The Plug in the Bottom of Lake Tahoe

Lake Tahoe, at 6,200’ in elevation, is near the crest of the Sierra Nevada Mountain Range in Northern California. Mark Twain once remarked that when one is at Tahoe, he or she breathes the same air angels breathe. There are many stories connected with the giant lake, which was first seen by an American, John Fremont, in February 1844. One of the stories has to do with a plug in the bottom of the lake—1,645’ below the surface.

In 1858-9 the giant Comstock Lode of silver was discovered beneath Virginia City, Nevada, which is roughly 30 miles east of Tahoe in the high, Nevada desert. Over the next 20 years the mine yielded $500-600 billion (2007 dollars) in silver and gold. Fortunes were made and lost on both the mining and on the stock market in San Francisco that supported many of the mining ventures.

One day in early September 1869, a weary San Francisco stock speculator named Lester Williams was vacationing in Carnelian Bay on the North Shore of Lake Tahoe. He relaxed by going fishing. One day he was drifting quietly in his row boat about three miles out in the lake, southeast of Dollar Point. He noticed his boat going in a lazy circle. Williams watched and slowly recognized he was floating in a broad whirlpool. "If this is a whirlpool, there must be a hole down there, he thought." He casually picked up a loose board used as a forward seat and he scratched an "L" on it with his knife. Then he stood and gave it a toss into the center of the rotating whirlpool. The plank was gradually sucked down and it disappeared into the lake.

A bit later, as Williams rowed to shore, an idea hatched in his mind. He landed, secured the boat, grabbed his bags from the cabin, and returned to San Francisco, post haste. Once there he hurried to visit Tom Speed, an astute stockbroker with an office on Montgomery Street in the center of the financial district. Williams told Speed about his idea. Speed signed on immediately. For three days the pair tracked down and checked maps, survey reports, and Tahoe water-level readings. Their findings confirmed their concept: The level of Lake Tahoe had dropped over the summer just as the Comstock mines were filling with water.

Speed insisted on one more proof of what was happening. Williams took off for Virginia City. There, dressed as a rumpled miner, he was hired to work in the Comstock as a pump tender, deep in a mineshaft. The mines were having a great deal of trouble with the water seeping—often gushing—in. After a couple of days working far below the earth, Williams was delighted to see the wood plank with "L" on it floating in a large, underground pool near his assigned mine shaft. He quit his job and returned to San Francisco where he and Speed completed their plans to get richer quick.

A few weeks later, back at Carnelian Bay, Williams hired carpenters to build him a large, flat-bottom "fishing boat" that had a big well (opening) in the middle of it and a cabin over the well. Once the boat was completed, Speed arrived on the scene with two large crates. They were muscled aboard the boat at night by the partners. They also loaded a huge round of Douglas Fir. The next day at sunrise they rowed out to do some serious fishing.

The partners found the whirlpool once again, but it took them hours of trials to finally determine (approximately) the location of the hole on the bottom of the lake. They fixed the position of the hole from the boat by noting landmarks on the shore. They calculated that the hole was about two feet in diameter. In the crates aboard they had many feet of chain and a windlass, which they attached inside the boat alongside the well in the middle. From the round of fir, using hatchets, they fashioned a cone-shaped, wooden plug to which they attached their chain.

With great care they reeled out the chain via the windlass and allowed the plug to be pulled down into the lake in the center of the whirlpool. The swirling water guided the plug into the hole. The moment it was sucked into place, the whirlpool stopped. The hole was plugged!

But could the pair get the plug out again? They tugged and strained for an additional few hours. Finally, using the oars as levers, they were able to winch the plug up a foot at a time until they overcame the weight of the water at the floor of the lake. They practiced their plugging and unplugging maneuver with the windlass several times; then they headed for shore with the windlass and plug concealed in the boat's cabin. Once ashore, Speed headed back to San Francisco. He knew what to do.

Over the next two weeks, rumors about the Comstock mines seem to proliferate in San Francisco. The word was that the mines were filling with water rapidly (which was partially true) and that mining might have to stop altogether very soon because the pumps couldn't keep the mines dry. Of course the share prices of the mines started trending downwards, and suddenly they were free falling. As this was happening, a certain brokerage firm in the City was actually buying the depressed shares...all that were available. "Who would buy shares in mines full of water?" a few people wondered.

A few days after the mine stocks had been bought, the mines suddenly stopped filling, the pumps emptied the water, and silver & gold mining was re-started with a vengeance. As this happened, word spread and the share prices shot skyward. Speed and Williams sold their accumulated shares and made millions over the next week.

Then, several weeks later, the mines began flooding again; the cycle was repeated. Share prices fell; the shares were purchased. Water stopped filling the mines; share prices went up. Speed and Williams made more millions.

This went on until late in November when cold weather hampered Williams' boat trips to his whirlpool. There was snow on the mountain tops. Speed joined his partner on Thanksgiving Day 1869 for one last trip to the secret place. Greed! As they were lowering the plug, Speed's heavy, gold watch chain caught on the plug chain and he was pulled into the well and the lake. Williams slipped on the wet, boat bottom as he frantically grabbed at the thrashing Speed. Both men were pulled down into the icy water, ensnarled in the plug's chain.

The whirlpool sucked the wooden plug and the rich men down until the plug plopped into place in the hole, one more time.

The battered boat was found washed up on the East Shore of Tahoe after the second winter storm of the 1869-70 season. The windlass was there, but no plug, chain, or occupants.

The plug remains in place to this day, somewhere southeast of Dollar Point.

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For readers with a technical or geographic bent, here are a few facts that relate to the story:

1. The elevation of Virginia City is 6,220’ above sea level.

2. Some of the mines under Virginia City were dug to depths as deep as an elevation of 3,220’. (i.e., The mines went down 3,000’ below the surface.)

3. Mining in the Comstock Lode eventually had to be halted because of the natural inflow of water into the lower portions of the mines.

4. The elevation of the surface of Lake Tahoe is 6,225’.

5. The lake is 1,640’ deep at its deepest point, which is about three miles southeast of Dollar Point.

6. The elevation of the bottom of Lake Tahoe is 4,585’; this is about 1,365’ higher than the bottom of the Comstock mines.

7. Water flows downhill.

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Author's Note: Many thanks to the legacies of the deceased David J. Stollery, Jr. of the Tahoe City World and Washoe & Virginia City journalist, Sam Davis; they created original versions of this story. Many ideas in this story were in one of Dave's weekly pieces written and published between 1963 and 1969 as his "Tales of Tahoe."    Copyright © 2009 Steven C. Brandt

Carnelian Bay on Dwellable