Oro Grande Cemetery, one of the oldest in the Victor Valley area, was originally established as Bennette Memorial Park sometime around 1890. Bennette, a rancher who raised stock in and around Oro Grande until 1894, relocated to Redlands for a time before returning to his Oro Grande ranch in 1903, where he lived until his death in 1944. The cemetery had its last interment in the mid 1960's, and ownership was transferred to San Bernardino County by the Oro Grande Foundation in the mid 1970's. On May 9, 1975, the Oro Grande Cemetery was designated by the State of California Office of Historic Preservation as a Point of Historic Interest. Oro Grande itself began as a trading post in the mid 1800's as early pioneers passed through the area. Among the earliest travelers was Fr. Francisco Hermenegildo Graces, a missionary priest who traveled with Mojave Indians as he traced a route to the coast in 1776, followed by explorer and trapper Jedediah Smith in 1826, frontiersman Kit Carson in 1828, and the Mormon Battalion in 1846-1847 as California became a state. Though Oro Grande had many visitors and few residents as a trading post, J.H. Lane, a former army captain, founded a store at the narrows of the Mojave River in 1852 to serve travelers and increasing numbers of settlers. The gold boom of 1849 helped form Oro Grande as a permanent settlement, and around the 1880's the Oro Grande, or Big Gold, Mine became established along with the town. In 1885, the Southern California Railway was laid through Oro Grande and Cajon Pass to San Bernardino, linking larger populations and industry to the high desert region. Although gold was not abundant in the Big Gold Mine, deposits of silica and lime were discovered and mined instead, and those mineral deposits continue to be mined.