Chronicles of the Comstock, The beginnings of the Comstock:
As the prospectors and early miners were following the old California Trail through Nevada on their way to the California Gold Rush in 1849, a few of them stopped to camp along a small stream running into the Carson River where the town of Dayton now stands. Eager to try their skill at panning for gold, some of them were able to pan out a few flecks of color from the stream. Convinced that this was just a taste of what they would find when they reached the “real” gold fields in California, they pushed on over the Sierras.
On a pleasant day in May 1850, a wagon train from Salt Lake City halted for a few days’ rest at the same location. It, too, camped among the willows and tall cottonwood trees.
