Letters from the Nevada frontier : correspondence of Tasker L. Oddie, 1898-1902 / edited by William A. Douglass and Robert A. Nylen.

Of the many easterners who went west at the close of the nineteenth century, Tasker L. Oddie was one of the most purposeful. The twenty-seven-year-old attorney and business executive from East Orange, New Jersey, moved to Austin, Nevada, in 1898 as secretary of the Nevada Company, which had mining interests in central Nevada. There he uncovered for his employers, the Stokes family, a fraud committed by the firm's general manager. In the aftermath of the scandal, Oddie struck out on his own in search of valuable mining prospects. He started small, worked hard, and eventually became wealthy through his involvement with silver claims in the fabulous strike at Tonopah, so much so that he could do what he liked second-best to mining: raise blooded cattle. He climbed the political ladder from Nye County district attorney to governor of Nevada to U.S. senator. Oddie tells his own story in his letters to family members back home, particularly his mother, who, when his father died, was left in straitened circumstances. Oddie, who was well educated and loved music, continually assured his mother that success in mining took time and patience but would pay off handsomely in the end and that all would be well with her and his sisters. He was right. He retired all his debts and brought his mother and sisters to Nevada to live with him. Perhaps the most enjoyable facet of the letters, however, is Oddie's evolution from the traditional executive at his desk to an outdoorsman who thoroughly enjoyed hardship, deprivation, hard physical labor, and the occasional high adventure afforded by America's rapidly vanishing frontier. The story of maturation in a sometimes harsh environment and against heavy odds comes through in his letters. History knows Tasker L. Oddie the public servant well. This book presents Oddie the man.

Electronic reproduction. Boulder, Colo. : NetLibrary, 2000. Available via the World Wide Web. Available in multiple electronic file formats. Access may be limited to NetLibrary affiliated libraries.

Description based on print version record.