Nevada Historical Marker #112
Carlin. Carlin, the oldest town in Elko County, was established as a railroad division point in December 1868 by the Central Pacific Railroad. When the railroad tracks reached the Carlin meadows, always a favorite stopping place for wagon trains along the California Emigrant Trail, construction crews laid out a townsite and built a large roundhouse and shops Central Pacific officials named the town after William Passmore Carlin, a Union general who served his country with distinction during and after the Civil War.During the 1870s and early 1880s, Carlin competed with Elko, Palisade, and Winnemucca for the staging and freighting business of the many mining camps north and south of the railroad. In 1965, the town became the principle shipping point for the nearby Carlin Gold Mine, the second largest gold-producer in the U.S.Carlin is still a principle division point on the Union Pacific Railroad line. During the period from 1906 until the early 1950s, Carlin was an important icing station in Nevada for refrigerator cars on both the Southern and Western Pacific Railroads (Western Pacific reached Carlin from the east in 1908, but freight and passenger service was not inaugurated over this transcontinental line until 1910).
West Hamilton St, Carlin, NV, United States
Nevada Historical Marker #50
Carlin Canyon. In December 1828, Peter Skene Ogden and his trapping brigade (Hudson’s Bay Company’s Fifth Snake Country Expedition) were the first European Americans to enter here. Joseph Paul, one of Ogden’s trappers, died nearby—the first emigrant to die and be buried in the Humboldt Country.Late in 1845, John Frémont dispatched a group down the Humboldt. They traversed this canyon with difficulty on November 10. In September 1846, the Reed-Donner Party, en route to disaster in the deep snows of the Sierra Nevada, viewed the canyon.The Central Pacific’s Chinese track gangs constructed the transcontinental railroad (now Southern Pacific) through here in December 1868. Subsequently, the canyon became known as Carlin or Moleen Canyon. The Western Pacific, the second transcontinental rail link across Nevada, was constructed in 1907.In 1913, Nevada Route 1, the first auto road, took over the abandoned Central Pacific grade through the canyon. In 1920, Route 1 became the Victory Highway, and in 1926, U.S. Highway 40. In its freeway phase, it is now designated Interstate 80.
Chestnut St, Carlin, NV, United States