Cabin Under the Rock

“Cabin Under the Rock” is a popular excursion for off-road explorers. The cabin is a Nevada original, shoved under a massive rock that appears ready to crush the structure. Beyond the 100-year-old cabin itself, many know little about the history of the couple who called “the little cabin” their home. The road is notorious and known for washouts and shelf roads, “sketchy” at best, making the journey as exciting as the cabin.

Who in the world was Albert A. Bass?

Albert A. Bass was born on April 16, 1869, in Missouri. As a young man, Bass served as a private in Company A, 1st Battalion of the Nevada Infantry in the Spanish-American War. He was discharged after six months following an injury.

Bass moved to Nevada around 1890 and mined at Pine Grove. On May 19, 1900, James Butler discovered the second-richest silver strike in Nevada. Due to assay errors, the ore value was not realized until a second assay was completed later in the year. By early 1901, the rush to Butler (now Tonopah) was on. Bass was the 35th miner to arrive in the new town of Butler.

James Butler did not work all of his claims. From December 1900 to December 1901, Butler leased out his eight claims, including Desert Queen, Burro, Valley View, Silver Top, Buckboard, and Mizpah. Bass leased Butler’s Valley View claim in 1901. The lease paid in spades, “he amassed a comfortable fortune.” By 1904, along with partner James Breen, he built the third oldest stone structure in Tonopah, a two-story stone boarding house and saloon, The Palace Hotel.

Bass married Anna Meagher in Bishop, California, in 1906. Two years later, he found rich ore ten miles west of the old mining town of Belleville. Bass discovered the new mining town of Ibex, nine miles north of Marietta Station on the Carson and Colorado railroad. “The county is pretty rough and precipitous where the find was made,” and supplies were packed in three miles. In July 1908, a wagon road was graded, allowing the shipment of the first carload of ore.

Ibex

Bass’s mines were good producers and were reported in multiple newspapers.

Between 1908 and 1930, Albert and Anna worked their mine and lived in their unique cabin, built under a large boulder. Their home was isolated; according to the US Census in 1930, only five people lived near Marietta, the closest town.

Anna died in June of 1930 at the Mineral County Hospital in Hawthorne. Bass continued to live and work his claim with Howard Pressley, his nephew and only surviving relative. In March of 1934, the cold weather exacerbated Bass’s miner’s consumption (silicosis). He was brought to Hawthorne for medical treatment and died on March 11, 1934.

Following Bass’s death, the claims were worked by Roy Lad.

Cabin under the Rock

Due to its unique construction, Bass’s cabin is commonly known as “Cabin Under the Rock” Albert built the cabin under a crevice created by a giant boulder. Besides the location and the roofline cutout, the cabin itself is a normal cabin for the era, two-room, wood construction, with heat provided by wood stove and stovepipe.

Albert and Anna had made their “comfortable fortune” and lived in the luxury of Tonopah. Yet the search for silver drove them into the isolated Nevada desert. In a time when modern conveniences like indoor plumbing, heat, hot water, and telephone were common, they chose to live in a Cabin… under a rock. 

Cabin Under the Rock Water System

For water, Albert created a gutter system draining down the rock into a cistern. The gutters are made of wood, and nailed into the rock. Mortar or concrete appears to be sealing the system.

A similar system drains into a second cistern below the cabin.

The Cabin

The cabin is of standard construction, with two rooms. Visitors leave their business cards on nails sticking out from the walls. In the second room is a table with a geocache.

A sketchy situation

I first learned of Cabin Under the Rock from friend and phenomenal photographer Vic Trijio. Vic had a beautiful photograph on the wall of the strangest structure I had ever seen, a cabin built under a crevice of a gigantic boulder. I asked Vic, and the other explorers about the cabin. Every response was the cabin was amazing, but the road was “sketchy.”

When Jared of Great Basin Exploring planned a day trip to the area, I didn’t know Cabin Under the Boulder was on our agenda. That is probably a good thing; I’m not sure if I would have slept the night before! After getting my little one on the bus, I headed to Hawthorne to meet Jared. His friends Bill and Linda joined in the day’s adventure.

Bill and Linda drive a two door Rubicon, so I parked next to them instead of Jared’s Taco. Seriously, it’s a thing; Jeeps park together! We engaged in the age-old Jeeper greeting; we spent ten minutes comparing builds and admiring the Jeeps. Poor Jared and his Taco weren’t one of the cool kids.

