of the period reveal elaborate drawings of deer, lizards, and the sun.

first appeared: 8/12/2001

Virginia City (pop. 920) was the seat of operations in the Comstock Lode, the richest known silver deposit in the United States. It gets its name from prospector Henry T.P. Comstock, who was among those staking claims in the area in 1859 in hopes of finding gold. He sold his claim before the lode became wildly profitable after its sand was assayed for silver.

first appeared: 8/5/2001

More than 220 unique autos are on display in the National Automobile Museum, located in Reno. The oldest car in the collection is an 1892 Philion Road Carriage. Powered by a two-cylinder, one horsepower steam engine, it is one of the oldest American-built cars.

first appeared: 7/29/2001

The Black Rock Desert at the north end of the Reno-Tahoe area is where the sound barrier was first broken by a vehicle on land. That took place in 1997, when the rocket-powered Thrust SSC achieved a speed of 763.035 mph.

first appeared: 7/22/2001

The state motto—“All for Our Country”—has been a part of the state seal since it was adopted in 1866, but no records of the committee meetings and legislative discussions exist telling why those words were selected.

first appeared: 7/15/2001

Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge, 30 miles west of Pahrump (pop. 24,631), is home to at least 24 plants and animals found nowhere else in the world. The 22,117-acre refuge also includes spring-fed wetlands and alkaline desert uplands.

first appeared: 7/15/2001

The Jarbidge Wilderness, located near Jarbidge (pop. 60), derives its name from a Shoshone legend about a group of braves that chased a wild and fierce creature they called a jarbidge into an area cave and blocked it inside with boulders.

first appeared: 7/8/2001

A trip to the historic district of Boulder City (pop. 12,567) offers visitors a collection of buildings erected in the 1930s during construction of Hoover Dam. The city was built as a residential community for workers building the dam and other projects.

first appeared: 7/1/2001

The Nevada Territory, created in 1861, was nearly named Washoe after the Washoe Indians who lived in the area. Although the name Nevada prevailed, a county stretching across the western edge of the state bears the name Washoe.

first appeared: 6/24/2001

What do you name a community inside the southern point of Nevada and near the Arizona and California state lines? How about Cal Nev Ari (pop. 350).

first appeared: 6/17/2001

Cathedral Gorge State Park, near Panaca (pop. 700), offers visitors views of rock formations resembling cathedral spires. Eons of erosion have carved the distinctive shapes into the area’s soft clay.

first appeared: 6/17/2001

The state’s highest mountain is 13,145-foot Boundary Peak near the California border south of Hawthorne (pop. 4,162). Nevada’s longest river is the Humboldt, which flows for 500 miles from the Humboldt Mountains east of Elko (pop. 14,736) to Humboldt Sink south of Lovelock (pop. 2,069).

first appeared: 6/10/2001

Pyramid Lake in western Nevada is the state’s largest natural lake and a bountiful fishing spot. In the 1880s, the lake became a major commercial fishing ground; by the early 1900s, Paiute fishermen were being hired to catch 10 to 15 tons of trout a week to be sold in the mining camps.

first appeared: 6/3/2001

Belmont, near Tonopah (pop. 3,616), is a ghost town now but once was the seat of Nye County government. The courthouse, built in 1876 and in service until 1905, is a historical attraction today.

first appeared: 6/3/2001

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