Thursday, August 15, 2013

Ghost Town Reprise!

 We had traveled to Virginia City earlier this summer but wanted to make a second trip to go through Nevada City, just a few short miles away. My favorite building held a variety of very old musical displays. We could put a quarter or two in some of them and hear an old tune. I loved this player piano. It reminded me of the very first piano I learned to play, at my grandmother's home in Richmond, California.

This home must have been built and furnished by the richest of the town residents. 
 Nevada City was a real mining town, but many of the ancient buildings on the grounds have been moved from other locations in order to save and preserve them. We watched workmen in the process of building a foundation around yet another transported log cabin.

The yellow painted home also held a piano, one of the earliest "square" pianos. I don't know why they were called square, when they are actually rectangular. As a retired piano teacher I love to see the pianos that were used in the old days. I wish I could have tried this one out! That is quite fancy wallpaper, to go with the music room!

 Mr. Keith always wants his picture taken inside the creaky old outhouses we find in ghost towns. What is with that guy?

 The general mercantile store. We've been watching and loving the TV series "Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman" on Netflix and I tried to picture the characters in their similar environments, built by Hollywood, but very much like this era.

I've noticed that the doorways in ghost towns always seem shorter than our more modern doors, pointing out the fact that people didn't grow as tall then as they do now. I'd have fit in nicely, though, at 5 feet, 2 inches tall!

 A Saddler and a Barbershop, both important necessities. I believe that sometimes the barber did double duty as a dentist of sorts! I'm not sure I would have been comfortable with that, but in those days and in that part of our country there wasn't much choice! Just give me a good shot of whiskey first, please!

 I loved this building, with prickly pear cactus growing on the roof. That plant evidently survives the harsh, snowy, cold winters of Montana .

Back in Virginia City after lunch ... closing the door on yet another ghost town adventure.

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