Greeley Hill, CA

Greeley Hill is a Mariposa County census-designated place in the Sierra Nevada foothills, up at about 3,153 feet along the Tuolumne County line. The 2020 census counted 927 residents. The town center sits in a wide upland valley drained by Bean Creek, with the North Fork of the Merced River running through the larger mountain landscape. Coulterville is six miles southwest down Greeley Hill Road, and the two places share a ZIP code.

The name comes from Josiah Greeley, who settled the hill country, but the landscape does most of the introducing. Roads run through open upland, forested slopes rise toward the Stanislaus National Forest, and the North Fork carries the valley toward the Merced. Northern Mariposa County history centers on gold-era settlements, old roads, and scattered mountain communities, with Coulterville and Greeley Hill often telling the story together. Greeley Hill is a high foothill place with one foot in the region’s mining past and the other in the long Sierra road network.