Lost Legacy of Carson Valley

Lost Legacy of Carson Valley is first comprehensive book about the history of Henry Fred Dangberg and his family. It details the exhilarating rise and the devastating fall of one of Nevada's most prominent pioneer families. The book contains hundreds of personal family photographs along with rare documents and letters never seen before. It reveals the private lives of the legendary Dangberg family and the secrets that were kept quiet for generations. H.F. Dangberg, Sr. was a tireless worker and a true visionary. He shaped the agricultural and livestock history of the Carson Valley. Dangberg started with 160 acres in 1856 and built an empire of ranches and farms that covered 33,473 acres at the time of his death in 1904. He constructed more dams and dug more ditches and canals in his life than any man in Nevada. Those same ditches, canals and reservoirs are still in use today. Dangberg's four sons, Fred, John, George and Clarence, continued the legacy and the H.F. Dangberg Land & Live Stock Company prospered. The company's four main ranches were capable of finishing and marketing 20,000 head of sheep and 2,000 head of beef cattle annually. They donated land to bring the Virginia & Truckee Railroad to the Carson Valley and built the town of Minden in 1906. The Dangberg family played a major role in the development of Douglas County. H.F. Dangberg, Jr.'s serious financial problems in the 1930's led to a bitter feud in the Dangberg family that was never resolved.