Truckee is an incorporated town in Nevada County, California, United States.

[8] The Donner Party ordeal is arguably Truckee's most famous historical event.

In 1846, a group of settlers from Illinois, originally known as the Donner-Reed Party but now usually referred to as the Donner Party, became snowbound in early fall as a result of several trail mishaps, poor decision-making, and an early onset of winter that year.

Choosing multiple times to take shortcuts to save distance compared to the traditional Oregon Trail, coupled with infighting, a disastrous crossing of the Utah salt flats, and the attempt to use the pass near the Truckee River (now Donner Pass) all caused delays in their journey.

Finally, a large, early blizzard brought the remaining settlers to a halt at the edge of what is now Donner Lake, about 1,200 feet (370 m) below the steep granite summit of the Sierra Nevada mountains and 90 miles (140 km) east of their final destination, Sutter's Fort (near Sacramento).

Several attempts at carting their few remaining wagons, oxen, and supplies over the summit—sometimes by pulling them up by rope—proved impossible due to freezing conditions and a lack of any preexisting trail.

The party returned, broken in spirit and short of supplies, to the edge of Donner Lake.

A portion of the camp members also returned to the Alder Creek campsite a few miles to the east.

During the hard winter the travelers endured starvation and were later found to have practiced cannibalism.

Fifteen members constructed makeshift snowshoes and set out for Sutter's Fort in the late fall but were thwarted by freezing weather and disorientation.

The railroad goes into downtown Truckee, and the Amtrak passenger lines still stop there on the trip from Chicago to San Francisco.

[9] Truckee's Sinophobic movement had begun during the Reconstruction Period, marked by the Trout Creek Outrage of 1876: By 1876, some 300 of the town’s residents, from workers to its most prominent citizens, had formed a local chapter of the Order of the Caucasians, also known as the Caucasian League, to drive out the Chinese.

Truckee gained statewide notoriety that summer when late one night seven of the group's members, clad in black, surrounded and set fire to two cabins full of Chinese woodcutters who had refused to leave the area.

The vigilantes shot at the Chinese men as they ran out of the cabin, killing forty-five-year-old Ah Ling.

[10]Charles Fayette McGlashan, local lawyer and owner/publisher of the Truckee Republican, defended those accused in the Trout Creek Outrage and was a leader in the town's anti-Chinese movement.

Constable Reed was among those accused of participating in the Trout Creek Outrage fifteen years prior.

[12] Truckee reportedly had one of the nation's first mechanized ski lifts at the site of the Hilltop Lodge.

Winters are chilly with regular snowfall, while summers are warm to hot and dry, with occasional periods of intense thunderstorms.

Freezing temperatures have been observed in every month of the year and there are an average of 228.4 nights with lows of 32 °F (0 °C) or lower – seven more than Fairbanks and only eight fewer than Nome – but only 6.0 nights with lows of 0 °F (−17.8 °C) or lower and 15.6 days where the high does not top freezing.

There were 12,803 housing units at an average density of 380.4 per square mile (146.9/km2), of which 4,326 (68.2%) were owner-occupied, and 2,017 (31.8%) were occupied by renters.

Amtrak's California Zephyr stops daily at Truckee station.

[36] A free public bus, operated by Placer County, California, connects Truckee station to Lake Tahoe, and to Incline Village, Nevada.