Episode 2: Life In a Mining Town and Its Hazards

<p><img src= "https://assets.libsyn.com/secure/show/337586/Miners_at_Work_Underground_Virginia_City_Nevada_-_NARA_-_519595.jpg" alt="Miners at Work Underground Virginia City, Nevada" width="300" height="263" /></p> <p> </p> <p>Life in a mining camp was exciting, frustrating, and dangerous. Men worked in treacherous conditions beneath the towns of Virginia City, Nevada, Tombstone, Arizona, and hundreds of others place across the west. Listen as Sherry and Marshall discuss this and other topics related to the miners, the towns where they lived, what they ate and drank, and more. </p> <p> </p> <p>The show's <strong>Lagniappe</strong> (something extra):</p> <p>Virginia City, Nevada’s <em>Territorial Enterprise</em> had a little fun reporting when a dairy wagon tipped over in 1878. The headline was, “Whey Goin?” and they wrote, “The horse attached to the milk wagon of Mr. Pedroli, proprietor of the Gold Hill Dairy, ran away yesterday morning. The horse started at the turn this side of the Imperial, and brought up at the lumber yard of I.E. Doan & Co. The air was filled with milk and the wagon was a regular smear-case. From the length of time he has been in the milk business Pedroli’s horse ought to know <em>butter</em> than to act in such a <em>whey</em>—‘tain’t the cheese.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Cream cheese pies and cream cheese sandwiches were the most popular ways to eat cream cheese in the American West. The pioneers got a little more creative as the turn of the century neared.</p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Escalloped Asparagus</strong></p> <p> </p> <p>1 lb. asparagus</p> <p>3 eggs, hard-boiled, optional</p> <p>½ cup milk</p> <p>1 tablespoon flour</p> <p>4 ounces cream cheese</p> <p>½ teaspoon salt</p> <p>¼ tsp. pepper</p> <p>1/4 cup bread crumbs</p> <p> </p> <p>Cook the asparagus until tender. Drain and set aside. Chop or slice the eggs and also set aside.</p> <p>Make the milk gravy by melting 1 tablespoon butter in a saucepan and then add 1 tablespoon flour. Cook for 1 minute and then add the milk. Add salt and pepper and