Nevada History: On The GO! – Nevada’s Age-Old Question: Dayton vs Genoa (Off-site, SVL)

June 6, 2026
1:00 – 3:00 pm, a two-hour special program

Title of Program: Nevada’s Age-Old Question: Dayton vs Genoa. A special American 250 Nevada Program

Speakers: Michael Fischer, Jeff Kintop, Stan Paher, and special panelist TBA

Summary of Program: This is a special two-hour program that will look at the age-old question of whether Dayton or Genoa was the first settlement. Our distinguished panel will talk about the available historic documents, newspaper articles, and limited diary entries, the establishment of a mail station and route between Salt Lake City and Sacramento, and the cast of characters who worked and lived in the Carson Valley and Gold Canyon areas.

We have a distinguished historian panel that will tackle this question. Each member has spent years looking into this topic. Here’s your chance to find out if this ongoing debate can be resolved. This will be an engaging Nevada history program that you don’t want to miss. Our historian panel includes Michael Fischer, Jeff Kintop, Stan Paher, and a TBA panelist.

Speaker Bios

Michael Fischer
Michael E. Fischer was appointed Director of the Department of Cultural Affairs by Governor Gibbons in 2007 and served in the Sandoval Administration until Cultural Affairs was merged with Tourism. Before that, he practiced dentistry in Gardnerville for 31 years. Fischer served eight years as a Douglas County Commissioner.

Fischer brings many years of private-sector cultural affairs management. He has served several terms on the Board of Directors of the Western Folklife Center. As a life member, he serves on the board of the Douglas County Historical Society. He is currently on the boards of the Thunderbird Lodge Preservation Society and the Nevada Agricultural Foundation.

Jeff Kintop
Jeff Kintop has worked in Nevada History for 45 years. He retired from the Nevada State Library, Archives, and Public Records in 2018, where he worked for 35 years, starting as an Archives Assistant and retiring as Administrator of the Division.

As newspaper reporter Guy Clifton once wrote in 2013, “A funny thing happened to Jeff Kintop on his career path back to his native Minnesota. He fell in love with Nevada, and the rest, quite literally, is history. Kintop, the former Nevada state archivist, moved to Reno in 1979 to work on a grant-funded history education project at the University of Nevada, Reno.” The grant funding ran out, so he was hired part-time at the Nevada State Archives.

He has written or contributed to books, reports, and articles on Nevada history, historical research, and archival programs. He served on and was chair of the State Board on Geographic Names and is now Deputy Coordinator/Co-Chair of NVSHRAB and President of the Nevada Judicial History Society.

Stanley Paher
Native Nevadan Stanley Paher is the author of 19 books on Nevada, Arizona and Death Valley. As author-publisher, collector of rare books, maps and photographs, Stanley Paher has kept alive the history, lore and spirit of Nevada and the Southwest.

Through carefully researched text and a few thousand rare photographs, he has documented many aspects of Nevada life. His purpose is to make history stay alive through text and illustration. Paher loves his work and is steadfastly dedicated. Through his own chosen self-sacrifices, he has enriched the lives of hundreds of thousands of Nevadans and others who have read and enjoyed his books.

Historian Speaker Panel:

Our distinguished historian panel: Stan Paher, Mike Fischer, Jeff Kintop, and special panelist TBA.