The Yerington Electric Company Telephone “Central” in July 1914: George Plummer & Evelyn Snyder

July 2025 – Mason Valley NV

Steve Plummer, (whose grandfather George Plummer was Joe Wilson’s nephew, and lived in Nordyke with the Wilsons in 1900, employed as a miller) wrote:

“I’ve been rummaging through some long-forgotten photos and found this, the Yerington Electric Company Telephone ‘Central’ in July of 1914, if the wall calendar is correct. George Plummer was the general manager, and I think this ‘telephone girl’ might have been Evelyn Snyder. Evelyn died four months later at age 19, and the obituary described her as the ‘genial and popular operator.…’

“I scoured the 1914 papers, and didn’t see any other operators mentioned, so I’m pretty convinced it was Evelyn.  Her obituary was the only mention of  ‘telephone girl’ or ‘telephone operator’ that year.”

Anthropologist Evan Pellegrini replied: “I am pretty sure that the woman in the photo is Evelyn, there is a photo of her on her grave at the Valley View Cemetery in the Catholic Cemetery section at Yerington.“

Full-size photo:

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In a related matter, Evan Pellegrini , in continuing to gather & organize historic photographic and familial information for Mason Valley & beyond for a manuscript, wrote:

“I have been searching for any photos that may exist of the Plummer Schoolhouse that sat just south of the big bend in SR208 (State Route 208) in Missouri Flat (southern end of Mason Valley). The McGowans were unable to locate one and I have asked Steve Plummer if he knows of any…The photography studio in Pine Grove used to take the school photo there in the early days of the school.“

“At one time George Wilson, Joseph Isaac Wilson’s brother owned the ranch where the schoolhouse sat before it burned down…”

Steve Plummer confirmed: “The Plummer Schoolhouse burned down the evening of March 21, 1944, and was occupied at that time by the Evans family.”

Nordyke Mill Intrigue Continues with New Research from Steve Plummer

We are who we are because they were who they were. – Unknown