Robidoux Pass was named for Joseph Robidoux III of St. Joseph, Missouri, who established a trading post and blacksmith shop here in 1849 at the start of the California gold rush. The pass is an integral part of the original historic U-shaped Scotts Bluff, which forty-niner William Kelly likened to a horizontal shepherd’s crook, with the present Wildcat Hills as the straight staff, Robidoux Pass as the top of the crook, and the climatic formations within Scotts Bluff National Monument as the flair at the end. Rocky Mountain fur trappers and traders used this pass in 1830 when they took the first wheeled vehicles westward along the Platte River, and emigrants bound for Oregon began using it in 1843. It was also the classic route during the first two years of the California Gold Rush, 1849-50. Evidence given by Capt. Howard Stansbury of the U.S. Corps of Topographical Engineers shows that beginning in 1851, most emigrants traveling along the south side of the North Platte River switched from Robidoux Pass to the V-shaped gap now called Mitchell Pass within the present national monument, northeast of here. Even so, emigrant diaries and military observers indicate that the Robidoux Pass route was never entirely abandoned. The eastern junction of these alternate routes was at a point this side of present Melbeta, and they rejoined at Horse Creek near present Lyman, Nebraska. Although Mitchell Pass appeared shorter and therefore preferable, measured tracings on USGS quadrangle maps indicate that the two routes are nearly equal in length. Robidoux Pass was historically distinctive for its picturesque eastern approach, which struggling emigrants likened to an enchanted valley, for its copious springs said to be among the best on the route to California, and for nearby trees useful for firewood and wagon repairs. From the pass looking east, travelers saw the North Platte Valley and distant Chimney Rock, and from the summit looking west toward Fort Laramie they saw a broad panorama climaxed by Laramie Peak, which some mistakenly believed was their first view of the Rocky Mountains.