Read Online On the Back Roads by Bill Graves - Free Book Online Page B

Matt said that he has strict requirements about who goes on these wilderness excursions. “The crazies who want to tear things up don’t make it. I don’t want them. I have to go there again, remember.” Nor will he take anybody from Nevada or neighboring California, saying, “You wouldn’t show the locals your favorite fishing hole.”
    These guys roll in here periodically on Matt’s Suzukis. They come from all over the country, spend a night here at Sue’s Motel, and maybe have dinner at the Silver King Café across the road. The next day they are at it again, exploringNevada’s abandoned outback. They will probably never come back or even remember the name of this town, but their encounter with Nevada will stick with them. Nevada has a way of doing that.

16
Potluck Booze Made Pizen Switch
Yerington, Nevada
    P izen Switch. What a great name for a town! That’s what it was, and would still be, were it not for some persnickety latecomers who didn’t much care for its derivation. Pizen, with a long i, was what the miners and cowboys called the homemade whiskey that sold for ten cents a cup at the Willow Switch. Know simply as the “Switch,” it was a dirt-floor saloon with a roof of bulrushes and a siding of willow switches.
    The potent pizen made at the Switch was potluck booze that never tasted the same twice. When the pizen barrel got low, most any liquid was considered a filler. Peddlers of hair tonic, liniments, and turpentine could often unload a whole wagon at the Switch if their timing was right.
    As things typically happened in the Old West, the saloon and everything around it became known as Pizen Switch. Road signs pointed to it. It was a scheduled stop for the stagecoach.
    Then the new-fashioned reformers, who today would have to parade their cause on TV talk shows, created a ruckus by arbitrarily renaming the town Greenfield. That was in 1873. After that, you could tell the old-timer from the newcomer by which name he called the town.
    This grudge lasted until the townspeople were overcome by universal greed, which they called “a quest for growth.” The railroad was coming west. They all wanted to be part of it. The general manager of the railroad was named Yerington. To butter him up, they gave the town his name in 1894. It didn’t work. The railroad went elsewhere. All they got was a rail spur. Nevada got a town named Yerington.
    Today, with a population of 2,400, Yerington is on Alt. U.S. 95. An alternate highway is normally a short offs hoot that parallels the main road. This alternate, however, is 106 miles long, goes through three towns, and even twists a bit. A whole new highway number might make navigation more intuitive through here, less complicated. I guess if I am going to roam the back roads, I will just suffer the complications that go with it.
    For many, probably most, the cultural and social centers of this farming and ranching town are Dini’s Casino and Casino West. The owners of both are blood relatives and descendants of Italian ranchers who, along with many Portuguese, sett led this rich valley.
    Dini’s is the oldest family-owned casino in the state. Known for good drinks and the best food in town, its customers are essentially local and mostly retired. The casino floor is an overcrowded maze of glowing coin machines, mostly nickel, that play every game of chance but craps. Dini’s has one blackjack table, but the game is seldom played for lack of a dealer.
    Almost next door is Bryan Masini’s Casino West. It’s bigger, less down-home than Dini’s, but again, its patrons all seem to know each other. Bryan, in his forties, a father of four and an active member of the school board, became a state-licensed casino operator at the age of twenty-four—the youngest yet.
    The tidal wave of family-fun centers now flooding Las Vegas has trickled into Yerington. Obviously, a casino’s sole existence is