Ramsey
Early in 1906, Texas transplants Tom and Bladen Ramsey discovered gold in the Virginia Range and sold off their holdings in Goldfield (which unfortunately for them would become one of the most productive). News of their discovery spread, and soon others arrived and the townsites of Ramsey and Tremont were laid out by summer. Easy access to Southern Pacific's Nevada & California Railroad at Apache, in the valley below, proved advantageous to the new district.
Oft-forgotten Tremont, located at the center of the district, soon grew to include a saloon, restaurant, and store operated by Loftus & Braun of Dayton. A lack of water, however, stifled further growth, and when promoters of the Ramsey townsite guaranteed the resource for all new residents, Tremont dried up as its inhabitants relocated. This guarantee also lured others to Ramsey, and by the end of the year the town had eight saloons, three restaurants, two hotels, brokerage and assay offices, stores, post office, daily newspaper - the Ramsey Recorder - and stage lines to Virginia City and Carson City.
The quick growth at Ramsey subsided in 1907, but in 1909 a thirty-ton amalgamation and cyanide mill was built by the Ramsey Comstock Mining Company. The mill operated for only a year, producing about $80,000 before its closure. In 1919 the property was taken over by the Lahontan Mines Company, who also attempted development, but it did not last. A final revival was started in 1939, but it too ended about 1940.
