History of Beatty

Old Man Beatty

Montillus ("Old Man") Beatty purchased the Lander Ranch in the spring of 1896. He was one of the three white men in the Oasis Valley. He settled here with his Paiute wife to farm and raise his family. Being an old miner, he always opened his home to anyone who would pass through on their way to the mines in Death Valley.

He came from Iowa, and he enlisted in the Union Army at Lyons in May of 1861 with Company I of the Second Iowa Infantry. A disability got him discharged, and after that he headed west. He and his Paiute wife raised three children out here, Maude, Montillus Jr., and Frank.

When the town went up he took the job of first postmaster in January of 1905, but he couldn't read or write and only held it about a year, so he went back to working his claims. He died in December of 1908 after a fall from a wagon, three years after the town that carries his name was laid out on his old ranch.

Gold in a Rock

In August of 1904, Shorty Harris and Ed Cross found gold in a rock and the Bullfrog Mining District was born.

Robert Montgomery had found several mines in the Panamints, so when he heard of the Harris/Cross find, he hired a Shoshone Indian to help him locate a claim in the new mining area. The Montgomery Shoshone was found, and thus began one of the biggest and shortest-lived gold rushes in the Death Valley area.

A Town on the Ranch

Bob Montgomery purchased a large area of the Beatty Ranch to plat a town site. The town of Bullfrog was in place, but they had no water. With Bob Montgomery's town, the miners and businessmen would have plenty of water, which made this town much more appealing.

Bob Montgomery named his town site Beatty, in honor of Montillus Beatty. Mr. Beatty was the first Postmaster and seemed to thrive on all the activity happening on his old ranch.

Three months after the start of Beatty, the Bush Brothers platted the town of Rhyolite. Although Beatty never reached a population much over 650, it was destined to become the supply center for all the other mining towns in the Bullfrog Mining District.

The Railroads Arrive

By 1906, railroads had made it to Beatty. With an ice house, several hotels, saloons, a newspaper, fresh produce, meat markets, and general mercantile, Beatty had everything anyone could want, including plenty of water.

Three railroads ended up serving the Bullfrog district, and all of them ran through Beatty. The Las Vegas and Tonopah came up from Las Vegas, built by William A. Clark, and its tracks reached Rhyolite in December of 1906. The Bullfrog Goldfield came down from Goldfield, and the Tonopah and Tidewater came north out of Ludlow, California, built by borax man Francis Marion Smith after Clark went back on a handshake deal to let him connect at Las Vegas.

Beatty is where they all met. The Bullfrog Goldfield never built a depot of its own and used the station and yard at Beatty instead. The run down to Las Vegas was 118 miles, about six hours by train in 1906.

With new roads being built between Beatty and outlying towns, it was becoming the center of travel as early as 1906. With passenger trains, stage coaches, and automobile stages, you could go just about anywhere from one convenient location.

Railroad Days

In March of 1907, one of the most important real estate transactions occurred. Robert Montgomery sold the town site of Beatty to Dr. W.S. Phillips of Chicago and E.S. Hoyt of Tonopah for $100,000.00. Wanting to promote their new town, they backed Railroad Days, said to be one of the biggest celebrations seen in Nevada. A train from Los Angeles, California carried many investors and party-goers free of charge to the town of Beatty, where they were treated to fresh fruits, seafood, and champagne as they disembarked from the train. Beatty wined and dined its new investors.

Hoyt and Phillips promoted Beatty in newspapers throughout the world. Looking towards England for funding, some of the ads were not what they seemed. They had pictures of paddle boats loaded with ore on its way to Goldfield, Nevada to be processed on the Amargosa River. Although it was later found that Dr. Phillips had started one of the largest scams of the time, it gave Beatty the jump start it needed. With no town manager or city government to promote their town and the mining interests, they elected their own and kept Beatty alive.

The Others Fall Away

As the gold ran out, towns started collapsing, and by 1914 Beatty had become the largest town in the Bullfrog Mining District. Beatty remained a railroad hub until 1940, when the railroad was placed into maintenance. By 1942, the tracks were pulled up by the Department of War Office for use in World War II.

Rhyolite went first, and it went fast. The banks were gone by 1910, the last train pulled away from Rhyolite Station in 1914, and by 1920 the census counted fourteen people. A good deal of the town ended up here, hauled over whole or pulled apart for the lumber, and the Miners Union Hall came with it and became the Old Town Hall. What Beatty had that Rhyolite never did was water, and of all the towns and camps that went up in the Bullfrog district, Beatty is the only one people still live in.

Gateway to Death Valley

Beatty now had to depend on automobile traffic and the newly developed highways from Reno to Las Vegas. Although still a mining town, Beatty would start catering more and more to tourism. Known as "The Gateway to Death Valley" since 1933, when Death Valley was declared a National Monument by President Herbert Hoover, Beatty has embraced tourism by expanding economic opportunities to provide restaurants, motels, and information about the area's historic sites.

Many Faces

With the conception of the Nevada Test Site and the development of the atomic bomb, Beatty took on a new task. Many of the young men growing up in Beatty started working at the test site, which is still one of the employers of many Beatty residents today. From mining to railroads, atomic bombs and nuclear arms testing to tourism, Beatty has had many faces since October of 1904. Still a thriving community of 1,000 residents, Beatty offers diverse opportunities to visitors and residents alike.