Pershing County, Nevada: History
The Humboldt Trail passed through Pershing County, bringing 165,000 immigrants in the 1840s and 1850s, who named the area Big Valley. Travelers would stop here for water and grass before crossing the Forty Mile Desert, regarded as the most difficult part of the trail.
Mining began in the 1860s in the Humboldt Mining District. The Star and Buena Vista districts were discovered shortly after, making Unionville the county's mining center. A smelter was built in Oreana. Gold placer deposits were discovered in American Valley, Spring Valley, and Dry Gulch in 1881. These operations worked successfully for about ten years.
The Arizona Mine was discovered in 1862 near Unionville, and sustained operations continued until 1880. There was a possible exploration for in 1963 from the chance of a large deposit of silver.
The Humboldt District (also known as the Imlay or Eldorado District) was on the north and west ends of the Humboldt Range. It was organized in 1860, the first mining district in present-day Pershing County. Humboldt City was established in 1863, with a population of 500. The Imlay Mine yielded a substantial yet unknown amount of silver, which was shipped. The Star Peak mine yielded $130,000 until 1935, all of silver and gold.
The district produced 35,483 ounces of gold from 1932 to 1959.
In 1868, the Central Pacific Railroad was built in the county, running through Lovelock. The Lovelock station was built in the winter of 1879, and was a gateway to Lovelock for the rest of the nineteenth and most of the twentieth centuries. It was expanded in 1917, but abandoned in the 1990s. It was purchased by the City of Lovelock.
A rivalry with Humboldt County influenced the decision to build the Pershing County Courthouse.