Valmy, Nevada: A French Revolution in a Nevada Desert

The small railroad stop of Valmy, Nevada carries a name with outsized historical weight. It was named for the Battle of Valmy, fought in northern France on September twentieth, seventeen ninety-two, when a French Revolutionary army stopped a Prussian invasion with a day-long artillery duel. Goethe, who witnessed the battle, reportedly said that day marked the start of a new era in world history.

The Southern Pacific Railroad established a section point and water stop here around nineteen ten, and a post office opened in March of nineteen fifteen under the Valmy name. Before that the spot had been called Stonehouse. In the steam era, Valmy served as a fuel and water stop for locomotives grinding across the Nevada basin.

Today it is a census-designated place in Humboldt County with only a handful of residents. The battle for which it is named decided the fate of the French Republic. The railroad stop it became decided very little, but the name endured.