Category: Looking Back
All Eyes on Tahoe’s Echo Summit
The Civil Rights Movement, the fastest men on the planet and an unlikely track formed an unforgettable summer in South Lake Tahoe in 1968 Written by Sylas Wright Imagine a state-of-the-art synthetic track nestled in the rugged woods above Lake Tahoe, overlooked by fans perched on granite boulders, waiting anxiously for the world’s fastest sprinters […]
Looking Back: The Story of Nevada’s Birth
Politics, war and silver prompted Nevada’s statehood Written by Matthew Renda The year 2014 ushers in Nevada’s 150th birthday. The Nevada Constitution, which was created at a convention in Carson City in July 1864, was sent to Washington, D.C., via telegram on October 26, although the transmission lasted until October 27. The 16,543 words cost a […]
The Dislocation of Lake Tahoe
How California’s Gold Rush led to a fractured governance structure in the Basin Written by Matthew Renda The formation of the five counties dividing Lake Tahoe’s shoreline was more influenced by what happened outside the Basin in the middle of the nineteenth century than what occurred within. As the destinies of California and Nevada […]
The Man Behind the Bomb
Harvey’s bomb remains a teaching tool for FBI more than 30 years later Written by Matthew Renda In the early morning of August 26, 1980, three men dressed in blue worker’s coveralls wheeled an object roughly the size of a copy machine through a side entrance of Harveys Resort Hotel at Stateline, Nevada, perched on […]
Tahoe’s Tunnel of Doom
A huge dam and an epic pipe dream once threatened to change Lake Tahoe forever Written by Scott Lankford Ever wonder why Tahoe’s 39 trillion gallons of pure Sierra snowmelt were never dammed or drained to slake the bottomless thirst of California or Nevada? Strange to say, that almost happened—not once but several times—with Tahoe’s […]
Bay to Bay
How Lake Tahoe’s early conservationists changed the world Written by Scott Lankford During the Gold Rush era, pioneer geographers stubbornly penciled in a mythical river linking Lake Tahoe to San Francisco Bay. Of course, no such river exists. Yet, in the battle to save the planet’s lakes, bays and beaches from destruction, Lake Tahoe and […]
From Bozen to Boating
Five generations and more than 100 years separate Jakob Obexer—who emigrated from Austria in 1906 at age 20—from Jacob Fields, a seven-year-old now running around the marina that his great-great-grandfather established. “There’s not a day that goes by that I do not feel blessed to be part of a family that is so rich and deeply rooted in Tahoe’s history,” […]
Historic Tall Tales of Lake Tahoe
Bankrupt and blacklisted, a failed 70-year-old British philosopher named Bertrand Russell once sat stark- naked in his tiny cabin near the shores of Lake Tahoe, typing out a manuscript titled An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth. That book would eventually help to reestablish the writer and philosopher’s career: Ten years later, in 1950, Russell was […]
Best Historic Yarns
Bankrupt and blacklisted, a failed 70-year-old British philosopher named Bertrand Russell once sat starknaked in his tiny cabin near the shores of Lake Tahoe, typing out a manuscript titled An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth. That book would eventually help to reestablish the writer and philosopher’s career: Ten years later, in 1950, Russell was awarded […]
Snowfest: A look back at the North Shore’s wacky/iconic winter carnival.
On June 26, 1981, Bobby Everson stood before some 35 representatives from North Tahoe resorts, businesses and service organizations. A local boy and a rising star in the ski industry, Everson had just taken a job as the marketing director at Alpine Meadows and was pitching the idea of a winter carnival to boost March […]
