Native Americans were undoubtedly the first humans to traverse the Sierra Nevada Mountains, but it is unknown if they regularly used Ebbetts Pass since any trail they would have used is no longer traceable. It is traditionally held to be the pass used by Jedediah Smith in late spring of 1827 when leaving California at the end of his first exploratory journey, the first crossing ever of the Sierra Nevada by a non-native, but snow would have obscured any trail so he was blazing his own path. It may also have been used by the Bartleson-Bidwell Party on their emigration to California.