| Tejon Pass (Kern County) | |
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| Puerto el Tejon | |
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Tejon Pass (Kern County)
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| Elevation | 5285 feet |
| Traversed by | unpaved road |
| Location | |
| Location | Kern County, California |
| Range | Tehachapi Mountains |
| Topo map | Liebre Twins, CA |
Tejon Pass in Kern County, the original Tejon Pass, is a mountain pass in the middle of the Tehachapi Mountains linking Southern to Central California. This pass is 15 miles to the northeast of what is now Tejon Pass, in the middle of the Tehachapi Mountains, at the top of the divide between a point about 5 miles east of the Rancho Tejon boundary in Tejon Creek Canyon and Cottonwood Creek Canyon north of Antelope Valley. It lies at an elevation of 5285 feet, between two peaks, of 5491 feet to the west and 5566 feet to the east.
What is now the old Tejon Pass, was originally discovered by padre Francisco Garces in 1776. In 1806, Lt. Francisco Ruiz, on an expedition into the San Joaquin Valley, named this Pass Tejon Pass, and also named Tejon Canyon, and Tejon Creek, after a dead badger found at the canyon mouth. Rancho El Tejon was later established along Tejon Creek and a road straight North from Elizabeth Lake across Antelope Valley to this Rancho over Tejon Pass and beyond evolved. Before 1854, this Tejon Pass was once the main road connecting the southern part of the state with the east side of the San Joaquin Valley to the north. [1]
In 1853, the old Tejon Pass route was surveyed by the U.S. Army for suitabliaty as a route for a railroad into California, and was found wanting. Additionally the commander of the expedition found the wagon road over the pass to be one of the worst he had ever seen. He much preferred the Grapevine Canyon route, which he used for his own wagons.[2]
This led to Old Tejon Pass having its place usurped by the Fort Tejon Pass to the west in 1854, when the Stockton - Los Angeles Road was established over a much easier route for wagons through the Grapevine Canyon. After Fort Tejon was abandoned the Fort was dropped from its name and it is now called Tejon Pass. The old pass was used less and less and eventually lost its desigation on official maps.[1] However it remained in use by men like Tiburcio Vásquez who prefered the less traveled routes.