Genoa and Mormon Station: Nevada's Oldest Settlement in Carson Valley

Carson Valley opens at the eastern foot of the Sierra Nevada like a green lap, and at its western edge, tucked against the granite, sits Genoa — a town of about thirteen hundred people, a single shaded Main Street, and the oldest permanent settlement in Nevada. It began in 1851 as Mormon Station, a stockaded trading post on the emigrant road, where wagon trains that had just survived the desert stopped to buy flour, shoe their oxen, and gather themselves for the climb over the mountains.

Nevada was not yet a state, a territory, or even a map line when the first logs went up here. The name changed, the Mormon settlers were called home, the original post burned, and a replica now stands in its place — but the settlement itself never stopped. This is the story of how a trail-side corral became Genoa, of the Norwegian skier who carried the Sierra's mail across the snow, and of the saloon that has been pouring since 1853.

Mormon Station and the Emigrant Trail

The first attempt came in the spring of 1850, when Abner Blackburn and Hampton Beatie, with a handful of other men out of Salt Lake City, threw up four log walls beside a stream in Carson Valley — no roof, no floor, little more than a corral with ambitions. It was meant to catch the gold-rush traffic coming down the Carson River. Beatie sold the unfinished post and headed home that September, and the station stood empty.

The settlement that lasted belongs to John Reese. A Salt Lake merchant who had once employed Beatie, Reese reached the site on July 4, 1851, with a train of wagons loaded with goods and seed, guided in by his nephew Stephen Kinsey. He took over the abandoned claim, fenced and plowed thirty acres, and built a log store and hotel inside a stockade, with a blacksmith shop to mend the broken wagons that crawled in off the trail. Turnips sold for a dollar a bunch. By the close of that first year the settlers had drawn up a squatters' government of their own, and Reese was its recorder.

The location was no accident. The Carson Route of the California Trail ran straight down what is now Main Street, and every emigrant who crossed the Forty-Mile Desert and followed the Carson River upstream eventually arrived at Reese's gate. Carson Valley was Washoe country long before the wagons, and the trading post sat at the hinge between two worlds: the dry basin behind and the high Sierra ahead. Fresh vegetables, hay, a forge, a bed under a roof — in 1851 these were worth far more than their price.

From Mormon Station to Genoa

For its first years the post answered to Salt Lake. Brigham Young sent the apostle Orson Hyde to the valley in 1855 to survey a townsite, set up a county government, and fix the line between Utah and California. Hyde served as probate judge and held court in the loft of Reese's trading post. The surveyed town took the name Genoa in 1856, after the Italian port that gave the world Christopher Columbus. Locals say it juh-NO-uh, never the way the Italians do.

The Mormon chapter closed in 1857, when Young recalled the faithful to defend Salt Lake City against the approaching U.S. Army. Reese stayed on to protect his holdings and left for Utah two years later. The town carried on without him. Danish and German farmers drained the marshes and planted hay and grain; Nevada's first cattle ranch took root on the valley floor; and in 1858 the Territorial Enterprise printed its first issue here, before moving to Virginia City, where it grew into the paper that employed Mark Twain. For the silver boom that followed, see Virginia City and the Comstock Lode.

Genoa kept making history. A provisional territorial legislature met here in December 1859. In 1860 the Pony Express stopped in town, and when Nevada Territory was organized in 1861, Genoa became the seat of Douglas County. Three years later Nevada joined the Union on October 31, 1864 — the day recounted in Nevada Day and Battle Born statehood. The county seat eventually moved to Minden in 1916, and Genoa settled into the quiet it keeps today.

Then came fire. On June 28, 1910, a blaze that began at the county poor house swept two blocks of the business district and took what remained of Reese's trading post along with the Rice Hotel. The courthouse was left a brick shell. The stockade stayed gone until 1947, when the Nevada Legislature put up $5,000 to rebuild it as a museum on the original site. The state park followed in 1957.

Snowshoe Thompson and the Genoa Bar

If the trading post is Genoa's origin, Snowshoe Thompson is its legend. Born Jon Torsteinsson Rue in Telemark, Norway, in 1827, he grew up on skis. From 1856 until 1876 he carried mail on ten-foot wooden skis, with a single pole, between Placerville, California, and Genoa, and later on to Virginia City — roughly ninety miles of Sierra winter, three days eastbound and two back. He crossed passes when no horse or sled could. The government never paid him what it owed, and he never stopped carrying.

