Reno Man Wins Nevada Magazine’s 2012 Photo Contest

Kristoffer Glenn Pfalmer (left) poses with Nevada Magazine Editor Matthew B. Brown on August 27 in Carson City. Pfalmer had large prints made of his three photos that earned accolades in the magazine's 2012 photo contest.

Kristoffer Glenn Pfalmer, a guardsman navigator for the Nevada Air National Guard in Reno, is the Grand Prize winner of Nevada Magazine’s 35th annual Great Nevada Picture Hunt photo contest — the feature story in the publication’s September/October 2012 issue.

The winning image, titled “Ranges Blue," was captured from a Las Vegas-bound commercial jet about 100 miles northwest of the city looking east into Nevada. The picture shows dozens of Nevada's mountain ranges shrouded in a beautiful blue haze (see below). "I used the color casting as an artistic element," Pfalmer says.

In addition to the Grand Prize, Pfalmer won the Events category with his black-and-white "Thunderbirds" photo and was runner-up in the Photo Illustration category with his "Strega" image. Both images are of planes that participated in the 2011 National Championship Air Races and Air Show (now the TravelNevada.com Reno Air Races, which occur annually in September).

Photo: Kristoffer Glenn Pfalmer

The additional categories of Nevada Magazine's 2012 photo contest are: City Limits, Wide Open, Nature, People, and Then & Now. Overton resident Jay Wanta won the City Limits category with his vibrant nighttime image of the Las Vegas Strip; Neil Lockhart of Reno won Wide Open with a beaming black-and-white image of North Lake Tahoe; Las Vegas' Jose Witt took top honors in Nature with a photo of a golden-colored bobcat; Oregon photographer Larry Turner won the People category with his soulful image of grey-bearded Beatty resident Fred Reed; Mauricio Reyes-Gomez of Las Vegas won Photo Illustration with his Valentine's Day-themed photo of his balloon-wielding girlfriend at Bonnie Springs; and Beatty's Mark Holloway swept the Then & Now category, in which photographers snap a modern photo from the same place a historical photo was taken a number of years ago.

To view the winning images and runners-up, pick up the latest issue at national bookstores and where magazines are sold in Nevada, or visit nevadamagazine.com. Look for information in a future 2013 issue covering rules of submission for the 2013 photo contest, or check back regularly at nevadamagazine.com.

Also in the September/October 2012 issue

Photo: Rob Petersen

The remainder of the current issue honors Nevada’s centennial ranches — ranching families that have survived for 100-plus years. Lake Tahoe photographer Rachid Dahnoun captures this traditional lifestyle wonderfully in a photo gallery feature.

Also highlighted are scenic autumn drives and hikes, Reno's MidTown District, volunteer efforts at Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge, Fallon's Tractors & Truffles event, Pahrump Valley Winery's Grape Stomp, a Q&A with St. Louis Rams running back and Las Vegas native Steven Jackson, and a history story titled “Nevada's Lost City,” which includes excerpts from a new Arcadia Publishing book of the same name.

2013 Nevada Historical Calendar Now Available

The 2013 Nevada Historical Calendar, produced by Nevada Magazine, is now available for pre-order. For 40 years, Nevada residents and enthusiasts have enjoyed the award-winning wall calendar full of black-and-white photographs from years gone by. It also makes for a great holiday gift.

A snowy 1930s scene of downtown Reno is featured on the cover (above). The 2013 calendar features many more images from Nevada’s past, including John Wayne in Carson City during the 1976 filming of "The Shootist," a 1920s Fourth of July celebration in Ely, a 1953 photo of downtown Henderson (classic cars included), and a 1933 image of Dini's Lucky Club in Yerington.

Each calendar is $14 plus $4 shipping and handling. To order, visit nevadamagazine.com, or call 775-687-0603.

NEVADA STATE EMPLOYEE SPECIAL

Nevada state employees can get the 2013 Nevada Historical Calendar for $11 by e-mailing pati@nevadamagazine.com or calling 775-687-0633.

Cave Lake Nominated a Top State Park in America

Cave Lake State Park. Image courtesy of Department of Conservation and Natural Resources

Take Me Fishing fans select their favorite places to boat and fish during Nature’s Waterpark Showdown.

Fans of the Recreational Boating & Fishing Foundation’s Take Me Fishing campaign took to Facebook this summer to participate in Nature’s Waterpark Showdown. Each fan was invited to help determine the top eight natural “waterparks,” or state parks, for boating and fishing in America. They could also enter for a chance to win the grand prize: a vacation to a state park for a family of four. Twenty-four pre-determined watering holes were put to the test and, after eight weeks of voting, the fans have spoken.

