The Remarkable Life of Carson City Pioneer Charles W. Friend
Astronomer, jeweler, watchmaker, weatherman — Charles W. Friend would wear many hats after moving to Carson City about 1867.
This is the guy who became the state’s first meteorologist and built (at his own expense) Nevada’s first astronomical observatory. And from the mid-1870s until his death about thirty years later, he meticulously collected data on Nevada’s rainfall, barometric pressure, wind and weather conditions.
I confess I’m not a big weather buff or astronomer, so all that scientific stuff seemed a bit on the dry side when I started researching this story. But Charles Friend’s life really started grabbing my attention as I learned about his adventurous early years.
Born on July 7, 1835 in Magdeburg, Prussia, he moved to South America with his parents as a child. And when the Gold Rush hit in 1849, the family (like so many others) raced north to California.
Charles Friend, Sr. settled with his family initially in Placer County, where an 1852 census identifies his occupation as “Trader.” But for young men, gold was where the action was, and son Charles,then 17, was (not surprisingly) working as a “Miner.” By the time of the 1860 Census the family was still in Placer County, receiving mail at the Sacramento City post office but probably with a large farm miles away. Father Charles had done well; he was listed as owning $1,000 worth of real estate and another $1,000 in personal property, and father and son were now identified as “Farmers.” (Their farm might have been the Placer House Rancho, a 160-acre ranch situated halfway between Sacramento and Auburn, which Charles Sr. would advertise for sale in late 1869).
Young Charles took a bride just before Christmas 1863, wedding Amanda J. Blaver of San Jose at Auburn Station. He was 28 years old while she was just 18. Their first daughter, Emma, was born nine months later, in August 1864, at their home in Folsom, and a second daughter, Annie, arrived the following year.
Tragically, four days before Christmas in 1865, young Amanda passed away. She had been “in ill health for several months,” the newspaper recounted, though she’d seemed to be improving. But that evening her condition suddenly worsened, and she’d sent Charles to fetch a doctor. By the time Charles and the doctor returned they found Amanda “lying dead on the floor.” She was 21 years old. No cause of death was identified in her obituary but given the birth of her second child that same year, postpartum infection or other complications were a possible cause.
Charles had a broken heart, two young daughters to raise, and farm duties to tend to. He married again roughly a year and a half later, June 17, 1867, wedding Ellen (“Nellie”) Hortense Crain, also of Folsom. (And in an odd coincidence, Ellen was the younger sister of Elizabeth Crain Raymond, wife of swindler Ross Raymond, who we met in an earlier story!)
By late 1867 Charles had relocated to Carson City and, with partner Andrew Maute, opened a new “stationery and cigar store” on Carson Street, three doors south of the county buildings. They also carried a wide inventory of other goods, including jewelry; a newspaper advertisement from December, 1867 noted that they made rings, pins, earrings, belt buckles, and cigar cases; cleaned and repaired watches. Charles performed “engraving at moderate rates.”
Jewelry plus chewing tobacco and “true Havana cigars” may sound like an odd combination today, but that was surprisingly common in gentlemen’s specialty stores of the day. Partner Maute’s name quickly disappeared from the business, suggesting Friend likely bought him out. And by March 1869, Charles Friend was already expanding, adding a large “show window” to the front of his business.
Charles and his second wife, Nellie, quickly settled into the Carson community. Charles developed his own amateur “cotillion” band, performing for a Legislative Ball in January, 1869. Surprisingly, Charles’ nimble fingers even helped a local doctor with a post-mortem autopsy. The coroner’s jury report indicated that his background had included “ practic[ing] medicine and surgery” (a possible oversimplification by the transcriber, but suggesting perhaps he might have worked with a doctor at some earlier time in the past).
Meanwhile, Charles and Nellie’s family continued to grow. They would have least three more children of their own: Laura, born in 1868; and twin boys, born in 1873 (though one died in January 1875).
Charles’ business also continued to thrive. By 1873 his Carson Street store “opposite Capital Square” was selling watches and jewelry, diamonds, silverware, clocks, and even Florence sewing machines. And his store had grown large enough take on an employee: Saxony-born watchmaker Alfred F. Hentschel.
It’s unclear exactly when Charles became fascinated by weather and astronomy, but it had apparently become a passion of his by around the mid-1870s. Using his own equipment, Charles started tracking local rain, snow, wind, temperature, and barometer pressure reading, meticulously recording his observations three times a day from his residence on Stewart Street. Seeing value in his meticulous work, the State Legislature appointed him the state’s first official Meteorologist in 1881.