He died in Genoa on May 15, 1876, aged forty-nine, and is buried in the town cemetery under an 1885 marble stone carved with crossed skis and the words Gone but not forgotten. A statue of him stands on the grounds of Mormon Station.

Down the street at 2282 Main, the Genoa Bar opened in 1853 as Livingston's Exchange, and its sign still bills it as Nevada's Oldest Thirst Parlor. Behind the counter hangs a diamond-dust mirror shipped from Scotland and hauled over the Sierra by wagon. The wood stove is fed by logs locals carry in, the lamps keep their old fixtures, and the walls hold oil paintings, pioneer photographs, and a ceiling's worth of memorabilia. Theodore Roosevelt stopped in. So did Hollywood: The Shootist, Honky Tonk Man, and Misery have all put the room on film.

Genoa Today

Genoa sits at 4,807 feet, forty-two miles south of Reno and seven miles northwest of Minden, with 1,343 residents at the 2020 census. The Genoa Historic District, 129 acres and twenty-nine contributing buildings, has been on the National Register of Historic Places since 1975. Along Main Street stand the brick courthouse of 1865, now the Genoa Courthouse Museum, and Late Victorian buildings. A mile south, Walley's Hot Springs has been drawing bathers since 1862.

Mormon Station State Historic Park, at 2295 Main Street, holds 3.54 acres of lawn and old trees around the reconstructed stockade. The museum shows original pioneer-era artifacts from the trading post's years. The 1856 Kinsey House, a three-story Greek Revival brick home built for Stephen and Sarah Kinsey and one of the oldest houses still standing in Nevada, and a 1908 blacksmith shop share the grounds; the state added the Kinsey property to the park in 2025. The park is free to walk, and the museum charges a dollar. Each September since 1919 the town throws the Candy Dance, an arts-and-crafts fair with hand-made candy that funds the town's government.

At a Glance: Genoa and Mormon Station, Nevada

• Genoa, in Carson Valley at the foot of the Sierra Nevada in Douglas County, is the oldest permanent non-native settlement in Nevada.
• John Reese founded Mormon Station as a stockaded trading post on July 4, 1851, along the Carson Route of the California Trail.
• Orson Hyde surveyed the townsite in 1855; it was renamed Genoa in 1856, after the Italian city of Columbus's birth.
• The Mormon settlers were recalled to Utah in 1857. A fire on June 28, 1910 destroyed the original trading post.
• The replica stockade was built in 1947 and became Mormon Station State Historic Park in 1957.
• The Genoa Bar opened in 1853 and bills itself as Nevada's Oldest Thirst Parlor.
• Snowshoe Thompson carried Sierra mail on ten-foot skis from 1856 to 1876 and is buried in Genoa.
• Today: 1,343 residents, a National Register historic district, and the Candy Dance each September.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Genoa the oldest town in Nevada?

Yes. Mormon Station, founded in 1851, is the first permanent non-native settlement in what became Nevada, and Genoa grew directly from it.

Why was Mormon Station renamed Genoa?

Orson Hyde, sent by Brigham Young to organize the valley, surveyed a townsite in 1855, and the town took the name Genoa in 1856, in honor of the Italian city that was Christopher Columbus's birthplace. Locals pronounce it juh-NO-uh.

Is the Mormon Station stockade original?

No. The 1851 trading post burned in the fire of June 28, 1910. The stockade at the park is a 1947 reconstruction on the original site, and it houses original pioneer-era artifacts.

Who was Snowshoe Thompson?

A Norwegian-born mail carrier who crossed the Sierra between Placerville and Genoa on ten-foot skis for about twenty years, beginning in 1856. He died in Genoa in 1876 and is buried there.

Conclusion

Genoa is the rare Nevada place where the first chapter is still the main street. A trading post, a ranch, a courthouse, a saloon with a Scottish mirror, and a mail carrier's grave all stand within a few blocks of one another, at the exact spot where the emigrant road met the mountains.

We return to Nevada's early roads often at The Eclection, from the desert crossing at Ragtown to the silver camps of the Comstock. To bring a piece of that era home, explore our curated collection at The Eclection.

Resources & Further Reading

For deeper study, these are reliable, non-commercial starting points:

• Online Nevada Encyclopedia — articles on Nevada history, people, and places.
• Nevada Historical Society — the state museum and research library for Nevada history.
• Nevada State Parks: Mormon Station State Historic Park — park history, museum, and visitor information.

Hero photograph: Mormon Station State Historic Park, 2295 Main Street, Genoa, Nevada, on the California and Pony Express National Historic Trail (2008). National Park Service photograph, public domain.