Nevada

Archaeological evidence indicates prehistoric Native settlements in Nevada more than 20,000 years ago; cave dwellers left rock writings in the south, and Basketmaker and Pueblo peoples also lived in the area. Explorers in the early 1800s found Mojave, Paiute, Shoshone, and Washoe groups throughout the region.⁠[1]

Early exploration was led by missionaries and fur traders. In 1775–76 Francisco Garcés travelled from New Mexico to California, and other Spanish Franciscans later followed his route.⁠[1]

In 1821 the area became part of Mexico.⁠[2]

In 1825 Hudson’s Bay Company trappers explored the northern and central regions; in 1827 Jedediah Smith led American traders into the Las Vegas Valley and across the Great Basin. By 1830 the Old Spanish Trail was bringing traders from Santa Fe and Los Angeles.⁠[1]

John C. Frémont, with Kit Carson, explored the region in 1843 and 1845, publicizing the Great Basin and the Sierra Nevada. In the 1840s pioneers used the Humboldt Valley–Donner Pass route, and the Gold Rush of 1849 greatly increased migration through Nevada to California.⁠[1]

Under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 the area came under U.S. sovereignty; it was part of California until it was added to the newly organized Utah Territory in 1850. In 1849 a settlement was made at Mormon Station, later Genoa, in Carson Valley.⁠[1]

In 1855 Mormons from Utah settled the site of present-day Las Vegas; they abandoned it in 1857.⁠[3]

Silver strikes began in 1858. In June 1859 the Comstock Lode, named for Henry Comstock, was discovered on a property he partly owned, and mining boomtowns such as Virginia City and Washoe quickly arose; Virginia City became the most famous mining camp in the West, and the lode’s output justified a branch of the U.S. Mint at Carson City, which closed in 1893.⁠[2][4][1]

After rapid settlement, Nevada Territory was created in 1861 from the western part of Utah Territory. Before statehood, the first regular legislative session was held at the Warm Springs Hotel in Carson City, on the site of the present Nevada State Prison.⁠[2][5]

A first convention framed a constitution in November and December 1863, and a second convention met in July 1864. During the Civil War (1861–65) Abraham LincolnAbraham LincolnAbraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States (1861–1865). Born to a frontier farming family in Kentucky, he had less than a year of formal schooling, taught himself law, and served in the Illinois legislature and the U.S. House of Representatives before winning the presidency as the Republican candidate in 1860. During the Civil War he preserved the Union, issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863 and pushed the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery through Congress. He was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington on April 14, 1865, and died the next day.Open the full entry valued Nevada’s mineral wealth and wanted another Northern-aligned state to support antislavery constitutional amendments and to serve as a buffer against Confederate advances from Arizona and New Mexico; although Nevada Territory had only about a fifth of the population required for statehood, Congress accepted the proposed constitution and granted statehood in 1864.⁠[6][1]

On October 26, 1864, transmission of the constitution by telegraph began from Carson City via Salt Lake City; the document ran to 16,543 words and 175 pages, and sending it cost $4,303.27. Abraham Lincoln received it about two days later. William Seward sent the statehood proclamation on October 30, and statehood took effect on October 31, days before the presidential election of November 8.⁠[6][2]

Nevada was the second of two states admitted during the Civil War, after West VirginiaWest VirginiaWest Virginia is a U.S. state formed from the western counties of Virginia during the Civil War; its capital and largest city is Charleston. It became the 35th state on June 20, 1863. Its population was 1,793,716 in the 2020 census (April 1, 2020).Open the full entry, and became known as the “Battle Born State.”⁠[2]

In the peak years 1876–78 the Comstock yielded silver ore worth about $36 million a year; output then fell sharply, and the rich lower levels flooded in 1882. In the 1870s federal limits on silver in the monetary system lowered silver prices, closing many mines and turning some towns into ghost towns.⁠[4][1]

Cattle ranching became a major industry, but unpredictable beef prices, high railroad rates, and severe winters bankrupted many ranchers in the late 1880s. The state’s population fell from 62,000 in 1880 to 47,000 in 1890.⁠[1]

In the 1890s the Silver Party, which grew out of the Free Silver Movement, arose and won several offices; by 1902 the two major national parties controlled state politics.⁠[1]

Prosperity returned in the early 20th century with silver near Tonopah, copper around Ely, and a gold strike at Goldfield, and railroads expanded to serve the mines; hay from irrigated river valleys let ranchers enlarge their herds. World War I prolonged the boom, but the 1920s brought depression.⁠[1]

Las Vegas became a railroad town in 1905 and was incorporated in 1911.⁠[3]

On December 21, 1928, President Calvin Coolidge signed the Boulder Canyon Project Act; Hoover Dam later became the key structure of the Boulder Canyon Project.⁠[7]

Hoover Dam on the Colorado River, built in 1930–36, boosted southern Nevada’s economy, and its cheap hydroelectric power made manufacturing possible; in the northwest, power from Bonneville Dam and piped-in natural gas brought industrial growth.⁠[1]

Bids for the dam were opened on March 4, 1931, the contract was awarded to Six Companies on March 11, and the contractor received notice to proceed on April 20. The river was diverted around the dam site on November 14, 1932; the first concrete was placed on June 6, 1933, and the last on May 29, 1935. The dam began impounding water in Lake Mead on February 1, 1935, and President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated it on September 30, 1935. The first generator, N-2, went into full operation on October 26, 1936.⁠[7]

