Whereabouts
According the State Marker System:

"Located off of a dirt road, approximately six miles northwest of Wadsworth"

​The Mystery of Marker 24 (2007)
Perhaps no other MIA has eaten more of my time than the old marker at Olinghouse. I'd say it was all in good favor except uncovering the mystery of the Olinghouse Marker is still no closer today. For every year it remains an MIA, I further conclude that chances grow increasingly slim that this marker will ever be back. I'll get to why in a minute.

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The Olinghouse began its life sometime in the late 1990s, and after only a year, the Olinghouse marker had succumbed to deliberate vandalism. The symptom? "Blue sign season." The truth is, any information regarding Marker 24 comes in quiet tones from the SHPO. This fellow marker found this out right away after his first attempted "conquering" in 2007. Today's marker hunter will find the road into Olinghouse "CLOSED!," five miles from State Route 447. Yes, boys and girls. What was then a lovely public road is now strictly "private" with a burgeoning cattle gate spanning its width. Here's the deal.

Both sides of this road are posted liberally with "Private Property," "KEEP OUT!" and other threatening signs warning people to "Stay Out!" Fortunately, my trip up to the gate in 2007 was a calm one, a benign comparison to others who came before me and had walked away with very different circumstances. One might even go as far as saying these encounters were unfortunate "consequences" that were met with threats of violence.

Have I hooked you yet?

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Now, about that question a minute ago.

"Will the marker ever be back?"

Allow me to elaborate. Shortly after its disappearance, it was rumored that Marker 24 was deliberately re-located at the townsite of Olinghouse, approximately 6 miles off of SR 447 on Olinghouse Road. At the time, Olinghouse was freely public. Visitors were allowed to drive right up to the town site until 2000 when a new mining corporation by the name of "Target Minerals" bought the entire townsite and adjacent lands in Olinghouse Canyon. The company purchased a sum of adjoining lands, including the portion of the road and the remainder of BLM Road 0456, also known as Pah-Pah Road, which leads from Olinghouse to Vista Blvd in Sparks through the Wah Wah Range. Doing this, Target Minerals deliberately ensured that access to the town was off-limits to the public all the for the sake of re-working the Olinghouse Mine. Although this sounds innocent and regular enough for Nevada, here is where the story takes a sudden turn.

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At the beginning of my search for the Olinghouse Marker, I contacted Bob and Luis from local website, Forgotten Nevada, along with a few other ghost bums from an active (and highly dedicated) ghost town web ring. Thanks to this collective batch of passionate and very knowledgeable individuals, I learned much more about the goings on at Olinghouse after the town was purchased. The owner of the Olinghouse (whose contact name and number I shall keep to myself for privacy reasons) stated that he only "closed the town for safety issues," a legitimate liability safeguard while the mine was being worked. Contrarily, he also stated that he does allow people into Olinghouse, which is still an active town with a handful of residents. This also coincides with what I was told by another fellow contact that even "we (the residents of Olinghouse) love visitors!"

However, the story takes an abrupt turn when the owner added:

"But I have a caretaker living on the property that likes to shoot at people."

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Interesting enough? A handful of people who have tried to visit Olinghouse for themselves state of having been severely threatened by this "caretaker." Apparantely, this trigger-happy loon has little to no regard for anybody. Threats of violence, including actual pot-shots have occurred, along with less menacing abuse like nasty emails, and claims filed to the Washoe County Sheriff's Office, are among some of offenses this nut has committed.

What's even worse is that all of the victims of this caretaker had never once crossed the gate into Olinghouse, yet they were confronted for simply driving the public road to the gate. One of the most serious incidents happened in 2006 when the "caretaker" threatened a single father and the man's seven-year old son at gunpoint. Furthermore, accusations by this idiot have already made it to Reno. As such, don't be surprised if you see a Washoe County Sheriff doing a daily patrol of the five-mile dirt road from SR 447.

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The Plot Thickens

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So, what of the unfortunate Olinghouse marker? My advice would be to stay away. Accessing Olinghouse is out of the question unless you contact the owner himself. A fellow marker hunter, "Air Force" Dave S, also dug up some information about the mysterious Marker 24, shortly after I had debuted this website in 2008. Dave met with Mara Jones, one of the active Architectural Historians at the State Historical Preservation Office (SHPO), and helped further shed some much-needed light on this story. Out of his interview, Dave came away with this statement ...

Mara:

"The marker at Olinghouse is no longer there. Apparently people were using it for target practice and the state was tired of replacing it (the plaque). We're still unsure whether we want to replace it or not."

The case of Marker 24 is a sad example of how heartless vandalism ruins precious sites for everybody. However, I want to leave this case on a good note. The town of Olinghouse is in stellar condition and other locals that I've talked to have informed me of four standing buildings, along with the town's small cemetery with intact headstones that have been maintained by the locals. As of late, the owner stated:

"We're keeping the town as it is and working around it."

So, although the townsite is still within the bounds of private property, the road gate preserves it for future generations. Hopefully, some resolve will be corrected to this mess in the future and the crazy caretaker will have permanently soiled all of his ammo.

Finding Olinghouse itself is a piece of cake, but again, accessing it is an altogether different story. Olinghouse Road is unsigned from the highway, but it is easily discernable by a wide, graded dirt path retreating westward into the Wah Wah Range, exactly three miles north of Wadsworth. Even though the road itself leads to private property, the county is still in charge of its maintenance, making it passable in any passenger car. Olinghouse sits six total miles west of SR 447, but you'll find it blocked by the locked gate at Mile Five. Workings by Target Minerals at Olinghouse continue to this day, and a fence lines the road from Mile Five to prevent any parking along the road. That's not all.

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Marker 24 ... Lives?

Shortly after visiting Olinghouse, I researched even further and discovered a rumor that Marker 24 was still alive, some 74 miles north of its original location! Where does that put us exactly: at the entrance to Bruno's Country Club in Gerlach. Eager to put this case to rest, I made the half-day trip to Bruno's in 2008 and came away with what looked like a blue Standard-medium sized marker placed in Bruno's parking lot. As you'll see, I found this "marker" newly painted, and other than the lack of a state seal, was indeed a marker in the flesh! Instead of a plaque, the words "Bruno's Country Club" lie embossed across its face. This discovery thus coincides with Dave's interview with Mara Jones ...

"People were using it for target practice and the state got tired of replacing it (the plaque). We haven't seen it since."

My conclusion is that it could've been a remake from the SHPO after its initial disappearance, but was simply abandoned after its plaque went missing thanks to said crazy caretaker. Then maybe just maybe somebody might've found the marker itself and donated it to Bruno? If so, this is a great wrap-up for this case. Until further findings come up, I have listed Marker 24 with these new coordinates, and although the marker has been turned into a piece of badass bling for Bruno, it means that Marker 24 is technically present and accounted for! The photo below is the only known photo of what could be Marker 24. Again, we are about 75% sure of this accuracy based on our findings.

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