Here's an explanation, and some history:
Many visitors to Dennis Hof's world famous Moonlite BunnyRanch, its nearby sister operation, The Love Ranch, and that establishment's two immediate neighbors and competators, the Sagebrush Ranch and the Kit Kat Guest Ranch, do not realize that all four of these legal brothels are acutally located in the town of Mound House - an unincorporated, but historical burg in far-northwestern Lyon County, Nevada - and not in Carson City itself (which, until 1969, was part of the now-defunct Ormsby County). Indeed, many who are only aware of the BunnyRanch from viewing the HBO show
Cathouse somehow mistakenly think it is found near the bright neon glitz of Las Vegas, which is over 400 miles to the southeast. But these adult playhouses are actually located just outside of the Silver State's capital city, with the Moonlite BunnyRanch (originally known as the Moonlight Ranch, prior to being purchased by Hof in 1993) sitting on property that was once part of a busy late-19th Century railroad depot.
A brief history of Mound House, Nevada"The town of Mound House started out as a stop on the wagon road between Carson City and Dayton. Originally it was called Mound Station, named for the mounds of gypsite in the area." - Scott Schrantz, from his "Around Carson" blog (2009/02/15, "Then and Now #40: Mound House Rails")Though the famed Pony Express (1860-1961) passed through this area, and had a stop at Mound Station/House, it was the iron horse that really established the town."In 1869 the V&T Railroad was built through this wide plain on its way up to the Comstock, and the wagon stop naturally became a railroad stop." - Scott Schrantz, from his "Around Carson" blog (2009/02/15, "Then and Now #40: Mound House Rails")The Mound House depot and siding on the Virginia & Truckee Railroad were completed in 1869. A Post Office was established in 1877, but the town really took off in 1880, when the V&T began construction of a narrow-gauge line named the Carson & Colorado Railroad. From its origin point at Mound House, that railway first headed east to Dayton and Fort Churchill, then south to the mining camps of western Nevada and eventually into California's Owens Valley. It was originally envisioned to continue on south to the Colorado River, but never made it there. However, it did turn the little depot at Mound House into a major freight and passenger transfer point. The V&T was a standard guage line, so cars used on the 3-foot wide C&C rails could not run continue onto its parent company's route.
The Southern Pacific Railroad purchased the C&C from the owners of the V&T in March 1900, later renaming it the Nevada & California Railroad. This acquisition proved to be fortuitous, as less then two months later a huge silver deposit was discovered down south near Tonopah, followed shortly thereafter by a siginificant gold strike in nearby Goldfield."The C&C, which just a few years before had seemed like a costly mistake, suddenly was the best way to get to the new bonanza in the south. Mound House became very busy, since all SP traffic had to pass over the V&T between Reno and Mound House before transferring." - Scott Schrantz, from his "Around Carson" blog (2009/02/15, "Then and Now #40: Mound House Rails")But the SP's owners quickly grew tired of having to transfer freight and pay the V&T to use their tracks. So by August of 1905, they had constructed a new, standard guage branch line to run between their newly renamed N&C (the former C&C) at Fort Churchill and the transcontinental railroad mainline (of their Central Pacific subsidiary) at Hazen. This "Hazen Cut-off" for the most part spelled the end of having to transfer goods and people to the V&T at Mound House, but that N&C branch (which had been converted to standard gauge only a year before) somehow managed to hang on for nearly three decades until it was finally abandoned in 1934 and the tracks torn out two years later.
Battered by the Great Depression of the 1930s, the V&T ceased its operations on its Carson City - Virginia City line through Mound House in 1938. Its rails were removed for scrap in 1941, with modern-day Highland Drive and Red Rock Road subsequently being built by Lyon County over the abandoned grade of the V&T's former railbed. Moonlight Road also runs along the alignment of a former "transfer trestle" track in the Mound House yards, one once used to more ore and other cargo between cars of the two differently-gauged rail lines. During the 1940s and '50s, the depot buildings, and indeed almost all remaining vestages of the railroad's existence in Mound House, were torn down and became only faded memories.
Fast forward to the dawn of the 21st Century, and the Nevada Commission for the Reconstruction of the Virginia and Truckee Railway faced a dilema. Commercial, industrial, and residental development in Mound House precluded using the original route down Red Rock & Highland for their recreation of this historic rail line. So civil engineers created a new path for the modern V&T Railway, one that (unfortunately, but understandably) bypasses Mound House to the west, bridges over U.S. Highway 50 (on a recycled twin steel span, relocated from southern Nevada), and then circles around a large hill before rejoining the original route near the Carson City - Lyon County border. Though the excursion trains will not be running through the original site of the Mound House depot and yards, they will still be close enough for their whistles to be heard by those standing at the original site of this historic rail junction."On the site of the depot is West Coast Shot, Inc., an ammunition manufacturer. Their tall shot tower faintly echoes the water tower that used to sit on the other side of the tracks." - Scott Schrantz, from his "Around Carson" blog (2009/02/15, "Then and Now #40: Mound House Rails")Well, that's the story of Mound House, in breif!
BTW, here is a link to an excellent photo of a RailFest train heading over the new U.S. 50 crossing at the Lyon County - Carson City border:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/scottschrantz/3824546572/It was taken last Saturday by Scott Schrantz, some of whose writings I quoted above and whose extensive documentation of the V&T reconstruction can be found on the
Around Carson blog site (
http://aroundcarson.com/tags/vtrailroad/p1).
The former main entrance to the MLBR (on Moonlight Road) was, as noted above, built along the path of the railroad grade where the multi-gauge transfer trestle once stood. A Historical Marker, commerating the Pony Express stop in Mound House, can also be found on the MLBR grounds just inside the white gate, on the north side of the Moonlight Road. Very recent first-time visitors who've only used the newly-constructed BunnyRach Boulevard main entrance may want to take a minute or two to explore the MLBR's original entry road... and the echos of days gone by that can be found there.
Hope you've enjoyed the history lesson!
Regards,
Speed Racer
