Nevada’s history is rooted in the Wild West, from cowboys and Indians to train robberies and silver and gold mines. Though much has changed over the decades – Nevada now draws nearly 55 million visitors each year and attracts international audiences – much of the allure of the state is still found in its western heritage and wide-open spaces.

Originally belonging to the American Indian tribes Washoe, Paiute and Western Shoshone, the area we now know as Nevada was claimed by Mexico before becoming part of the Utah Territory and eventually attaining statehood in 1864.

Many famous explorers, including Jedediah Smith, John Fremont and Kit Carson, ventured into the vast expanse of Nevada to find a fast route from the eastern states into the wild frontier of California. Peter Skene Ogden explored what would become Southern Nevada in 1826, followed by Smith and his party just a few months later. In 1829, Antonio Armijo led a party into the present site of Las Vegas by way of the Old Spanish Trail from New Mexico to Los Angeles. Fremont and Carson later trekked through Northern Nevada, in 1844 and discovered Pyramid Lake.

While many temporary towns and trading posts were established throughout the rough Nevada frontier, primarily in Northern Nevada by Mormon settlers and gold miners, the distinction of Nevada’s first town is often given to Mormon Station, which was founded in 1851 near present-day Carson City and was later renamed Genoa. A nearby settlement in what is now Dayton, just a few miles from Genoa, was founded earlier than Genoa but did not flourish, and the debate over which town was Nevada’s first settlement lingers. However, Dayton holds the claim as the site of the first gold discovery in the state in 1849.

Just a few years later, more Mormon settlers moved into the future Utah Territory, and in 1855 a group of these settlers built a fort near what is now downtown Las Vegas. However, in 1857, relations between the federal government and the Mormon Church became tense and Brigham Young, president of the church, called his followers back to Salt Lake City. Nevada’s sparse population plummeted.

Two years later, gold (and later silver) was discovered on the south flank of Sun Mountain, near what is now Virginia City. The discovery of the Comstock Lode in 1859 was the first of Nevada’s many mining booms and attracted thousands of new people to the state. In 1860 the Pony Express was established to carry mail between St. Joseph, Mo., and Sacramento, Calif., and was a vital link in Nevada’s development.

The Territory of Nevada was created by an Act of Congress on March 2, 1861. The state continued to grow as the mines yielded more and more wealth and by 1863, more than 10,000 miners, prospectors and settlers lived on the Comstock. Later, on Oct. 31, 1864, President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Nevada’s admission to the Union as the 36th state. The Nevada State Constitution was sent to Lincoln in the longest telegraph message in history up to that time.