Moved Down the Mountain: The Virginia City Houses That Became Reno Homes

Reno likes to be called a railroad town, a river crossing, a divorce capital. It is also, in a few places we can document and perhaps in more that we cannot, a town built partly out of another town. When the Comstock Lode faded, Virginia City lost most of its people, and some of what they left behind — lumber, doors, windows, sometimes whole houses — went down the mountain to be put back together where the town was still growing.

This article tells that story as carefully as the record allows. One Reno house has a documented journey from Virginia City, and a well-sourced Nevada tradition of “moving buildings” makes the practice entirely believable. There is also a local memory that comes up at the shop: a cluster of relocated Virginia City houses off Second Street, near Saint Mary’s. We went looking for it in the published record, and we will tell you plainly what we found and what we did not.

When the Comstock Emptied Out

The Comstock Lode was discovered in 1859, and the National Park Service describes Virginia City at its height as one of the most important cities between Chicago and the West Coast. The Park Service puts Virginia City and Gold Hill together at about 4,000 people in 1862 and, by 1874, at an estimated 25,000. Those mid-1870s numbers are estimates; the census counts are lower, and they tell the fall more clearly. Virginia City recorded 7,048 residents in 1870 and 10,917 in 1880, then 8,511 in 1890, 2,695 in 1900, 1,200 in 1920, and just 590 in 1930.

Several blows landed close together: thinning ore, the 1875 San Francisco stock crash, the Great Fire of October 26, 1875 (roughly 2,000 people homeless), and rich ore at Bodie, California, in 1878. By 1881 Comstock production had hit its lowest level in two decades. What remained was a small town left as custodian of hundreds of 19th-century buildings. For the boom itself, see our history of Virginia City and the Comstock Lode.

A Town on Wheels: Moving Houses Off the Mountain

On the Comstock, wood was never cheap. According to the Forest History Society, the mines consumed roughly 600 million board feet of lumber and 2 million cords of firewood over about twenty years, most of it cut in the Lake Tahoe basin and brought down by flume and rail; local timber simply was not enough. A frame house in Virginia City was, among other things, a stockpile of milled lumber that had been hauled a long way at real cost.

When a house stopped being worth living in on a shrinking hillside, its value did not vanish. It stopped being tied to the lot. A wood-frame house could be taken apart in sections, loaded, and reassembled elsewhere, often for less than building new. The best-documented Nevada example is the Nordyke Ranch House in Lyon County: in 1903 James Wilson bought a house off a lot in Virginia City, had it disassembled, and shipped it to Mason Valley. When it joined the Nevada State Register in 2014, news coverage (the Review-Journal and This Is Reno) called it a rare house whose move is documented, one of the “moving buildings” of Nevada’s boom-and-bust towns, and noted that moving buildings out of declining places was not uncommon.

Nordyke is not in Reno, but it proves the habit. Moving was ordinary. The paperwork is the rare part.

The V&T and the Haul Down to Reno

The Virginia & Truckee Railroad made it easier. Ground was broken on February 18, 1869, and the first passenger train ran from Virginia City to Carson City on January 29, 1870. The Reno extension was started in late 1871, and the final spike was driven on August 24, 1872, tying the Comstock to the transcontinental line at Reno. Rail cut the cost of hauling ore and nearly halved lumber freight rates. Before the rails, freight took the grade; our guide to the old road to Virginia City through Lockwood and Lousetown covers that earlier route. The V&T’s last train ran on May 31, 1950.

The one Reno house we can document riding that line is the Caughlin Ranch House, 3636 Mayberry Drive. Reno Historical says the large Italianate ranch house was disassembled in Virginia City, where it may have been built as early as the 1860s, moved to its present site around 1900, and carefully reassembled; the move was more economical than building a new house. The ranch’s earlier, smaller house became a bunkhouse. Crissie Andrews married sheriff William Henry Caughlin in 1895 and lived there until 1955, and the house joined the City of Reno Historic Register in 2008.

The sources disagree on details. A Historic Reno Preservation Society FootPrints account says the house was “built in Virginia City in 1851” and has stood in Reno since 1901. But the Comstock was not discovered until 1859, so 1851 cannot be right, and “as early as the 1860s” is more credible. Another article credits George Washington Andrews with building it in Virginia City, while Reno Historical describes him as the Reno rancher who bought the property around 1874. We treat the original builder as unknown.

Reno’s Old Neighborhoods and the Second Street Story

Reno was founded on May 9, 1868, when the Central Pacific established its station at Lake’s Crossing, and it became the Washoe County seat in 1871. Its census count was 1,362 in 1880, 3,563 in 1890, 4,500 in 1900, and 10,867 in 1910. Virginia City fell from 10,917 to 2,244 over the same thirty years. One town needed fewer houses and the other needed more, with a railroad between them, and the arithmetic practically invites the story. Saint Mary’s belongs to that growth: Dominican Sisters began Mount Saint Mary’s Academy in 1877, and Sisters’ Hospital opened in 1908. For how Reno’s main streets filled in during those years, see how Fourth Street became Nevada’s main street.

