Looking for the Chinese influence in early Nevada

By Ruby McFarland

For the Appeal

Today, Feb. 8, is the start of Chinese New Year, bringing the year of the Rat.

Although you would be hard pressed to find any evidence of the Chinese being in Dayton, they were important to Dayton history.

Most people don't know what they are looking at when they drive into town and see what looks like a road up on the left side of the hill. That is the Chinese or Rose ditch dug by the Chinese in 1856.

When the ditch was finished some of the Chinese remained, working gold-bearing placer deposits. They became a fixture in the area and the community was called Chinatown before it officially took the name of Dayton in 1861.

However, the 1860 census only showed three Chinese in Dayton. The same census recorded 14 Chinese living in Virginia City - most all doing laundry for the miners.

The 1870 census reflected 3,156 Chinese in Nevada, but it didn't show the greater presence only two years before. Thousands of Chinese worked on the building of the Central Pacific portion of the transcontinental railroad in 1868.

The three Chinese remaining in Dayton were probably a man named Hully and a married couple named Hep Sing and Ty Kim. The couple was married in San Francisco and lived the rest of their lives in Dayton.

It was difficult for the Chinese to make a living. Employment was limited for the most part to being laborers, laundry men, woodcutters, cooks and servants.

The communities let the Chinese know that they were not welcome, for the most part. The areas where the Chinese were concentrated in the 1870s were Virginia City and Carson City.

The other notable Asian populations were the Truckee Meadows, Humbolt and Elko Counties, along the route of the transcontinental railroad. The Chinese also built a lot of the short rail lines throughout Nevada.

By 1890 most of the Chinese had left Nevada, with only 1,276 still living in the state. China towns fell victim to fires, too often caused by arson. You don't find much left of the nineteenth century Chinese experience in Nevada.

Dayton was the first China town in Nevada. A historical marker can be found at the corner of Highway 50 East and Dayton Valley Road.

The Feb. 20 meeting of the Historical Society of Dayton Valley will be held from noon-1:30 p.m. at Makin'-Coffee, East Pike Street and Highway 50 East.

The Dayton Museum is located on Shady Lane and Logan in Old Town Dayton. The web site is daytonnvhistory.org. Group tours are available. Call 246-5543, 246-0462 or 246-0441.

• Ruby McFarland has lived in Dayton since October 1987, she serves as a board member of the Dayton historical society and a docent at the museum.