South Pass Wagon Road Brochure

The lure of gold has been a driving force within human culture for thousands of years. The desire for gold has led to mass movements of people and cultures into areas where gold was found or rumored to be. Such is the casem with the Sweetwater Mining District of central Wyoming. Gold may have been discovered at South Pass as early as 1842, but extensive development of mines, mining camps and towns did not begin until the mid-1860s. By 1867, the Sweetwater Mining District had a population of 1517 people and South Pass City was the county seat of Carter County, Dakota Territory, which subsequently became Sweetwater County, in 1868. Because no railroad was ever built across South Pass, all goods had to be moved by wagon and all passengers by stagecoach to the mining camps.