[2][3] After completing his formal schooling at age 13, he left his birth home in Savoy, Massachusetts to work as a cabin boy on a ship bound for South America.

At 15, Bliss became interested in California Gold Rush and booked passage on a ship to Panama, with plans to travel across the isthmus before catching a steamer to San Francisco.

Duane Bliss founded the Carson and Tahoe Lumber and Fluming Company in Gold Hill, Nevada.

He moved his logging trains from Glenbrook to Tahoe City on the northwest shore of the lake and converted them to passenger service.

Bliss's Lake Tahoe Transportation Co. was later connected to Southern Pacific's international rail service to Truckee, California.