Here is the memory that comes up at the shop: a handful of old houses west of downtown, off Second Street near Saint Mary’s, are said to have come down from Virginia City. We could not confirm it. We searched Reno Historical’s house entries and tours, several years of FootPrints, and the National Register listings for Washoe County. None identifies a group of Virginia City houses off Second Street near Saint Mary’s. That is an absence in what we could reach online, not proof the memory is wrong. We could not search newspaper archives, university special collections, or Sanborn fire insurance maps, which is where a real answer would live.

One caution. Several well-known houses near downtown did move, but within Reno: the Nystrom Guest House (built 1875) in 2019, the Lake Mansion twice (1971 and 2004), and the 1868–69 Benham–Belz House in 2025. Reno Historical calls Benham–Belz the oldest surviving house built in Reno “not counting older houses that were later moved to Reno”; such houses exist, but the entry does not say where they came from. A house moved across town is easily remembered as one moved from farther away. Until someone finds the deed, permit, or photograph, the Second Street cluster is local memory worth documenting, not established fact.

How to Tell a Transplanted House

No single clue proves a house came from somewhere else, but several together are suggestive. These are general building-history tests, not a rule specific to Virginia City:

• Numbered or lettered marks on framing members, used to put a taken-down house back in order.
• A foundation or floor frame that does not match the house above it, or old nail holes and notches that line up with nothing.
• A mix of older cut nails and later wire nails, and plaster or siding lines where walls were rejoined.
• Paper: deeds, permits, newspaper notices, and fire-insurance maps showing a lot empty one year and built on the next.

What Remains Today

The Caughlin Ranch House still stands on Mayberry Drive, restored in 1993 and honored with a Reno Historical Resources Commission preservation award in 1997. It is privately owned, so check its status before visiting. Up the hill, Virginia City still holds more than 400 mostly 19th-century structures, according to the National Park Service, and houses such as the Henry Piper House and Piper–Beebe House remain where they were built. Reno, meanwhile, keeps moving houses, now to save them rather than salvage them.

If a family story says your old Reno house came from Virginia City, write it down and share it with the local historical groups below. A single deed or photograph can turn memory into history.

At a Glance: Virginia City Houses Moved to Reno

• Virginia City fell from 10,917 residents in the 1880 census to 2,695 in 1900, while Reno grew from 1,362 to 4,500 over the same twenty years.
• Lumber was costly on the Comstock, so a frame house was often worth more taken apart and reused than left standing; Nevada has a documented tradition of “moving buildings.”
• The Virginia & Truckee Railroad reached Reno in 1872, giving the Comstock a rail route to the Truckee Meadows.
• Documented: the Caughlin Ranch House at 3636 Mayberry Drive, disassembled in Virginia City and reassembled in Reno around 1900, and the Nordyke Ranch House in Lyon County (1903).
• Not verified: the cluster of Virginia City houses remembered off Second Street near Saint Mary’s. We could not find a published source, so we treat it as local memory.
• Sources conflict on the Caughlin house’s age (1851 versus “as early as the 1860s”) and on who built it; check primary records before repeating a date.

Frequently Asked Questions

Were houses really moved from Virginia City to Reno?

Yes, at least one. The Caughlin Ranch House on Mayberry Drive was disassembled in Virginia City, brought down on the Virginia & Truckee Railroad, and reassembled in Reno around 1900. The practice is also documented in the 1903 move of the Nordyke Ranch House to Lyon County.

How were the houses moved?

In the documented cases, they were taken apart and reassembled. We found no source describing a house moved whole from Virginia City to Reno.

Can you confirm the relocated houses off Second Street near Saint Mary’s?

No. We found no published source for it. It remains a local memory worth documenting.

How can I find out whether my Reno house came from Virginia City?

Start with deeds, permits, and fire-insurance maps, then look for physical clues such as assembly marks and mismatched foundations.

Conclusion

The Comstock left Nevada more than silver and legends. It left lumber, frames, and a few houses carried down the mountain and given second lives in Reno. The record gives us one Reno house we can follow from Virginia City to Mayberry Drive, a firm sense that the practice was common, and a blank where the Second Street memory should be.

That blank is an invitation. If you can fill it, please do. And if the rooms of that era appeal to you, we would be glad to show you furnishings chosen for the history they carry.

Resources & Further Reading

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

• Online Nevada Encyclopedia — articles on the Comstock, the Virginia & Truckee Railroad, and Nevada communities.
• Reno Historical — illustrated entries and walking tours covering Reno’s historic buildings and neighborhoods.
• Historic Reno Preservation Society — preservation advocacy, tours, and the FootPrints newsletter.