After we left the highway, the road to Marietta was good but as washboarded as ever. Once we left the flats and headed up the hill, we ran into washout after washout. I don’t know how there are still mountains; I swear several mountains worth were swept downstream in flash flooding. The road was non-existent in many places; other times, the washouts were better than the road.

We took our time crawling over, into, out of, and up washouts. I followed the guys to see the lines they took over obstacles. This was the first big off-road trip since Honey Badger got her lift and 35″ tires. She did awesomely, and I loved the extra clearance.

I had been worried about the shelf roads I had been warned about. Drop-offs and off-camber (tilting) are my nemeses. Or is the plural of nemesis nemeses or maybe nemi?

It turns out the part I was worried about, the shelf roads, weren’t too bad. At some time in the recent past, but before the washouts, it appears the road had some work done. The shelf road had a big drop-off on one side, one that if you started rolling, nothing would stop you until you hit bottom. But it was fairly wide and it didn’t bother me.

As the road in was so rough, we tried another way back to the highway. It seemed like a good idea… for a while. We hit, even more washes on this route. Then darn it, we had to be off-camber to avoid the washouts and unstable ground, which put us in the brush and sand.

I might be better at shelf roads, but still not a fan of off-camber. We were on level surfaces for the most part, but one washout required us to be sideways on the hill. Bill and Jared scoped it out and decided on the best lines to take. Jared told me, “Oh, I forgot to tell you Bill will go anywhere.” Thanks for the warning ;).

Bill went through first, expertly taking the hill even while sliding down in the sand, then came back to spot me. We took it super slow, and Bill was a great spotter; his signals told me exactly what I needed to do. For me the hard part was taking it slow when I wanted to hurry and get through. Jared was last, getting through much quicker than me.

Bill said we would be fine once we were over the off-camber as long as we didn’t run into a big “waterfall.” (See… that’s called foreshadowing.)

Phew, through that obstacle. We got back on track and made it less than a quarter mile before, yup, a large waterfall.

The guys debated the best way to get down the waterfall. I’m surprised; I was less afraid of the waterfall than the off-camber. Then the question came up, what else was past the waterfall? And more important, if we had to turn back, how on earth would we get back up? They decided the devil we knew was better than the one we didn’t, so we turned around to retrace our tracks.

Flex time!

Bill helped me check out Honey Badger’s flex.

Sweet Nothings

At the waterfall, around 3 pm, I figured out I wouldn’t be home early like I told the family. The guys were debating our the best course of action, and Linda congratulated me on making it through the off-camber. I used my Garmin In Reach to message the family.

Doing fine but hit major washouts. Taking Time.

I love my Garmin but forget to use it in conjunction with my phone, so typing takes a while. After multiple deletes, I was talking myself through the message. I added, “Love you.” Linda, who was by my window, looked over and deadpan says, “Thank you, but I don’t know you that well.” I told her, let’s see what you say after we get out of this mess. (See, here I foreshadow again.)

We finally made it back to the highway and headed to Mina for dinner. Sadly, they had just closed for the day. At the end of our goodbyes, Linda threw her arms around me and said, “I love you.”

Want more ghost towns?

For information on more than five hundred ghost towns in Nevada & California, visit the Nevada Ghost Towns Map or a list of Nevada ghost towns.

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References

• Find a Grave: Albert A. Bass
• Find a Grave: A.A. Bass
• Goldfield News and Weekly Tribune. Camp if Ibex ships hi grade. September 12, 1908
• Mineral County Independent News: A biography of Albert A. Bass
• Nevada State Journal: Ibex attracts attention. July 27, 1908
• Nye County Historical Property Survey
• Paher, Stanley.  Nevada Ghost Towns and Mining Camps.  Nevada Publications, 1970. Page 452-455.
• Paher, Stanley.  Nevada Ghost Towns and Desert Atlas.  Nevada Publications, 2009.  Page 193.
• Reno Gazette-Journal: Big mining deal made at Camp of Ibex. July 29, 1908
• Reno Gazette-Journal: Ibex Mountain camp is proving a winner. August 3, 1908.
• Silver Sue. Mineral County Nevada: Volume 1 Mining Camps, Towns & Places. Museum Associates of Mineral County, 2011. Page 188.
• Silver Sue. Mineral County Nevada: Volume 5 Roads and Routes of the past. Museum Associates of Mineral County, 2012. Page 42, 214, 215.
• Starbucks Exploring: Bass Camp
• Wikipedia: Bass Building
• Wikipedia: Spanish American War

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