Springdale

Though this part of Oasis Valley was long inhabited by natives, ranchers arrived in the late nineteenth century, and in winter 1906 the Bullfrog Goldfield Railroad was laid and established the station of Springdale. A station and water tank were built, and soon a small settlement formed. A post office opened in February 1907, and in July postmaster Albert L. Lidwell laid out a new townsite. Springdale got a boost as a shipping point when nearby Pioneer developed, and soon had four saloons, a hotel, restaurants, livery stable, and even a red-light district. A fifty-ton mill was built by the Springdale Mining & Milling Company in February 1909 to treat ore from neighboring mines, and that May Springdale gained its first school.

When Pioneer started to wane in 1911, Springdale followed. The mill too closed, and the town's population dropped from 75 at the beginning of the year to just ten by the end. The Bullfrog Goldfield Railroad ceased operations in 1928, but Lidwell attempted to breathe new life into the town a decade later with the construction of a cyanide plant to work the old tailings at Pioneer; unfortunately he died before operation could begin. In subsequent years, Springdale has been little more than a ranch, though a service station did exist along the highway until 1958 when the highway was routed around the ranch.


Bullfrog Goldfield Railroad
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Bibliography