History records Sand Harbor as playing an important role in the operations of the Sierra Nevada Wood and Lumber Company, one of three large combines supplying lumber and cordwood to the Comstock mines during the late 19th century. Walter Scott Hobart organized the company and John Bear Overton was its general manager.

The steamer "Niagara" towed log rafts from company land at the south end of Lake Tahoe to Sand Harbor. Here the logs were loaded on narrow-gauge railway cars and taken two miles north to a sawmill on Mill Creek.

Lumber and cordwood were started on the way to Virginia City via an incline tramway 4,000 feet long, and rising 1,400 feet up the mountainside where the material was transferred to water flumes and transported to Lakeview just north of Carson City.

The tramway has been described as "the Great Incline of the Sierra Nevada."

Notes on this marker:

I have a thing about paying $6 just to take a 30 second picture. Thankfully, Sand Harbor has a 5 minute picture parking spot. But they mean 5 minutes!