| Old Tejon Pass | |
|---|---|
  Old Tejon Pass Tejon Pass (Kern County) | |
| Elevation | 5,285 feet (1,611 m) |
| Traversed by | unpaved road |
| Location | Kern County, California |
| Range | Tehachapi Mountains |
| Coordinates | 34°59′21″N118°32′43″W / 34.98917°N 118.54528°W Coordinates: 34°59′21″N118°32′43″W / 34.98917°N 118.54528°W |
The Old Tejon Pass (originally Tejon Pass) is a mountain pass in the Tehachapi Mountains linking Southern and Central California.
The pass is located in Kern County, California, 15 miles (24 km) to the northeast of the current Tejon Pass. It runs at the top of a divide between a point about 5 miles (8.0 km) east of the Rancho Tejon boundary in Tejon Creek Canyon, and Cottonwood Creek Canyon north of the Antelope Valley. It lies at an elevation of 5,285 feet (1,611 m), and sits between two peaks of 5,491 feet (1,674 m) (to the west) and 5,566 feet (1,697 m) (to the east).
The ancient native trail which utilized what is now known as the Old Tejon Pass was found and explored in 1772 by Spanish explorer Pedro Fages. [1] The pass was used in 1776 by missionary explorer, padre Francisco Garcés. In 1806, Lt. Francisco Ruiz named it Tejon Pass while on an expedition into the San Joaquin Valley. Ruiz also named Tejon Canyon and Tejon Creek, all referencing the dead badger (or tejón) he had found at the canyon mouth.
In early 1827, the first overland American exploratory journey to California, led by Jedediah Smith, used the pass to move northwest from Antelope Valley into San Joaquin Valley, led by Native American guides familiar with the pass. [1]
Rancho El Tejón, a large 1843 Mexican land grant in the Tehachapi Mountains, was headquartered below the pass along Tejon Creek. Eventually, a road running straight north (from Elizabeth Lake), across westernmost Antelope Valley, and then over this Tejon Pass evolved. This route to the pass diverted from the El Camino Viejo at Elisabeth Lake, and from 1849 to before 1854 it was the main road connecting the southern part of the state to the trail along the eastern side of the San Joaquin Valley to the goldfields to the north. [2]
In 1853, the road which used the Old Tejon Pass was surveyed by Robert Stockton Williamson of the U.S. Army for suitability as a rail-bed for the planned transcontinental railroad into California. It was found wanting. The commander of the expedition particularly found the wagon road over the pass to be "one of the worst" he had ever seen. [3] He much preferred the Grapevine Canyon route, a much better road further west. Williamson scouted it and found it would be far more suitable for rail lines and wagons if the bulk of the traffic henceforth went that way. The name "Tejon" was transferred west to the "Fort Tejon Pass," an integral part of the Stockton – Los Angeles Road, which was established through Grapevine Canyon. From then on, the old pass was used less and less; and eventually lost its designation on official maps. [2] Afterward, Fort Tejon was abandoned, and the "Fort" was eventually dropped from the pass' name, becoming simply, the Tejon Pass as it is known today. [3]
The Tehachapi Mountains are a mountain range in the Transverse Ranges system of California in the Western United States. The range extends for approximately 40 miles (64 km) in southern Kern County and northwestern Los Angeles County.
The Tejon Pass, previously known as Portezuelo de Cortes, Portezuela de Castac, and Fort Tejon Pass, is a mountain pass between the southwest end of the Tehachapi Mountains and northeastern San Emigdio Mountains, linking Southern California north to the Central Valley. It has been traversed by major roads such as the El Camino Viejo, the Stockton – Los Angeles Road, the Ridge Route, U.S. Route 99, and now Interstate 5.
The Ridge Route, officially the Castaic–Tejon Route, was a two-lane highway between Los Angeles County and Kern County, California. Opened in 1915 and paved with concrete between 1917 and 1921, the road was the first paved highway directly linking the Los Angeles Basin with the San Joaquin Valley over the Tejon Pass and the rugged Sierra Pelona Mountains ridge south of Gorman. Much of the old road runs through the Angeles National Forest, and passes many historical landmarks, including the National Forest Inn, Reservoir Summit, Kelly's Half Way Inn, Tumble Inn, and Sandberg's Summit Hotel. North of the forest, the Ridge Route passed through Deadman's Curve before ending at Grapevine.
Neenach is an agricultural settlement in northwestern Los Angeles County, California, with a population of about 800. It is facing a massive change with the proposed construction of a 23,000-home planned community to its north called Centennial.
