Tejon Creek

The ancient native trail now known as Old Tejon Pass was "discovered" in 1772 by Spanish explorer Pedro Fages,[2] and used in 1776 by padre Francisco Garces, traveling east of the Anza Colonizing Expedition's main route. It is 15 miles (24 km) to the northeast of the present day Tejon Pass, in the Tehachapi Mountains, at the top of the divide between Tejon Creek Canyon in the San Joaquin Valley and Cottonwood Creek Canyon in the Antelope Valley of the western Mojave Desert.

In 1806, Lt. Francisco Ruiz named it Tejón Pass while on an expedition into the San Joaquin Valley. Ruiz also named Tejon Canyon and Tejon Creek, all after the dead badger (tejón) he had found at the canyon mouth.

Later the El Camino Viejo, a Spanish and Mexican inland route from the Pueblo de Los Angeles northward, crossed the western Antelope Valley from Elizabeth Lake to Cottonwood Creek, and then crossed the Tehachapi Mountains at Old Tejon Pass, following Tejon Creek down into the San Joaquin Valley.

Gold Rush 49ers, and early emigrants and teamsters followed this route. The Five Joaquins Gang used the route over the pass to drive their droves of stolen and wild horses southward to Sonora.[3]^: 495

It was described in 1853, by an Army Topographic Engineer, Lieutenant Robert Stockton Williamson as "one of the worst roads he ever saw." In an oak grove along the middle reach of the creek, on Rancho El Tejon, was the site of the Depot Camp of Williamson's Pacific Railroad expedition while it surveyed the passes into the San Joaquin Valley as possible routes for the railroad.[4]

Williamson much preferred as a wagon route the lower and easier Grapevine Canyon to the west that led to a pass between the Tehachapi and San Emigdio Mountains.[4] Following this discovery and the construction of Fort Tejon, wagon traffic soon changed to the easier Grapevine route named Fort Tejon Pass. The new Stockton - Los Angeles Road used it, and the Old Tejon Pass route was gradually abandoned.

The name Tejon Pass was transferred west following the closure of Fort Tejon, when "Fort" was dropped from the Fort Tejon Pass name.[4] The (Old) Tejon Pass eventually was so unused that it lost its name altogether on maps.

In 1858, the Butterfield Overland Mail 1st Division established the Sinks of Tejon Station at the mouth of Tejon Creek, west of Comanche Point. There at the Sinks of Tejon, the creek's waters sank into the ground of the San Joaquin Valley here during the dry season, instead of reaching Kern Lake.

The Butterfield Overland Mail (1857-1861) stagecoaches' next stations were: Kern River Slough Station located 14 miles (23 km) to the northeast; and Fort Tejon Station located 15 miles (24 km) to the southwest.

The Sinks of Tejon Station site is a registered California Historical Landmark, #540.

The California Historical Landmark reads:

NO. 540 SINKS OF THE TEJÓN, ALSO KNOWN AS ALAMO, STATION OF BUTTERFIELD OVERLAND MAIL LINES - Six miles east of this point was the site of the Butterfield Stage Line station Sinks of Tejón. Operating through present Kern County during 1858-61, this famous line ran from St. Louis, Missouri to San Francisco until the outbreak of the Civil War.[5]