Scott Schrantz's Blog

Dennis Cassinelli in Chronicles of the Comstock looks back at the big underground fire in the Yellowjacket Mine in Gold Hill, on April 7, 1869.

Rich Moreno, the Backyard Traveler, has a story about Cave Rock, and its history going back to the Washoe Indians and their legends, to the first toll roads around the rock on a rickety bridge, and up to the two modern tunnels we have passing through the volcanic rock today.

Crossposted from the WNHPC Blog.

Google a little while ago posted a bunch of the old LIFE Magazine photo archive. I did searches for Northern Nevada, and didn’t turn up a whole lot. Here’s a taste of what I did find, though.

Gaming mogul Bill Harrah in downtown Reno in 1959. In the background is Harold’s Club, which closed in the 90s and was torn down, Harrah’s Club, which expanded to take up the whole block, and the First National Bank of Nevada, which still stands on the corner, but is also part of Harrah’s. Planet Hollywood was there for a long time, but now it’s Ichiban steak house and sushi bar.

This from 1945 shows Douglas Alley, looking from Virginia Street to Center. Lots of great signs here.

This aerial photo of Lake Tahoe was also from 1959, and must have been part of a feature story on Bill Harrah. In the foreground is Harrah’s casino at Stateline, which now has grown into a huge hotel-casino complex.

Two more local blogs that I've discovered, Ann Onn Everything and Maven and Meddler. They don't exactly write about local issues all the time, but that's not a requirement to get my attention (although I do love placeblogs). I've added both of them to the right sidebar.

If you know of any other local bloggers, be sure to pass them along to me!

Photo by Flickr user Twoleaf

See? Even Las Vegas gets more snow than we do.

Maybe next week we can pull something out.

Labelscar.com has a good look back at the history of the Park Lane Mall. This mall in Reno was torn down about a year ago, but the attached Gottschalks was kept up and operating. Now Gottschalks is closing too, and the last vestige of the mall will be demolished soon.

I used to go to Park Lane Mall quite a lot back in the day when I was underage, since there wasn't a lot else for kids to do in Reno. It was never a great mall, but it was the only place in Reno back then to find a Hot Topic and Spencer's Gifts. Looking back it almost seems like we spent more time there than at Meadowood Mall, although I'm sure we hit them all equally. I look back on it nostalgically, but the fact is now there's a big empty hole right on Virginia Street just begging to be filled, and hopefully the developers can come up with something inventive instead of just another Summit Sierra clone. Ken at the Urban Blog has a few ideas about what the new Park Lane should look like, but I think in this economy we're going to see it remain a hole for the time being.

I know it's the oldest joke running, to say that the weather reports are always wrong. "Why'd you bring an umbrella today Bill?" Because the weatherman said it would be sunny! Har har har!"

But sometimes they're just so wrong it has to be mentioned. Come on, this report was from less than 24 hours ago:

A wind and snow storm is expected to leave as much as two inches of snow in the valley and as much at six inches in the mountains, said National Weather Service Meteorologist Chris Jordan in Reno.

Jordan said the first part of today’s storm will drop significant precipitation in the early morning hours, but intermittent snows showers are expected throughout the day.

Let's look outside, shall we?

I know it's all necromancy and educated guessing, but why do they keep telling us we have a "big storm" coming when they always fizzle out to nothing?

I got word a couple of weeks ago that the Taco John's in Minden would be closing. And sure enough, last week they locked the doors and took down the signage.

It's not a big loss; the food wasn't that great. Before it opened I had never been to a Taco John's before, and from the advertising I thought it would be something like Baja Fresh or Qdoba. Turned out to be just another Taco Bell clone, just like the Taco Maker that used to be in that building years ago.

It was open less than two years, and now there's another empty space in Minden. It's not a good sign for the folks trying to attract tenants to the Minden Gateway.

It was a fight between them and Mother Nature, and they won. The crews building the new Holiday Inn Express in Minden were trying to get the roof finished before the first snows hit. Well, they made it. Still a long way to go in the construction, but at least the snow is on the roof where it belongs, and not in the rooms.

They promised us a "big storm" was coming into the area this weekend, but we're still waiting for it. Yesterday we had flurries on and off, and a layer of flakes on the ground that you could politely call a "dusting", but no real snow yet. Is it too much to ask, to have one real snowstorm before New Year's?