Nevada’s shift to a modern economy began during the Great Depression of the 1930s. In 1931 gambling was legalized statewide and the residence requirement for divorce was cut to six weeks, making Nevada a centre for marriage, divorce, and resorts; by the late 1930s Reno was a tourist and casino destination.⁠[1]

In 1947 the 80th Congress officially named the dam “Hoover Dam,” after President Herbert Hoover.⁠[7]

On December 18, 1950, President Harry Truman authorized a 680-square-mile section of the Nellis Air Force Gunnery and Bombing Range as the Nevada Proving Grounds; the first atmospheric nuclear test, code-named “Able,” was detonated there on January 27, 1951. The site was renamed the Nevada Test Site in 1955.⁠[8]

One hundred atmospheric tests were conducted there until July 1962, and the Limited Test Ban Treaty signed on August 5, 1963, banned atmospheric testing. The United States conducted 828 underground tests at the site, the last, “Divider,” on September 23, 1992, the year President George H. W. Bush announced a unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing. In 2010 the site was renamed the Nevada National Security Site.⁠[8]

Tourism, the main source of prosperity, spread to scenic and recreational sites across the state; Laughlin became a resort in the 1980s, while Lake Tahoe had earlier been a fashionable playground. In the late 20th and early 21st centuries Nevada was often the fastest-growing state, straining resources, social services, and health care.⁠[1]

On April 26, 2021, the Census Bureau delivered the 2020 census apportionment results to the President. Nevada received 4 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, unchanged from before, with an average of 777,116 people per seat; on that basis the state has 6 electoral votes in the 2024 and 2028 presidential elections.⁠[9][10][11]

The state constitution has been amended more than 100 times since 1864.⁠[6]

The state legislature is the bicameral Nevada Legislature, made up of the Assembly and the Senate; since 1983 the Senate has had 21 members and the Assembly 42. Assembly members serve two-year terms and senators four-year terms, with half the Senate elected every two years, and legislators are limited to twelve years in each house. The Legislature meets biennially. Its fifth session, in 1871, met in the newly built Capitol Building, and in 1971 both houses moved to the Legislative Building just south of the Capitol.⁠[12][5]

As of November 2026 the governor is Joe Lombardo, sworn in in January 2023 as the 31st governor of Nevada. Born in Japan to a military family, he served in the U.S. Army and the Nevada National Guard and earned a bachelor of science and, in 2006, a master of science in crisis management from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas; he served 26 years with the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and was elected Clark County Sheriff in 2014 and re-elected in 2018.⁠[13]

In the Census Bureau’s 2010 state area measurements, Nevada has a total area of 110,572 square miles (286,380 sq km), of which 109,781 square miles (284,332 sq km) is land and 791 square miles (2,048 sq km) is water, all inland; it is the seventh-largest state and has 17 counties.⁠[14][2]

The Black Rock Desert lies in the northwest, and the Colorado River forms the state’s extreme southeastern boundary; Lake Mead National Recreation Area and Lake Tahoe are major scenic areas.⁠[15]

The Census Bureau estimated the population at 3,282,188 on July 1, 2025, up 5.7% from the April 1, 2020, estimates base of 3,105,593; growth from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2025, was 0.9%, tied for ninth-fastest among the states. Population density in 2020 was 28.3 people per square mile. In 2020–2024 there were 1,202,593 households, 27.9% of people aged 25 and over held a bachelor’s degree or higher, and median household income was $78,260 (in 2024 dollars).⁠[16][17]

The city of Las Vegas had 641,903 residents in 2020. The state has 27 recognized tribes.⁠[3][2]

Nevada’s nominal GDP in 2025 was $281,376.7 million (U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis data).⁠[18]

Mining and agriculture, the traditional bases of the economy, are now overshadowed by government activity and tourism; tourism centres on Las Vegas, Reno, and Lake Tahoe, Las Vegas also hosts conventions, and visitors come especially from southern California and abroad.⁠[15][1]

The state’s nicknames are the “Battle-Born State,” the “Sagebrush State,” and the “Silver State.” The state motto is “All for Our Country”; the Great Seal of the State of Nevada shows mountains, a quartz mill, a mining tunnel, a railroad, agricultural implements, and snow-capped peaks, encircled by 36 stars and the motto, under provisions dating to state laws of 1866 and 1875.⁠[2][19]

Nevada has had four state flags: the first, created in 1905 by Governor John Sparks and Colonel Harry Day, was used until 1915; the second, of 1915, was designed by educator Clara M. Crisler; the third, of 1929, was chosen in a statewide contest won by Don Shellbach III; and the current fourth flag stems from Senate Bill 396 of the 66th Session, introduced in 1991 by State Senator Bill Raggio. The current flag has a solid cobalt blue field with two sprays of sagebrush forming a half wreath in the upper left, a five-pointed silver star within it, the word “Nevada” below the star and above the sprays, and a golden-yellow scroll reading “Battle Born” above the wreath.⁠[20][19]

The state bird is the mountain bluebird (1967), the state flower sagebrush, the state trees the single-leaf piñon (1953) and the bristlecone pine (1987), the state animal the desert bighorn sheep (1973), and the state metal silver (1977); the state song is “Home Means Nevada” by Bertha Raffetto (1933). The state colours, silver and blue, were signed into law by Governor Richard Bryan in 1983.⁠[21][19]

State of Nevada: Official website: https://nv.gov/ (opens in a new window).⁠[22]

Nevada Governor Joe Lombardo: Official website: https://www.gov.nv.gov/ (opens in a new window).⁠[13]

Nevada Legislature: Official website: https://www.leg.state.nv.us/ (opens in a new window).⁠[12]