Black Towns

Nevada

Although no African American settlements have been identified in Nevada at this time, my research has demonstrated that as with most, if not all states, Africans lived, worked and contributed to the growth of the broader community.

Elmer Rusco in his book Good Time Coming?, identifies the presence of African Americans in early Nevada. The number of black individuals living in Nevada seems to have reached a high of about five hundred during the 19th century, with the majority living in Virginia City. Africans participated in silver mining in Nevada just as they did in the gold fields of California. Sixty-six black miners were part of the "rush to White Pine" in the late 1860’s but soon left, as did their white counterparts, when the mines at Treasure Hill failed.