It is located about 22 miles (35 km) northeast of the town of Lovelock, and is managed by the Pershing County Water Conservation District.

[5][7] The stamp mill at Rye Patch processed ore from the mines at Star City, Unionville and Rochester until the late 1870s.

A New Deal project intended to help fight the Great Depression, the dam was funded by the Public Works Administration and employed workers from the Civilian Conservation Corps.

For instance, when the reservoir was nearly drained in 1992 to provide water to the farms, anglers at the Rye Patch State Recreation Area complained of a massive fish kill.

[11] Furthermore, a study by the Nevada State Museum in 1987 concluded that construction of the Rye Patch and Pitt–Taylor Reservoirs flooded archaeological and paleontological sites that showed evidence of prehistoric human habitation.