Hale Tharp
Hale Dixon Tharp was a miner during the California Gold Rush, and the first non-Native American settler to enter Giant Forest, in what is now Sequoia National Park.
Gold Country
Tharp was born in Michigan in 1828. In 1851, a widow from Illinois, Chloe Ann Smith Swanson, hired Tharp to take her and her four sons to California in a covered wagon with two teams of oxen. They settled in Placerville, where Tharp married Swanson.[1] Tharp then began mining in California's Gold Country.[2]
Sequoia
In the summer of 1856, Tharp went to Tulare County to establish a preemption homestead, with the intent to return later to ranch cattle. He built a shake and brush shack near the confluence of the Kaweah River and Horse Creek, east of Visalia and south of Three Rivers. He then returned to Placerville.[2]
Two years later, Tharp, along with his brother-in-law John Swanson, returned to his homestead and built a log cabin and barn, Cattle Cabin. Tharp then sought cattle summer pasturage. Led by the local Yokuts Indians, Tharp "discovered" Crescent Meadow and Log Meadow near the Giant Forest. He claimed grazing rights there for several years.[2]
Tharp's Log is a home Tharp built in a hollowed Giant sequoia (Sequoiadendron gigantuem) log at Log Meadow. It is restored and visited by tourists in Sequoia National Park today, and is on the National Register of Historic Places.
Hale Tharp, along with stepsons George and John Swanson, were the first non-Native American settlers known to ascend the granite dome Moro Rock.[3]
References
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- Atwell Mill Grove
- Franklin Tree
- Garfield Grove
- General Sherman Tree
- Giant Forest
- Hazelwood Tree
- King Arthur
- Lincoln Tree
- Mark Twain Tree
- Muir Grove
- President
- Tharp's Log
- Washington Tree
- Alta Peak
- Mount Barnard
- Black Kaweah
- Florence Peak
- Junction Peak
- Kaweah Peaks Ridge
- Kaweah Queen
- Mount Kaweah
- Mount Langley
- Mount Le Conte
- Mount Mallory
- Mount McAdie
- Milestone Mountain
- Mount Muir
- Red Kaweah
- Mount Russell
- Sawtooth Peak
- Mount Stewart
- Table Mountain
- Triple Divide Peak
- Mount Tyndall
- Thunder Mountain
- Mount Whitney
- Ash Mountain Entrance Sign
- Cabin Creek Ranger Residence
- Cattle Cabin
- Giant Forest Lodge Historic District
- Giant Forest Village–Camp Kaweah Historic District
- Hockett Meadow Ranger Station
- Hospital Rock
- Pear Lake Ski Hut
- Quinn Ranger Station
- Redwood Meadow Ranger Station
- Smithsonian Institution Shelter
- Squatter's Cabin
- C.C. Curtis
- John Muir
- Stephen T. Mather
- Hale D. Tharp
- John Tyndall
- Josiah Whitney
- George W. Stewart
- Yokuts
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