Reno is a city in western Nevada and also seat of Washoe County. The city is located within the Truckee River, on the Lake Tahoe resort area of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Reno is a busy resort with great gambling casinos. Its proximity to a region of spectacular scenery and outdoor recreation causes it to become popular with tourists. Reno is also a residential community and also a commercial, services, and manufacturing center. Products include building materials, electronic equipment, plastics, and also specialized medical software. Reno is served by the Reno/Tahoe International Airport.
Reno is home to the University of Nevada-Reno (1874), a community college, and the Desert Research Institute, a division of the University of Nevada System. Museums include the Nevada Museum of Art, displaying American art from the 19th and 20th centuries; the Nevada State Historical Society Museum, housing products coming from the prehistoric era to the state's present; the William F. Harrah Foundation National Automobile Museum; and the W. M. Keck Museum, part of the Mackay School of Mines, with mining artifacts and a large exhibit on minerals. The University of Nevada is also the site of the Fleischmann Planetarium. North of Reno are the Animal Ark Wildlife Sanctuary and Nature Center and Pyramid Lake, Nevada's biggest natural lake and the site of sacred land of the Paiute people. Annual events in Reno include the Reno Rodeo, the Nevada State Fair, and the National Championship Air Races.
In 1859 the site of present-day Reno was a river crossing. Owned by Myron C. Lake, it was known as Lake's Crossing. The population of the community expanded right after a large silver deposit, the Comstock Lode, was discovered nearby in the late 1850s. In 1868 the Central Pacific Railroad reached the town, which was renamed for Jesse Lee Reno, a Union general in the American Civil War (1861-1865). It incorporated as a city in 1903.
The city developed in part due to its lenient residency requirement and divorce laws, which granted married people to journey to Reno to have a quick divorce that laws in their home states made more difficult. Reno for some time was known as the divorce capital around the world. The city grew even larger as a resort after the legalization of gambling in Nevada in 1931. Reno in the mid-1990s experienced additional business and population expansion, due to an influx of hotel, manufacturing, and distribution industries that contributed to the region's balanced economy.
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