The falls in North Katoomba were named after Laughing Water by a Longfellow admirer in 1889 (Katoomba Times, 13 July 1889). The area around Minnehaha Falls was owned in the 1890s by an American company called The Assets Realization and General Finance. Co. