Ward Charcoal Ovens State Historic Park is an area designated for historic preservation and public recreation located 20mi south of the town of Ely in White Pine County, Nevada. The 700acre state park protects beehive-shaped charcoal ovens constructed in the latter half of the 19th century.HistoryOvensThe charcoal ovens are associated with the silver mining ghost town of Ward, Nevada, established in 1876. The town at its peak had a population of 1500, two newspapers, a school, fire department, two smelters and a stamp mill. The town declined after 1880, with a fire in 1883 destroying a third of the town. The post office closed in 1888. Mining revived briefly in the 1930s and 1960s. The town has been mostly destroyed by repeated flash flooding in its low-lying site. Only the smelter, mill foundations and a cemetery are left.The charcoal ovens are two miles to the south of the townsite. Six large ovens remain in excellent repair, 30ft high, 27ft in diameter, with walls 2ft thick at the base. The ovens were in operation from 1876 through 1879. They were built of quartz latite welded tuff by itinerant Italian masons who specialized in the ovens, who were known as carbonari. The charcoal ovens prepared charcoal from locally harvested timber for use in the smelters at Ward, using 30 to 60 bushels of charcoal per ton of ore, for 16,000 bushels a day. The Ward ovens are the best-preserved of their kind in Nevada. They were listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.