Nevada’s Cave Lake State Park made the cut and was voted one of the top eight state parks in America by Take Me Fishing Facebook fans based on fishing, boating, and family fun.

The winning parks include:
• Blue Spring State Park, Florida
• Cave Lake State Park, Nevada
• El Dorado State Park, Kansas
• Fall Creek Falls State Park, Tennessee
• Itasca State Park, Minnesota
• Lake Murray State Park, Oklahoma
• Presque Isle State Park, Pennsylvania
• Wellington State Park, New Hampshire

Cave Lake State Park is a year-round park that offers outstanding recreational opportunities. It features a 32-acre reservoir and provides excellent trout fishing, boating, swimming, hiking, camping, and picnicking The 4,500-acre park is at an elevation of 7,300 feet in the Schell Creek Range adjacent to the Humboldt National Forest. Winter activities include ice-skating, ice-fishing, and cross-country skiing. The park is eight miles south of Ely on U.S. 93, turning onto Success Summit road (State Route 486) and continuing east for seven miles.

“We regularly stock Cave Lake with rainbow trout in addition to the native brown trout available, which provides excellent opportunity for anglers,” says Nevada Department of Wildlife fisheries biologist Chris Crookshanks. “Fishing is excellent from the shore, as well as from boats, and crawdadding is also permitted.”

To view the Nature’s Waterpark Showdown winners, visit the Take Me Fishing Facebook page. The parks showcased in the campaign are just a fraction of the many outdoor recreation spots available throughout the nation. For more information, visit TakeMeFishing.org.

For information on more parks in Nevada's Pony Express Territory, go here.

Virginia City’s Fourth Ward School

Historic school opens new Comstock Archives and Research Center.

STORY & PHOTOS BY ADAM ROBERTSON

Virginia City is one of the most historic places in Nevada—a bastion of the Old West in a modern age, residence of Mark Twain, resting place of the Suicide Table, location of the Comstock Lode, and home to the Fourth Ward School.

The school, opened in 1877 and operated until 1936, recently opened the Comstock Archive and Research Center—a collection of documents, maps, books, and memorabilia all pertaining to the Fourth Ward School and the history of the Comstock. Operation of the Archive and Research Center will work very much like similar collections.

“[The center will work like] the state Historical Societies, the library archives,” says Cindy Southerland, director of the Archive and Research Center, “where you come in, if you need help doing research [someone is there to help].”

Shelves of books containing documents and records of the
Comstock are available to researchers.

As you enter the school, you immediately head down a staircase, the old planks worn and warped from nearly 60 years of traffic by students and faculty. At the bottom, you turn into a classroom that was once the school’s home economics room. It still holds vestiges of its former life: a work station with a sink, stone slab, and plenty of workspace.

Across from it lies an old gas stove with two ranges and a glass-front, two-rack oven. By the entrance is a wall of wooden lockers, with notes scrawled by students long-since graduated. Though it wasn’t allowed at the time, after the school closed in 1936, many students returned to write their names or messages in the school and, in some places, these notes are carefully cleaned and painted around in order to preserve them.

In the middle of the room sits a long table filled with documents from the school’s heyday: diplomas, pictures, and newspaper clippings of sports teams and class photos, plus a copy of the rules to be followed by students and teachers—these are the start of the archives. The remainder of the documents are stored in a connecting room containing a vault—named the Purple Monkey for an anonymous donor who helped fund it—and a nearby storage room.

Documents of the Fourth Ward School laid out as an exhibit for
museum and archive visitors.

Originally, the plan was to have the archives focus solely on documents and records related to the Fourth Ward School. However, after some consideration, it was decided to expand the idea.

“We quickly realized that, up on the Comstock, we needed a place where people could come and find more information on more topics than just the Fourth Ward School,” Southerland says. “So we really expanded our mission statement; we expanded our collections. People can come in here now and start researching bonds, the mills, the railroad, and all the schools in the Comstock Historic District, including Gold Hill, Silver City, and Dayton.”

Over time, the collection has been organized into a database—part of which is to be made available to the public via computer. People will also be able to request help in doing research on documents and genealogy. The general public will not be allowed into the vault, however, and the full archive will only be available by appointment.

For more information about the Fourth Ward School museum, the Archive and Research Center, or to make a donation to the school, visit fourthwardschool.org.