Mountain House (formerly, Zimmerman's and Zimmerman's Mountain House) was a historic waystop for forty-niners halfway from

San Francisco San Francisco, officially the City and County of San Francisco, is a commercial, Financial District, San Francisco, financial, and Culture of San Francisco, cultural center of Northern California. With a population of 827,526 residents as of ...

to the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada ( ) is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primari ...

gold country. The

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...

is in

Alameda County, California Alameda County ( ) is a List of counties in California, county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 1,682,353, making it the 7th-most populous county in the state and List ...

, United States. It is located east-northeast of Livermore, and east of the

Altamont Pass Altamont Pass, formerly Livermore Pass, is a low mountain pass in the Diablo Range of Northern California between Livermore in the Livermore Valley and Tracy in the San Joaquin Valley. The name is actually applied to two distinct but nea ...

, historically the Livermore Pass, at an altitude of 207 feet (63 m), between the

California Aqueduct The Governor Edmund G. Brown California Aqueduct is a system of canals, tunnels, and pipelines that conveys water collected from the Sierra Nevada and valleys of Northern and Central California to Southern California. Named after California Gov ...

and the Delta-Mendota Canal. San Joaquin County's

Mountain House A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...

borrowed the name of the historic Mountain House and is located two miles (3 km) to the northeast further downstream on Mountain House Creek.

History

The Cholbon triblet of the Northern Valley

Yokuts The Yokuts (previously known as MariposasPowell, 1891:90–91.) are an ethnic group of Native Americans native to central California. Before European contact, the Yokuts consisted of up to 60 tribes speaking several related languages. Yokuts ...

were the original inhabitants of the Mountain House area. Their territory ran along

Old River Old River may refer to: * Old River (Belize) * Old River (Tasmania), Australia * The Old River, in the Australian state of Victoria In the United States: * Old River (Clay County, Arkansas) a lake in Clay County, Arkansas * Old River (Cross Co ...

distributary A distributary, or a distributary channel is a stream channel that branches off and flows a main stream channel. It is the opposite of a ''tributary'', a stream that flows another stream or river. Distributaries are a result of river bifurc ...

of the

San Joaquin River The San Joaquin River ( ; ) is the longest river of Central California. The long river starts in the high Sierra Nevada and flows through the rich agricultural region of the northern San Joaquin Valley before reaching Suisun Bay, San Francis ...

. In 1849 Thomas Goodall erected a blue denim cloth tent to serve as a midway stopover for gold miners headed from

to the

Sierra Nevada (U.S.) The Sierra Nevada ( ) is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primarily ...

foothills via

. Goodall eventually built an adobe house at the eastern edge of the

Diablo Range The Diablo Range is a mountain range in the California Coast Ranges subdivision of the Pacific Coast Ranges in northern California, United States. It stretches from the eastern San Francisco Bay Area at its northern end to the Salinas Valley a ...

hills, calling it The Mountain House. Simon Zimmerman later acquired the stop and it became known as Zimmerman's Mountain House, and became a well-known way station stop on the way to

Stockton Stockton may refer to: Places Australia * Stockton, New South Wales * Stockton, Queensland, a locality in the Cassowary Coast Region New Zealand *Stockton, New Zealand United Kingdom * Stockton, Cheshire *Stockton, Norfolk * Stockton, Chi ...

. The last remaining settlement buildings were leveled in 1940. In November 1994, the

San Joaquin County San Joaquin County ( ; , meaning " St. Joachim"), officially the County of San Joaquin, is a county located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States census, the population was 779,233. The county seat is Stockton. San Jo ...

Board of Supervisors officially launched the new community of

two miles to the northwest along Mountain House Creek. The Elk Horn post office, which operated from 1852 to 1853, was located at or near Mountain House. In 1915 the county road, passing in front of Mountain House, became the

Lincoln Highway The Lincoln Highway is one of the first transcontinental highways in the United States and one of the first highways designed expressly for automobiles. Conceived in 1912 by Indiana entrepreneur Carl G. Fisher, and formally dedicated Octob ...

, America's first to-coast paved road. The Mountain House Bar now occupies the site of the original Mountain House, and is located at 16784 West Grantline Road.

References

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Alameda County, California California Gold Rush