Editing Sierra Nevada (section)

===Thorough exploration===
The Gold Rush populated the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada, but even by 1860, most of the Sierra was unexplored.<ref name="roper">{{cite book |last=Roper |first=Steve |title=Sierra High Route: Traversing Timberline Country |year=1997 |publisher=The Mountaineers Press |isbn=978-0-89886-506-6}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Moore |first=James G. |title=Exploring the Highest Sierra |year=2000 |publisher=Stanford University Press |isbn=978-0-8047-3703-6}}</ref> The state legislature authorized the [[California Geological Survey]] to officially explore the Sierra (and survey the rest of the state). [[Josiah Whitney]] was appointed to head the survey. Men of the survey, including [[William Henry Brewer|William H. Brewer]], [[Charles F. Hoffmann]] and [[Clarence King]], explored the backcountry of what would become [[Yosemite National Park]] in 1863.<ref name="roper" /> In 1864, they explored the area around [[Kings Canyon National Park|Kings Canyon]]. In 1869, [[John Muir]] started his wanderings in the Sierra Nevada range,<ref>{{cite book |title=My First Summer in the Sierra |first=John |last=Muir |url=https://archive.org/details/naturewritings0000muir |year=1911 |publisher=Houghton Mifflin |isbn=978-1-883011-24-6 |url-access=registration}}</ref> and in 1871, King was the first to climb [[Mount Langley]], mistakenly believing he had summited [[Mount Whitney]], the highest peak in the range.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.rei.com/blog/hike/famous-u-s-summits-mount-whitney-california |title=Famous U.S. Summits: Mount Whitney, California |last=Leonard |first=Brendan |date=n.d. |website=REI Co-op Journal |location=www.rei.com/blog |publisher=REI Co-op |access-date=July 16, 2018 |archive-date=July 16, 2018 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180716200535/https://www.rei.com/blog/hike/famous-u-s-summits-mount-whitney-california |url-status=live }}</ref> In 1873, Mount Whitney was climbed for the first time by 3 men from Lone Pine, California, on a fishing trip.<ref name="roper" /> From 1892 to 1897 [[Theodore Solomons]] made the first attempt to map a route along the crest of the Sierra.<ref name="roper" />

Other people finished exploring and mapping the Sierra. [[Bolton Coit Brown]] explored the [[Kings River (California)|Kings River]] watershed in 1895–1899. [[Joseph N. LeConte]] mapped the area around [[Yosemite National Park]] and what would become [[Kings Canyon National Park]]. [[James S. Hutchinson]], a noted mountaineer, climbed the [[Palisades (California Sierra)|Palisades]] (1904) and [[Mount Humphreys]] (1905). By 1912, the [[USGS]] published a set of maps of the Sierra Nevada, and the era of exploration was over.<ref name="roper" />{{rp|81}}