Area Information - Truckee
Truckee is an
incorporated town in Nevada County, California, USA. The
population was 13,864 at the 2000 census. Truckee was named
after a Paiute chief. His assumed Paiute name was Tru-ki-zo. He
was the father of Chief Winnemucca and grandfather of Sarah
Winnemucca. The first people who came to cross the Sierra Nevada
encountered his tribe. The friendly Chief rode toward them
yelling "Tro-kay!", which is Paiute for "Everything is all
right". The settlers assumed he was yelling his name.
Truckee is located along Interstate 80 at
/
39.34222; -120.20361(39.342163,
-120.203568) at the eastern edge of Nevada County. The closest
metro area is Reno, Nevada. According to the United States
Census Bureau, the town has a total area of 33.8 square miles
(87.7 kmē), of which, 32.5 square miles (84.3 kmē) of it is land
and 1.3 square miles (3.4 kmē) of it (3.87%) is water, mostly
the Truckee River, the only outlet of Lake Tahoe.
The Truckee River flows from Lake Tahoe for
approximately 100 miles northeast to the border of the arid
Great Basin of Nevada and Utah and into Pyramid Lake. This water
source formed a natural, seasonal route for Native Americans.
Although no particular tribe is considered to have inhabited
Truckee year-round, the Washoe Tribe occupied a large territory
roughly centered in the modern day Carson City area, but
Shoshone and Paiute Tribes were also present (the Paiute Tribe
Reservation now encompasses Pyramid Lake). These peoples are
considered to be the primary source of Native American travelers
in the area. Hobart Mills, just north of Truckee on Highway 89,
has a large, horizontal, circular petroglyph of the type common
to travel routes in Nevada. The date of that petroglyph, as well
as several etched into granite slabs on the summit west of
Truckee, are not agreed upon. But those artifacts, as well as
the abundance of arrowheads throughout the Truckee region,
attest to a minimum of hundreds of years of Native American
presence. It is possible that, like the Shoshone, Ute and
earlier Fremont tribes of Utah and Eastern Nevada, the nearby
Native American populations fluctuated over the course of
millennia as a result of weather cycles, food changes, and
possibly disease or war. Some historians date the pre-Fremont
Indian culture of Eastern Nevada to as early as 10,000 B.C. and
it likely that the Eastern side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains,
since it faces the Great Basin, had native Americans of a
hunter-gatherer culture visit at least as early as 3,000 B.C.
These people were likely of a purely nomadic group since datable
housing structures like those found in Nevada and Utah are not
present. Like most of the modern history of the West, as the
European settlers' population increased, the Native American
population decreased. The Gold Rush of 1849 caused a surge in
fortune-seeking settlers (although Truckee itself wasn't settled
until later). It is not known exactly when the last Native
Americans passed naturally through Truckee, but they were
visually recorded in the 1850s.
Both a source of settler pride and hubris, the
Donner Party ordeal is Truckee's most famous historical event.
In 1846, a group of settlers from Illinois, originally known as
the Donner-Reed Party but now usually referred to as The Donner
Party became snowbound in early fall as a result of several
trail and decision mishaps. Choosing multiple times on shortcuts
to save distance compared to the traditional Oregon Trail,
coupled with infighting, a disastrous crossing of the Utah salt
flats, and the attempt to use the pass near the Truckee River
(now Donner Pass) all caused delays in their journey. Finally, a
massive, early blizzard brought the remaining settlers to a halt
at the edge of what is now Donner Lake - about 1,200 feet below
the steep granite summit of the Sierra Nevada mountains and 90
miles east of their destination, Sutter's Fort near Sacramento.
Several attempts at carting their few remaining wagons, oxen,
and supplies - sometimes by pulling them up by rope - over the
summit proved impossible due to freezing conditions and a lack
of any pre-existing trail. The party returned, broken in spirit
and supplies, to the edge of Donner Lake. A portion of the camp
also returned to the Alder Creek campsite a few miles to the
east. What followed during the course of the brutal winter is a
miserable story of starvation and an infamous resorting to
cannibalism. Although 15 members had constructed makeshift
snowshoes and set out for Sutter's Fort in the late fall, they
were also thwarted by freezing weather and disorientation. Of
them, only 7 survived with 6 having been cannibalized and 2
being lost or having escaped. The Truckee camps survivors were
saved by a Reed Party member who had set out ahead as a result
of being ejected from the party months earlier after killing a
man in a fit of jealous rage. Seeing that his group never
arrived at Sutter's Fort, he initiated several relief parties.
Of the original 87 settlers, 48 remarkably survived the ordeal.
The Donner Memorial State Park is dedicated to the settlers and
is located at the East End of Donner Lake.
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