1849: First trading post built.

1851: Permanent settlement organized that later included a two-story log store and hotel, a blacksmith shop, and a flour and sawmill.

1861: Genoa named Douglas county seat in the Nevada Territory.

1861:  The original Wally's Hot springs resort and hotel is built by David and Harriet J. Walley of New York.

1865 (Oct. 3): Court house opens

1882 (March 16): Town is buried by a sierra avalanche that kills nine and destroys many buildings.

1886: Raycraft Dance Hall built on Main Street. It's the location for the Oct. 29 "Candidates Ball" The $2.50 admission included dinner. Today, genoa Town Hall is on that site.

1897 (Nov 25): Adam Uber is taken from the courthouse jail and lynched by a mob of about 20 armed men "mortified by booze," for the murder of wagon driver Hans Anderson. The Hanging Tree is on Genoa Lane.

1910 (June 28): Fire begun in Genoa Poorhouse destroys most of town.

1961: Don Bently moves from Berkeley, California and starts Bently Nevada, a world wide engineering company.

1916 (Dec): Douglas County Seat is moved to Minden

1916 (Sept): Courthouse reopens as Genoa Elementary School

1919: First Candy dance is conducted to raise money for street lights. Annual event, which includes lare crafts fair, continues as main method to fund town budget.

1956 (June 6): Last day of school in courthouse.

1969 (April 21): Carson Valley Historical Society obtains courthouse for museum.

1979: County officially recognizes Genoa as an unincorporated town.

1989: County approves Genoa Lakes Golf Course and 350-acre housing development.

FACTS ABOUT GENOA
from Stories From the Sagebrush by Don Cox

The population in 1998 was 230 the projected population in 2003 is 259.

The Median income in Genoa is $36,875.

The total retail sales is $4.011 million.

Genoa's claim to fame is the fact that it is Nevada's first settlement, founded in 1851.

Genoa was founded by traders from Salt Lake City and first was called Morman Station. It was renamed Genoa (after the city in Italy) in 1855 by territorial Judge Orson Hyde. But the Nevada town's name is pronounced "ju-NO-ah," not Jen-o-ah."

Genoa's local legend is John A. "Snowshoe" Thompson. Born in Norway, Thompson carried the mail on skis over the Sierra between Placerville, California and Genoa in winter from 1856 to 1876. The "Mailman of the Sierra," who died in 1876, is buried in the Genoa Cemetery. The name "Thomson" on the tombstone is misspelled. His handwritten letters in the Genoa Courthouse Museum are signed "Thompson."

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