The Henness Pass route over the Sierra Nevada, about halfway between Donner Pass (on the south) and Yuba Pass (on the north), had become a popular route into California by the 1850s. It avoided Donner Pass, which had acquired a sinister reputation due to the fate of the Donner party in the 1840s. A road was constructed along the route in the 1850s, and by the 1860s, with the discovery of silver in the Comstock Lode in Nevada, much traffic was now traveling back eastward, carrying supplies into Nevada.
The increased traffic motivated the construction of service establishments along the road, hotels in particular. At one point about 30 hotels lined the route. This one, the Webber Lake Hotel, is the last one remaining. It was built in 1860 by Dr. David Gould Webber, who purchased the area around Webber Lake as a ranch.
Webber operated the hotel until 1877, and ran it as a resort when traffic decreased on the Henness Pass Road due to the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad. William Henry Johnson purchased Webber Lake Ranch before the turn of the last century. It was used for summer sheep grazing, and for at least 60 years, Webber Lake became a private fishing lake.
For over a century, Webber Lake Ranch including Webber Lake and the hotel remained in private hands, but it was purchased in 2012 by the Truckee Donner Land Trust and is now accessible to the public. Although the hotel still stood, it was on the point of collapse and is now being restored as funds permit. A new concrete foundation was added in 2018-19, and much of the exterior carpentry has been repaired, but at present (2023) it is still incomplete and closed to the public. It is hoped to turn it into a museum once it is fully restored.
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