Empire City used to be east of Carson City, but it declined after the turn of the 20th century, and pretty much disappeared. But the name didn’t go away entirely. There is still the Empire Ranch Golf Course, and the Empire Elementary School. But several people in the comments have been mentioning New Empire, so let’s take a look at what that is.

Until the 1950s, Carson City was very small. Town basically ended at Roop Street for a long time. The rest of the Eagle Valley was empty, with a few houses and ranches, but not much else. The airport was built in 1928, in a spot that was way outside of town back then, and is still more or less on the outskirts today. South of the airport, a road went down to meet Hwy 50 (appropriately, called Airport Road). Around this intersection, a few houses and businesses started to be built up, one of the first new neighborhoods in the valley in decades. This neighborhood took on the name of New Empire.

New Empire technically wasn’t part of Carson City back then. This is when there was still an Ormsby County, and the Carson City limits didn’t extend into the empty parts of the valley. But New Empire never became its own town either. It was just an unincorporated area until 1969, when Ormsby County consolidation happened, and New Empire officially became part of Carson City.

It’s been growing ever since. And while New Empire itself was growing, Carson City was expanding past Roop and to the east. By the 1980s, development along Hwy 50 had been built up so that there was no gap between Carson City and New Empire. It wasn’t a separate settlement anymore, it was just another part of town. The freeway sort of acts as a separator between Carson City and New Empire, but nobody notices.

I’m not sure how popular the name New Empire was among those who lived there 60 years ago. Some people in the comments remember it, and I know there used to be businesses that carried the name. But now I feel like it’s mostly forgotten. I live in New Empire, but I feel like I would get blank stares if I told anyone that these days. It has been fully swallowed up by Carson City. It still shows as a place name on Google Maps, though, so it hasn’t been completely erased.

Let’s take a tour through the years and watch New Empire grow into what it is today.