Between 1875 and 1876, Charles erected a tall wooden observatory beside his home, at his own expense – the first permanent astronomical observatory in the young state of Nevada. And he didn’t keep his love of the science to himself. He graciously welcomed Carson citizens to his observatory to witness unusual astronomical events. “A peculiar commotion among the planets will be visible here,” noted the Carson Daily Appeal in April 1881, referencing the rare planetary conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter. “Charles Friend’s observatory will likely be besieged on that occasion.” Charles also became one of the first to view the “The Great Comet of 1881” that June (Tebbutt’s Comet) – one of the brightest comets of that century — after a local night watchman pointed it out to him.
Charles had already purchased equipment at his own expense. But during the early 1880s, supportive local citizens circulated two petitions requesting that a larger, more professional telescope be procured from Washington for Friend’s Carson Observatory. Sadly, those appeals went nowhere at first.
Undaunted, Charles kept up his three-times-a-day weather readings. And in early 1883, thanks to his new position as official state Meteorologist, the State Printing Office released a printed version of Friend’s weather observations for the years 1880 through 1882. “Much credit is due to Mr. Friend for his tireless zeal,” the Daily Territorial Enterprise cheered in March 1883, adding its hope that the state legislature would “assist him in completing his apparatus and observatory.”
In November, 1884, Friend ran for – and won – the job of county Public Administrator (and would be reelected in November 1886). Interestingly enough, that post made Friend ex officio Coroner, as well, with a duty to inquire into suspicious deaths. So perhaps his autopsy experience in 1869 wasn’t as unusual as it might sound. In addition to his public service (administering the estate of Mrs. J.W. Cline in 1888, for example), Friend kept up his interest in lighter matters as well, adding his baritone voice to a local band in March 1884.
Friend’s early work as a weather recorder was apparently done pro bono. In 1885, the state legislature finally passed a bill authorizing $12.50 a month for Friend’s meteorological services. Gov. Adams promptly vetoed that bill, bellowing that “the work of recording the climatic changes was of no benefit,” so “the appropriation would be a waste of money.” Ouch.
Supporters wrote a flurry of letters on Friend’s behalf. Even the American Meteorological Journal weighed in, calling the governor’s position “short-sighted,” and saying it demonstrated a “lack of appreciation and even of intelligence which would hardly be expected in a governor of a state.” Ouch again!
Friend and his supporters prevailed in the end. In February, 1887 the legislature appropriated $500 to pay him retroactively for his meteorological reports for 1885 and 1886 at $12.50 a month, plus $200 to prepare summary volumes for those years. Immediately afterward, the legislature also officially established a Nevada Weather Service Station at Carson City. And Friend, of course, would be appointed its first director.
Charles Friend took his new position as state weatherman seriously. He reached out to establish a state-wide network of volunteer “corresponding” weather observers, and even proposed establishing weather stations “in every school house in Nevada” – to be funded by each school district. The advantages of detailed weather data, he pointed out, including knowing which localities were most favorable for specific crops, and providing helpful information to cattle ranchers.
Friend’s scientific curiosity and energy both seem to have been boundless. He served as an exhibitor at two State Fairs, displaying a collection of “delicate scientific [weather] instruments” in 1887, and “samples of dried vegatables by [a] new process” in 1888. He purchased the latest “Johnson optical patent dioptric eye-meters,” an acquisition that allowed him to fit glasses on customers with “weak eyes” with “perfect satisfaction.” And for the 1888 Christmas season, he offered “new designs” to patrons which the newspaper called “the very cream of the elegant jewelries which have just come on the market.”
Recognizing the value of Friend’s work, the Nevada legislature finally began helping him acquire additional new equipment. In 1886, the state provided $210.50 for the purchase of a microscope. It’s said that he also was allowed to place an early seismograph in the basement of the Capitol to measure and record earthquakes.
Best of all, in 1889, with assistance from state legislators, a massive new six-inch telescope was sent out from Washington for Friend’s use at the Observatory – “an instrument of about 800 diameters” (a maximum 800x magnification), weighing 900 pounds with its mount, worth $1,500. Citizens of Carson, the newspaper enthused, would be able to “view the various comets and eclipses at short range.” And with Nevada’s clear atmosphere, the editor continued, the result “would be as good as a million dollar affair somewhere else.”
Once again, Friend hoped to involve students in his star-gazing activities. He proposed inviting high school and university astronomy students his observatory once a month to gain a “practical knowledge of the study.”
Friend was invited to join a team traveling to Honey Lake Valley in late December, 1888 to view a total eclipse of the sun. Included in the party were a civil engineer, two professors and other scientists, and a photographer, and they brought with them an impressive array of equipment: transits, sextants, a chronometer, four cameras, and two telescopes. After several frustrating days of cloudy weather that hindered preparatory work to establish a reference line, they finally succeeded – and, on New Year’s Day, 1889, watched the shadow of the moon race across the wide landscape where they stood “in about the time one would take to turn around and see its flight across the plain.” We can only imagine how thrilled Friend must have been to be part of the undertaking.
