US 395, Part 9: Mono County (Bridgeport to Nevada State Line)

Another set of local lakes, which appeared in Out of the Past (and on the signpost above), are the Twin Lakes about 15 miles out of town. This scene was shot at Lower Twin Lake (click the thumbnail at left for a 95K still from the movie).

The municipal limit sign from the northwest side of town appears in Out of the Past as well. Click the thumbnail at right for a 63K still from the movie showing Joe's car and the town signpost.

The inset at right from the 2003 official state highway map appears to show some plans for realignment in this area.

The Sonora Pass lives in the shadow of its greater and higher neighbour to the south, the Tioga (see Part 7). At 9,624', however, it is darn nearly as high and until the Tioga's recent development and expansion the Sonora was a far more significant route. Its first use, of sorts, was by the southern half of the pioneer Bartleson-Bidwell frontier party -- California's first overland immigrants; see Part 23 -- in 1841 very near where the modern pass is today. Following the gold rush of 1848, the pass was quickly developed by the burgeoning mining traffic and over its curves, the Sonora admitted thousands of settlers into California's rich valleys for decades afterward. Nowadays, it is much less frequently used as the Tioga is faster and wider; grades as high as 26% (!!!) are on portions of its run and the route has little changed since its original signage in 1934. Thus, the truck warning is extremely well-advised. Caltrans persistently intends to develop CA 108 into a full freeway over the pass, in the same way that CA 120 is a quasi-freeway now, but has run into formidable community opposition and has been forced to make piecemeal upgrades instead using previously acquired right-of-way.

The Walker River is named for Joseph Reddefield Walker, the second white man to cross the Sierra (and the first to do it from the east), christened as such by admirer John C. Fremont. In a shocking example of ingratitude, however, a possibly apocryphal tale asserts that Walker thought Fremont was an out-and-out coward for an embarrassing incident with the Mexican military at Gavilan Peak, near what is modern-day Gilroy, among other less printable opinions.

Joseph Walker and Fremont first made their acquaintance in 1844, when Fremont hired him for his 2nd expedition. Walker knew the area very well, having entered it in 1833 under the command of Army officer B. L. E. de Bonneville over or near what was then Mono Pass (see Part 8), and his band were believed to be the first white settlers to enter Yosemite and see the sequoia. (Walker and Bonneville on this same expedition also led the first set of wagons over South Pass on a routing anticipating the Oregon Trail, but more about that in Part 23.) The reason for Walker's presence was not gold or Indians, but frank espionage; Walker and his detachment of 70 men were charged with the task of spying on the Mexicans for possible capture of California. The trip was brutal and provisions were short (his men were reduced to eating their own horses), but Walker persevered. Once over the pass and through Yosemite, Walker proceeded to the presidio at Yerba Buena on the San Francisco Bay and then marched down the coast taking notes as the unsuspecting Mexican governors welcomed him as an honoured guest. Once in Monterey, Walker returned eastward, but remembering the harsh Mono Pass he was determined to find a lower crossing. That he did, along the southern edge of the Sierras and the course of the Kern river south of Owens Peak, at 5,250', and today traversed by CA 178 (see Part 2). Fremont would later err and declare Walker's pass a superior method of entry to the state. Unfortunately for Fremont, it wasn't Walker Pass that he was looking at: he had traveled much too far south of Walker's crossing and was at the modern Cajon Pass instead (see Old Hwy 395 part 6), where I-15 runs now.

This same course was used by the Bartleson-Bidwell party as they descended south through the Antelope Valley to the Sonora Pass; for that matter, the original roadbed is still in use (see the late 1930s Burton Frasher postcard at right; click for a 119K larger image).

Walker prides itself on its local art community and there are several local galleries.

Continue to Part 10