Courthouse Site 1865 - 1909

Dayton was the first seat of Lyon County and had one of the first courthouses built in Nevada.  Finished in 1864, local residents celebrated the new two-story brick building and its Italianate styling as an important architectural benchmark for a new state.

On the afternoon of May 15, 1909, the two-story brick building burned and the county seat was moved to Yerington two years later.  Utilizing the ruins, the Nevada legislature funded the construction of a high school that opened in 1918.  The school closed in 1959 and the building became an elementary school, then a junior high school and is now the Dayton Valley Community Center.

STATE HISTORICAL MARKER NO.  127

STATE HISTORIC PRESERVATION OFFICE