It’s early evening on a crisp fall Friday night in the Carson Valley, and the patio is already buzzing at Nevada’s oldest saloon, Genoa Bar.
Deeply rooted at the foot of the Sierra Nevada mountains, less than an hour from Reno, the bar and its red brick building opened in 1853, two years after Genoa was founded. A fire destroyed many of the small town’s buildings in 1910, but the bar on the cozy corner of Main and Mill streets continued thriving.
Beyond the front door, booze is flowing, barstools are full, and history hangs like smoke in the air. Walls are slathered in 19th-century paintings and ephemera, the ceiling is stained with ketchup, and iconic sex symbol Raquel Welch’s bra dangles from the right antler of a mounted deer head. The bar has hosted famous folks, including Mark Twain, Teddy Roosevelt, Clint Eastwood, Clark Gable, Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, and Rob Lowe, and every inch of the room tells a story.
At the behest of a customer, the bartender shines a flashlight into the large heirloom diamond dust mirror behind the bar, causing it to glitter. This gemlike gleaming is not a Picon Punch-induced hallucination. It’s a reflection from the Victorian-era tin-mercury amalgam behind the glass.
This seemingly magical mirror from Scotland, delivered across the Sierra Nevada mountains via a covered wagon in the 1840s, is a microcosm of Genoa as a whole: Antiquated yet perfectly preserved, and oozing with history and charm, Nevada’s first non-native permanent settlement is not your ordinary small town.
Genoa resident Lacey Ludwig calls it “a sweet spot” in Northern Nevada.
“It’s just a really good central jump-off point,” Ludwig says. “We’ve got Lake Tahoe half an hour from us. There’s hiking, biking, fishing, museums, antique stores, fine dining. We have the big trail system that goes all the way up to the Tahoe Rim. You’re close enough to Reno … or you can just sit out where there’s no light pollution and look at stars. And you know, it’s just beautiful here right up against the mountains.”
Ludwig and her husband, Caden Gould, run the boutique White House Inn, located around the corner from the bar and next door to the aptly named Pink House restaurant on Genoa Lane. Most of the businesses in the town’s nationally recognized historic district, from the Genoa Courthouse Museum to the Genoa Town Hall, are within a short walking distance, on two or three tree-lined streets, quaintly tucked in the mountain’s eastern foothills, off State Route 206.
Ludwig and Gould met 18 years ago at Genoa Bar, or “the vortex,” as they call it, “because you would go in the afternoon and then you’d come out at 3 a.m.” Their inn is one of the town’s original settler homes, built in the 1850s. Gould’s aunt bought it in 1982 and converted it into lodging, naming it for the town’s original White House Hotel, another victim of the 1910 fire.
“There’s probably 25 homes in town that are original,” says Gould, who serves as vice chairman of the Genoa town board. “Everybody takes pride in trying to keep everything looking nice. We really do try to preserve it to the best that we can.”
A handsomely restored Victorian house with a white picket fence, the White House Inn looks like it hopped off a Hallmark card. Autumn leaves from the property’s trees float wistfully in the breeze. Free-roaming deer munch on fallen apples. Inside, the property is modern and warm with a comforting cottagecore aesthetic. The sun-filled common room is well stocked with board games and books about Genoa.
On a grassy plot across from the inn, Mormon Station State Historic Park reveals the story of Genoa’s origin as a trading post for Mormon travelers on the California Trail through interpretive signs, a reconstruction of the 1851 trading post (the original burned down), artifacts, and a pioneer-era homestead, including a blacksmith shop, chicken coop, apple orchard, and veggie garden.
All is quiet on Saturday morning with an uneven deer-to-people ratio on Genoa Lane. An energetic chipmunk scrambles across the state park’s picnic area as a man walks his dog nearby. Early risers sip coffee and eat breakfast at Flutter and Buzz Cafe on Main Street. Located kitty-corner from Genoa Bar, the cafe has an anti-inflammatory latte made with espresso, almond milk, cardamom, nutmeg, cinnamon powder, and maple syrup — a delicious and much-needed hangover cure.
