Home of Elisha Stevens

He got the first wagons over the Sierra in 1844: fifty people left Iowa and fifty-two reached Sutter's Fort, nobody lost. The credit went elsewhere. The pass carries the name of the party that failed there two years later; this bronze calls the train the Murphy-Townsend, and it spells him Stevens when he wrote Stephens. He came to Kern County in 1862, the first non-Native settler on the ground Bakersfield stands on, and was buried in 1887 without a stone. The grave was located in 2009.

What the plaque says

HOME OF ELISHA STEVENS NEAR THIS SPOT STOOD THE LAST HOME OF ELISHA STEVENS, NOTED AMERICAN PATHFINDER AND SCOUT. BORN IN GEORGIA APRIL 5, 1804, HE LEARNED BLACKSMITHING DURING HIS YOUTH. DRIFTING WEST HE BECAME A TRAPPER ON THE UPPER MISSOURI FOR MORE THAN TWO DECADES. IN 1844 HE LED THE 50-MEMBER MURPHY-TOWNSEND WAGON TRAIN SAFELY FROM COUNCIL BLUFFS TO SUTTER'S FORT. DURING THE MEXICAN WAR HE SERVED AS AN ORDNANCE MECHANIC UNDER COMMODORE STOCKTON. FOR A TIME HE LIVED IN SANTA CLARA COUNTY, THEN SETTLED HERE ON A 38-ACRE TRACT, THE FIRST PERMANENT SETTLER IN THE BAKERSFIELD DISTRICT. HE DIED SEPTEMBER 9, 1887 AND IS BURIED IN UNION CEMETERY. CALIFORNIA REGISTERED HISTORICAL LANDMARK NO. 732 PLAQUE PLACED BY THE CALIFORNIA STATE PARK COMMISSION IN COOPERATION WITH THE KERN COUNTY HISTORICAL SOCIETY, EL TEJON PARLOR NO. 239, N.D.G.W., BAKERSFIELD PARLOR NO. 42, N.S.G.W. AND KERN COUNTY MUSEUM, JULY 12, 1964.

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Garcés Circle — 1.0 mi
• Last Home of Alexis Godey — 1.3 mi
• Colonel Thomas Baker — 1.8 mi
• Gordon's Ferry on the Kern River — 2.9 mi