Beckwourth Pass
mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range
Beckwourth Pass is the lowest mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range at an elevation of 5,221 feet (1,591 m).
Geography
Beckwourth Pass is located at the north eastern edge of Sierra Valley at Chilcoot-Vinton, California near the border between Plumas County and Lassen County, 20 miles (32 km) east of Portola, California and 25 miles (40 km) northwest of Reno, Nevada.
California State Route 70 crosses over Beckwourth Pass. The Feather River Route of the former Western Pacific Railroad, now the Union Pacific Railroad, crosses beneath the pass via the Chilcoot Tunnel. Route 70 and the railroad line provide an alternate route between Sacramento, California and Reno, Nevada when Interstate 80 and the Overland Route, which cross the Sierra Nevada near Donner Pass, are impassable due to winter storms.
History
James Beckwourth discovered Beckwourth Pass in 1850. In 1851, he improved the path into Sierra Valley to create his Beckwourth Trail. The trail ran from Truckee Meadows (what is now known as Sparks, Nevada) through the pass into California and on to Marysville.
In late summer of 1851, James Beckwourth led the first wagon train of settlers along the Beckwourth Trail into Marysville.
One of the settlers in Beckwourth's first wagon train was ten-year-old Josephine Donna Smith.
The public source identifies “Beckwourth Pass” as mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Beckwourth, Pass and mountain.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Beckwourth Pass”, the useful work is to connect “mountain pass in the Sierra Nevada mountain range” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 14, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q727945. Authority coordinates are 39.792, -120.108. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1850 and 1851.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Beckwourth Pass” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.