Friend continued to compile Nevada weather data as well, documenting (among other things) a “terrible and long-continued drought” across Nevada in 1889, with average rainfall per station reaching just 55/100ths of an inch. “In most parts of the state it is as dry as a charity sermon,” the Daily Territorial Enterprise sighed that September. “[C]attlemen are despondent,” it grumbled the following month, noting that if the winter ahead was a bad one, thousands of animals would die, while if snowfall was light, they would “starve next Summer.”
Recognition of Friend’s scientific expertise continued to grow. In late 1889, he became one of the earliest members of the Astronomical Society of San Francisco (now the “Astronomical Society of the Pacific”). And in 1902, he and a Mr. Sinclair were hired to take astronomical readings to determine the correct longitude of Tonopah, as there was a dispute whether the mining camp was situated in Esmeralda or Nye County. The newspaper called it a “fact” that the camp lay in Esmeralda, but the true location turned out to be on the Nye County side of the line.
Now in his late sixties, by around 1904 Friend began experiencing health problems. The Daily Appeal of June 20, 1906 noted that he’d “appeared on the street today [for] the first time in weeks,” though “wan and thin.” Still, the newspaper celebrated the return of “Old Reliable” to his usual duties with his weather instruments, adding that “no more pranks will be tolerated” from the gods of wind and rain, “now that Friend is once more on hand.”
But, after a “lingering illness of more than a year,” Charles Friend finally passed away at his longtime home on the evening of January 10, 1907. He was 71 years old. His obituary in the Daily Appeal noted: “It would be hard to name a man in this city who has been better known than Charles Friend or who had a wider circle of friends and acquaintances. He might also be regarded as one of the best educated men in Nevada. His training had been in a scientific direction and he had a lasting passion for astronomy. But this was not the only field of learning he had explored. It was hard to bring up any scientific subject of which he was not familiar. . . “
The Inyo Register called him “one of the best known men in Nevada,” and Friend’s funeral drew a large crowd. As a long-time member of the Masonic Lodge, he was interred in the Masonic section of Lone Mountain cemetery. Pallbearers included local notables C.N. Noteware, Judge Murphy, and Friend’s early business partner, Andrew Maute. Of his five children, only two daughters survived him: Mrs. W.J. (Emma) Amberg of Sacramento and Mrs. J.G. (Laura) Ellis of Carson City. (Emma would later be buried in the same plot.)
Wife Ellen kept the jewelry store running until about 1923, when her own health began to fail. She passed away May 28, 1924 at the age of 74, and is buried beside her husband at Lone Mountain. Sadly, both Charles’ and Ellen’s graves today are unmarked, except for a small white stone bearing the Friend family name in the curbing.
Today, the site where Charles Friend’s house and observatory once stood – now a small grassy park – sits directly across Stewart Street from the Nevada State Archives, and is remembered with a small plaque.
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Why Care About Weather Data?
Back in 1885, Governor Adams grumbled that compiling wind, temperature, and other weather readings was “of no benefit” to Nevada, so paying for its collection “would be a waste of money.” What made Friend and so many other people disagree?
For one thing, Nevada back then was a relatively young and sparsely-settled state, so there really was no baseline data – no hard figures on “climate normals.” That meant it was impossible to accurately predict annual events or to know how conditions were changing. What was the usual rainfall in a particular part of Nevada? Were the seasons trending wetter or drier? Nobody really knew for sure. The data simply wasn’t there.
Yet weather affected virtually every business endeavor in the state. Farmers needed to know the length of growing seasons, average frost dates and anticipated rainfall to determine what crops would or wouldn’t thrive. Miners, businessmen, and railroads all needed to know when travel and transportations conditions were likely to be favorable, or when floods or snow might interrupt travel and freight. Individuals with health concerns sought information about particular climates.
Seasonal averages for things like rainfall and temperature were useful in themselves. But even more importantly, over time, those statistics could identify trends like drought cycles or periods of unusual precipitation. Nevada’s push for regional weather data also didn’t take place in a vacuum; by the late nineteenth century, the federal government had begun establishing a national weather network and was prioritizing standardized data collection.
Charles Friend found it all fascinating. His meticulously-recorded weather data helped position fledgling Nevada as a modern, forward-looking state, and the massive database he compiled is still used for reference today.
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Like to help the Lone Mountain Headstone Project install permanent markers on forgotten graves like Charles W. Friend’s? Donations can be sent to “Foundation for Carson City Parks and Recreation,” P.O. Box 3266, Carson City NV 89702. Just add a note specifying that the gift is intended for the Lone Mountain Headstone Project. The Foundation is a 501(c)(3) public charity, EIN 47-4750761; donations are tax-deductible.