Dayton
(Lathrop City)
In June 1859, George W. Lathrop and Thomas J. Harvey laid claim to 1280 acres along the Susan River and Nobles Emigrant Trail, where they established a station that came to be known as Lathrops. On September 8, 1862, the place was sold to Uriah & James Shaffer, and the following year was home to Shaffers' station and trading post, a cabin and blacksmith shop belonging to Henry Lomas, and a home belonging to Wilmans & Bass. With new mining strikes in Nevada and Idaho, the trail began to see more activity and the residents laid out a new townsite; as the place had been best known as Lathrops, the townsite was called Lathrop City. Unfortunately, it never developed and the promise of the Transcontinental Railroad drove the Shaffer Brothers to bankrupcy.
In 1868, they sold to the partnership of Thomas J. French and Andrew Litch. In 1873, a post office called 'Dayton' opened at the ranch with French as postmaster. It lasted until 1875, after which the French and Litch partnership was dissolved and the ranch was divided. Litch moved to Reno, but continued to rent his ranch until 1895, when his new son-in-law and daughter, B.F. and Clara Litch Gibson, took it over. Mr. Gibson and associate B.F. Jackson later founded Litchfield along the Fernley & Lassen Railway, which Gibson named for his father-in-law. Descendents continued to operate the ranch until 1975, and it has since become known as the Mapes Ranch.
