This is a selected list of people associated with the California gold rush. People listed here should be known to have been in Northern California during the period from 1848 to 1864.

• Samuel Brannan
• Frederick Catherwood
• Jean Baptiste Charbonneau
• Charles Crocker
• Thomas Fallon
• John C. Frémont
• John White Geary
• Domingo Ghirardelli
• Daniel Govan
• Ulysses Grant
• Frank James
• James Lick
• James Marshall
• Richard Barnes Mason
• Benjamin McCulloch
• Isaac Murphy
• Joshua Norton
• William Tecumseh Sherman
• Leland Stanford
• Levi Strauss
• John Sutter
• Mark Twain
• Edwin B. Winans
• Maríano Guadalupe Vallejo
• Joaquin Murietta