We're not sure exactly when the first humans set foot in what became today's Tauhindauli Park - but scientists believe it was about 10,000 years ago! Wandering small family groups came down from Alaska into today's Northern California as the Ice Age glaciers melted and the climate warmed. We believe that they likely were following river valleys in search of new hunting and fishing grounds for their families.

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Over the next 10,000 years, numerous different family groups and small tribal groups occupied the area that includes today's Park. These people were all hunter-gatherers - they moved with the seasons, following animals and plants they needed for food, without a permanent village.

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In the early 1800s, at the time the first Americans and Europeans were in Northern California, a Native American tribe known as the Okwanuchu occupied a territory that included today's Park. The Okwanuchu territory stretched from north of Mt. Shasta City, east past McCloud, and down the Sacramento and McCloud Rivers to near today's Lake Shasta. Researchers believe that the Okwanuchu were never more than about 150-200 people living amongst the pines and cedars of southern Siskiyou and northern Shasta Counties. While the Okwanuchu had no settled villages, we believe that they would have camped in or near today's Park during salmon fishing before moving on to other places with the seasons.

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The Park's location on the Siskiyou Trail meant that there was steady Native American foot traffic through today's Park for many millennia. The Wintu, who arrived about a thousand years ago, were located south of today's Lake Shasta, and the Shasta and Modoc, located north of Mount Shasta would have walked through today's Park as part of trade networks linking California tribes with tribes in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest. 

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The first Europeans and Americans to walk through today's Park were fur-trappers beginning in the 1820s. They were followed by Americans in the 1830s and 1840s--pioneers taking cattle and horses from Mexican California into Oregon, and the United States Exploring Expedition. In fact, in 1841, the "U.S. Ex. Ex." made a written entry in their logs that they drank from the soda springs located just across Upper Soda Springs Road from the Park.

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With the discovery of gold in California in 1848 and the arrival of hundreds of thousands of people from around the world into Northern California, life changed dramatically. Especially with the discovery of gold near Yreka in 1851 there was greatly increased travel along the Siskiyou Trail through today's Park.

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The McCloud family were the first permanent white settlers of the property that is today's Park. They owned and operated what became known as the Upper Soda Springs Hotel (later Resort) in the 1850s. Also living near today's Park was the Towendolly family (as they spelled their name). The Towendolly family were Trinity River Wintu from near Weaverville who were escaping from attacks by American prospectors on the Trinity River. The Towendollys came over the hills from the Trinity River and found refuge at Upper Soda Springs, protected by the McCloud family from attack. The Towendollys settled near today's Park, followed traditional ways and were friends and employees of the McCloud family.

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The second half of the 1800s brought mule trains, then stagecoaches, and finally the railroad in 1886. With the railroad came the City of Dunsmuir in the late 1880s, thirty years after the original settler family built the hotel.

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The 1900s brought still more change, as the City of Dunsmuir grew north and encompassed what became today's Park. By the middle of the century, the I-5 freeway, built along the path of the Siskiyou Trail, connected California and the Pacific Northwest, and electric power lines, making the same connections, were built and expanded.

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In about the year 2000, the State of California was able to acquire the central parcels of what has become the Park, using money from the Cantara Spill settlement.

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Today the Park is home to dozens of native species of plants and animals, and has a network of trail and bike paths, stretching over half-mile along the Sacramento River.