Last Mustang Ranch building burns for firefighter practice

RENO, Nev. – As Air Force Amy stood by, the modest building where she once worked at the infamous Mustang Ranch brothel burst into flames.

The 48-room, 20,000-square-foot structure known as the Mustang Ranch II annex was destroyed by fire Sunday as part of a training exercise by Storey County firefighters.

“It’s out with the old and in with the new,” Amy said. “The day of the $20 roll in the hay in a trailer is gone.”

The blaze left no buildings at the former site of the Mustang Ranch just east of Reno, which was padlocked by the government in 1999 after years of tax problems.

In 2003, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management auctioned off the annex for $8,600 to Dennis Hof, owner of the Moonlite BunnyRanch brothel just east of Carson City.

At the same time, the agency sold the gaudy pink stucco buildings that formed the heart of the state’s first legal brothel for $145,000 to Lance Gilman, who moved them a short distance next to his Wild Horse Adult Resort &Spa and continues to operate them under the famous name.

Hof said he had planned to use the Mustang Ranch annex as a museum next to his brothel, but moving costs proved too expensive. He donated it to fire crews instead.