In late May 1846, this cold-water spring, named by Edwin Bryant of the Donner and Reed emigrant wagon train, served as an excellent campsite and respite in the wilderness, with excellent water and surrounding ash, cottonwood, and cedar trees. George McKinstry wrote on May 30, 1846, that it was an excellent place to camp for a day or two to wash and recruit the cattle, and that he cut the name of the spring in the rock at the top of the falls. The ill-fated company, which later lost most of its members to starvation before reaching its destination, suffered its first death here at Alcove Spring when Mrs. Sarah Keyes, the elderly mother-in-law of James Frazier Reed, died after a prolonged illness with consumption. For pioneers on the Oregon and California Trails, places like Alcove Spring offered relief from scarce water and food, sickness, rough terrain, and harsh climate, and also became burial places for the dead, even as many emigrants survived to begin new lives in the West.