Letters From The Nevada Frontier: Correspondence Of Tasker L. Oddie, 1898-1902 (Nevada History) - Softcover

9780874175820: Letters From The Nevada Frontier: Correspondence Of Tasker L. Oddie, 1898-1902 (Nevada History)
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In 1898, Tasker L. Oddie, a twenty-seven-year-old New Jersey attorney and business executive, moved to Austin, Nevada, to serve as secretary of a company with mining and other interests in central Nevada. Over the next four years, he wrote frequent letters to his mother recounting the rigors of life on the Nevada frontier and the people he met there - miners, ranchers, Native Americans, and the townspeople of tiny, remote Austin and other isolated backcountry settlements. Nevada at the end of the nineteenth century was in economic decline, its known deposits of precious minerals nearly exhausted, its population drifting away to other possibilities. Soon Oddie was also striking out on his own in search of valuable mining prospects, eventually finding his fortune in the spectacular silver deposits of Tonopah, which were discovered in 1900.
Oddie's letters are full of vivid details, the lively accounts of a young man eager to experience life and make his fortune, observant and humorous, intelligent and endlessly curious. The letters remain the best records we have of central Nevada when it was still very much an unsettled frontier, peopled by rugged pioneers and ever-hopeful fortune-seekers. Through Oddie's letters, we see the depressing stagnating of mining towns in decline and the hectic excitement of the boom times following the Tonopah strike. This is real grass-roots history, sparkling with information about mining and community building in the frontier West. Eventually, Oddie became wealthy, expanding his interests from mining to cattle raising and going on to enter politics, eventually serving as governor of Nevada, then as U.S. senator. These letters of his youth document not only the spirit that eventually made him a leader of his state, but the state that he was one day to lead. Now available in paperback for the first time, Letters from the Nevada Frontier is an essential resource for anyone interested in the history of Nevada at the end of the nineteenth century.

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About the Author:
Tasker L. Oddie (1870–1950) arrived in Nevada as an attorney for the Nevada Company and became involved in the discovery of the Tonopah silver belt. He achieved political prominence as Nevada’s governor and U.S. senator. William A. Douglass helped to initiate the University of Nevada, Reno, Basque Studies Program (now Center for Basque Studies) and served as its coordinator for more than thirty years. Robert A. Nylen is curator of history at the Nevada State Museum.
From Library Journal:
Attorney Oddie initially moved to Nevada to work for the Nevada Company, which had mining interests in the state. He eventually struck off on his own, became wealthy through his involvement with silver claims in the fabulous strike at Tonopah, and turned to politics. This volume collects letters that Oddie wrote during his first years to his family back home in New Jersey, particularly his mother. They are of significant value because they tell the story of the Tonopah Mining Company from the perspective of a participant in the drama; Oddie's letters clearly reflect the excitement of the silver strike. The letters also depict less dramatic aspects of the early life of a man who went on to become a member of the U.S. Senate, detailing his finances, his attitude toward Indians and cowboys, and his comments on the clothing styles and behavior of his associates. This is a specialized work that will have value for libraries interested in this aspect of Nevada history.
- Dorothy Lilly, Grosse Pointe North H.S. Lib., Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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  • PublisherUniversity of Nevada Press
  • Publication date2004
  • ISBN 10 0874175828
  • ISBN 13 9780874175820
  • BindingPaperback
  • Number of pages416
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9780806124483: Letters from the Nevada Frontier: Correspondence of Tasker L. Oddie, 1898-1902

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