Daring and Dangerous Donner Summit
David Woodruff, local local historian and author, did it again! He presented a very educational and surprisingly entertaining recounting of the tales that have helped shape the human history of Donner Summit, one of America's most popular mountain corridors.
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Arguably Donner Pass is the most important square mile in California with many firsts:
•The first wagon trains to California•The first transcontinental railroad•The first transcontinental highway•The first transcontinental air route
They all crossed Donner Pass, entry to California, the land of opportunity. Many of the people who built California came over or left their mark on Donner Pass.
Let's begin with the railroad history. I found it to be intriguing. Donner Summit gets an average of 34 feet of snow each winter. In some years, more than fifty feet fall. To ease the grade, tunnels had to be dug through the mountain. The first Winter they were building the tunnels, 1866, there were 44 storms and 60 feet of snow fell. Snow falls on Donner Summit in feet, not inches in a normal winter. Not only does a lot of snow fall but the snow on Donner Summit is affectionately called Sierra Cement due to the fact that it is really heavy.
Even before the railroad was completed in 1869, the builders started building wooden snow sheds (photos above) to protect the track and eventually 40 miles of sheds were built. The sheds became an iconic symbol of Donner Summit.
We also learned about the first transcontinental highway – the Lincoln Highway (which was also the first public memorial to Abraham Lincoln). It began in 1914. As soon as people could afford to drive cars they wanted to travel and go over the Sierra. The Lincoln Highway was strung together from many smaller routes and stretched all the way across the country. It is one of my favorite highways!
I was mesmerized by the story of the blizzard of 1952 (here is an amazing video of it all). A major snow event engulfed Lake Tahoe and the Sierra, shutting down Interstate 40 (precursor to I-80) for 30 days straight. Not only was the vital transcontinental highway closed for a month, but a luxury train was stopped cold in the mountains with 226 passengers and crew onboard. The event was major news.
The City of San Francisco was the pride of the Southern Pacific train fleet, a state-of- the-art passenger train deemed the "world's most superlative train."
On Sunday, January 13, 1952, it rammed into a deep snow slide east of Yuba Gap, about 20 miles west of Donner Pass. When engineers put the train into to reverse to escape, the steel wheels slipped on the icy track.
When the deadly storm broke on January 16, relief parties rushed in for the rescue. The cold and weary passengers hobbled to safety along the tracks while the sick and weak were tobogganed or carried on stretchers. Miraculously, all passengers and all by one crew member survived their three-day ordeal on the snowbound train. Wild stuff!
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Incredible history in an incredible setting shared by an incredible presenter. Just another incredible night in South Lake Tahoe.
“Donner Summit has its beauty of high crags and gleaming granite…but it does not rival Yosemite. Donner Summit is special because it has kept a rendezvous with history, and its interest to the person who passes here should be historical as much as scenic…”-George R. Stewart
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