Ward Charcoal Ovens State Historic Park

Six Beehive Shaped Stone Charcoal Ovens Built In 1876 For The Ward Silver Smelters; A Nevada State Historic Park · Ely, Nevada

Ward Charcoal Ovens State Historic Park protects six beehive-shaped stone ovens standing in a row in a sagebrush valley on the edge of the Egan Range, south of Ely in eastern Nevada. They were built in 1876 to turn pinyon pine and juniper from the surrounding hills into charcoal for the smelters of Ward, a silver camp a few miles away that boomed in the 1870s and faded within a few years. Each oven is often described as about 30 feet tall and about 27 feet across at the base, made of fitted local stone with a doorway and vents, and they are among the best preserved of their kind in the West. After the smelting ended they are said to have sheltered prospectors, travellers and, by legend, stagecoach robbers. You can walk inside, hear the echo and smell the old soot. The park adds a small campground, picnic sites, trails and elk country, reached by a graded gravel road. It is a small, quiet place of mainly regional interest: an hour or two on its own, best folded into a day around Ely, Cave Lake and the Nevada Northern Railway, or a trip to Great Basin National Park.

Cave Valley Road off US 50 / US 6 / US 93, Ely, Nevada, 89301, United States

NO OPENING TIME HERE WAS CHECKED. The typical pattern: the park is open every day of the year, with day-use hours commonly from around sunrise to sunset, and the campground open to registered campers overnight; winter services may be reduced and some facilities closed. There is often no staff on site and no visitor centre. The traps that ruin a day are driving out after heavy rain or a thaw when the gravel road is mud, arriving with little fuel because nothing is sold at the park, turning up at midday and seeing no wildlife in flat light, and assuming a campsite will be free on a summer holiday weekend. Confirm current hours, road conditions and fire restrictions before relying on them.

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