Everything from the buildings to the roads are protected & preserved. National Historic Landmark (NHL) Districts, meaning the city as a whole-and much of the surrounding area-is recognized for its historical significance. Virginia City is one of a select few U.S. For the thousands of miners that were employed here, an injury in the mines was as likely as a street fight after a hard days’ work. Late 1800’s Virginia City was a place where bordellos outnumbered bakeries one where saloons and opium dens offered medicines an aching mind and body couldn’t find at a doctor’s office. Virginia City’s overnight prosperity wouldn’t last forever, but it would spawn a seedy underbelly and a culture of hard-core boozing, gambling, prostitution and violence. Over the span of just three decades, Virginia City’s silver mines generated the modern-day equivalent of over $10 billion. Money-hungry miners and prospectors followed suit, making the 250-mile journey east.
The dust had not yet settled on California’s Gold Rush and suddenly, Nevada silver took its place atop the minds of bankers, entrepreneurs, and industrialists.
The great Comstock Lode of the late 19th century transformed Virginia City, Nevada from a small mining town into the Richest Place on Earth.
