Jews in Nevada: A History

5. Settling, Praying, Working, and Partying in the Halcyon Years, 1865–1880

9 70 0 All of Nevada’s towns and mining camps had a cosmopolitan international population drawn to the United States by its economic opportunity.1 Jews emigrating from Prussia and eastern Europe were also fleeing discriminatory laws, military service, and pressures to assimilate. Once here, they did not—like San Francisco Italians—wish eventually to return to the old country. And unlike English immigrants to Utah, Jews were not interested in establishing a refuge from religious persecution.2 All of them, however, depended on the permanence and prosperity of their environment—neither of which was a certainty. Mobility and Settlement The mobility of Jews that was characteristic of the turbulent years before statehood continued through the 1870s. The early arrivals who rode out Nevada’s economic cycles into the early 1880s did moderately well. Those who arrived on the Comstock or any mining camp at the peak of the ore production initially prospered, but they needed to move on before the best times passed them by. Jews chose to live in Virginia City for the same reason others left for Eureka or Hamilton: they were centers of mineral production and needed a mercantile support community. Virginia City also had culture, excitement, and a mystique long remembered after its decline. Jews chose Carson City because it promised stability as the state capital and the permanent location for the Nevada Supreme Court, the U.S. Mint, the state prison, and other agencies. Also, the Virginia and Truckee Railroad conveniently connected Carson City to Virginia City in 1870 and Reno in 1872. Finally, the capital was tucked into the Sierra Nevada’s protective lee side, providing it with a far more temperate climate, meteorologically and socially, than that of the mountainous mining towns. 5 Settling, Praying, Working, and Partying in the Halcyon Years 1865­–1880 Settling, Praying, Working, and Partying 9 71 0 As economic prospects waxed and waned, scores of Jewish single men and families changed their addresses. Gone from Carson City were the Armers , Ashims, Bloomingdales, Fleishhackers, Greenbaums, Klaubers, Mandelbaums , Rosentocks, and dozens of others for whom the capital provided a stepping-stone to even more successful businesses in the West. Almost all of those leaving Carson City sold their properties to incoming Jews. Many moved up to thriving Virginia City. The Simon Ashims, John A. Moch’s family , some of the Wertheimers, and a host of early settlers left Virginia City for new bonanzas in Eureka and Hamilton. Joseph Rosenstock relocated his family to Elko, where he competed with the Reinharts in the general merchandise business. Soon the two families were joined by marriage. The Klaubers early abandoned what their son called northern Nevada’s “primitive conditions.” By 1880, the family of twelve children was in San Diego and Klauber had sold the Nevada property with one thousand tons of hay and a hundred cattle.3 His gamble on Nevada had paid handsomely. He was one of those who left the state permanently before the peak of the party. Virginia City’s Jewish population neared five hundred in the late 1870s. In contrast, Carson City’s much smaller Jewish population stabilized at about ninety in the same period. As elsewhere in Nevada, most were merchants, and their stores dotted Carson Street for eight blocks from Fourth Street, north past the plaza and state capital buildings to Robinson Street. On the Comstock, they popped up in the heart of the Gold Hill, Silver City, and Virginia City business districts. Ethnic Living Clusters Everywhere people lived in places they could afford—some in their stores, others in boardinghouses, and a few in well-appointed homes. The mostly unmarried French Canadians camped out in the forest during the cutting season and boarded around the French Hotel in the heart of Carson City during inclement weather. The Irish represented a full one-third of the population and concentrated in three areas in Virginia City. The tiny African American population had three small instances of residential proximity in Virginia City, though they spread out over time. The largest ethnic ghetto in many Nevada camps and cities was the ubiquitous Chinatown. In Carson City, the Chinese constituted 20 percent of the population and lived in uninsurable shacks on several square blocks east of the capitol building.4 Some people elected to settle in a particular place due to family or friend- jews in nevada 9 72 0 ship ties going back to the...