Gorman is an unincorporated community in northwestern Los Angeles County. Tens of thousands of motorists travel through it daily on Interstate 5, known locally as the Golden State Freeway.
Grapevine is an unincorporated community in Kern County, California, at the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley. The small village is directly adjacent to Interstate 5 and consists mainly of travelers' and roadside services. At an elevation of 1,499 feet (457 m), the community is located at the foot of a grade known as The Grapevine that starts at the mouth of Grapevine Canyon, immediately south of the community, and ascends the canyon to the Tejon Pass, which separates the Tehachapi Mountains from the San Emigdio Mountains via Interstate 5.
Fort Tejon in California is a former United States Army outpost which was intermittently active from June 24, 1854, until September 11, 1864. It is located in the Grapevine Canyon between the San Emigdio Mountains and Tehachapi Mountains. It is in the area of Tejon Pass along Interstate 5 in Kern County, California, the main route through the mountain ranges separating the Central Valley from the Los Angeles Basin and Southern California. The fort's location protected the San Joaquin Valley from the south and west.
Wheeler Ridge is an unincorporated community in the southwestern San Joaquin Valley, within Kern County, California. It is at the junction of the valley floor and the Wheeler Ridge landform of the Tehachapi Mountains.
Elizabeth Lake is a natural lake that lies directly on the San Andreas Fault in the northern Sierra Pelona Mountains, in northwestern Los Angeles County, southern California.
Rancho El Tejón was a 97,617-acre (395.04 km2) Mexican land grant in the Tehachapi Mountains and northeastern San Emigdio Mountains, in present day Kern County, California. It was granted in 1843 by Governor Manuel Micheltorena to José Antonio Aguirre and Ygnacio del Valle.
The Sebastian Indian Reservation (1853-1864), more commonly known as the Tejon Indian Reservation, was formerly at the southwestern corner of the San Joaquin Valley in the Tehachapi Mountains, in southern central California.
The Butterfield Overland Mail in California was created by the United States Congress on March 3, 1857, and operated until June 30, 1861. Subsequently, other stage lines operated along the route until the Southern Pacific Railroad arrived in Yuma, Arizona in 1877.
Stockton–Los Angeles Road, also known as the Millerton Road, Stockton–Mariposa Road, Stockton–Fort Miller Road or the Stockton–Visalia Road, was established about 1853 following the discovery of gold on the Kern River in Old Tulare County. This route between Stockton and Los Angeles followed by the Stockton–Los Angeles Road is described in ITINERARY XXI. From Fort Yuma to Benicia, California, in The Prairie Traveler: A Hand-book for Overland Expeditions by Randolph Barnes Marcy. The Itinerary was derived from the report of Lieutenant R. S. Williamson on his topographical survey party in 1853, that was in search of a railroad route through the interior of California.
El Camino Viejo a Los Ángeles, also known as El Camino Viejo and the Old Los Angeles Trail, was the oldest north-south trail in the interior of Spanish colonial Las Californias (1769–1822) and Mexican Alta California (1822–1848), present day California. It became a well established inland route, and an alternative to the coastal El Camino Real trail used since the 1770s in the period.
San Francisquito Pass is a mountain pass in the Sierra Pelona Mountains, located northeast of Green Valley and Santa Clarita, in northern Los Angeles County, California.
Tejon Creek, originally in Spanish Arroyo de Tejon, is a stream in Kern County, California. Its headwaters are located on the western slopes of the Tehachapi Mountains, and it flows northwest into the southern San Joaquin Valley.
Mud Spring, formerly called Aquaje Lodoso, is a spring and historic site in the western Antelope Valley, within northern Los Angeles County, southern California.
Willow Springs Canyon is a canyon cut by Willow Springs Canyon Wash. Its source is at the head of the canyon in the gap in the Portal Ridge of the Transverse Range, 0.5 miles north of Elizabeth Lake. It is cut into the slope to the northeast into the Antelope Valley, crossing the California Aqueduct. The mouth of the Canyon is 0.25 miles southwest of its confluence with Myrick Canyon Wash which is 300 feet southwest of the intersection of Munz Ranch Road with the Neenach - Fairmont Road in Los Angeles County, California, USA.
Cottonwood Creek, is a stream in Kern County, California. Its headwaters are located on the eastern slopes of the Tehachapi Mountains, near a spring 2 miles northwest of the Libre Twins peak. It flows east then southeast into Antelope Valley in the western Mojave Desert.
Castac Lake is a natural saline endorheic lake near Lebec, California. The lake is located in the Tehachapi Mountains just south of the Grapevine section of Interstate 5, and within Tejon Ranch. Normal water elevations are 3,482 feet (1,061 m) above sea level.