For over 3,000 years Sierra Miwok, Mono, Paiute, and other Native American groups have lived in the central Sierra Nevada region of California. When European Americans first visited the area that would later become Yosemite National Park, a band of Native Americans called the Ahwahnechee lived in Yosemite Valley. The California Gold Rush in the mid-19th century greatly increased the number of non-indigenous people in the region.