Photograph as originally submitted to this page in the Historical Marker Database www.HMdb.org. Click on photo to resize in browser. Scroll down to see metadata.

Photographer: Syd Whittle
Taken: July 6, 2009
Caption: The Sheffield Bell No.19
Additional Description: On June 16, 1858, the families of Arnold Trimmer and Frank Walker who both traveled west to Nevada in the same wagon train arrived in Carson Valley and settled in the town of Genoa. This bell, which was sandcast in Sheffield, England in 1865 was shipped via clipper ship around the horn and up to San Francisco, thence by wagon freight over the Sierras to Genoa. Here it was planned to grace the belfry of the newly, proposed Catholic Church. On the same day that the wagonload of lumber arrived for the church, the exciting news of a rich, gold strike in California spread like wildfire through the Carson Valley and by morning of the following day there was no around capable of building the proposed church, so the leading townspeople decided to use the lumber and the bell for a much needed schoolhouse, which stood about four blocks north and west of here. Mr. Trimmer, who is one of the Carson Valley Historical Society’s trustees, attended the school as a young boy. About 1916, the original schoolhouse was vacated and all the furniture and the bell was moved here to the courthouse. The bell has been traditionally rung on Independence Day.
Submitted: July 13, 2009, by Syd Whittle of Mesa, Arizona.
Database Locator Identification Number: p70504
File Size: 2.231 Megabytes

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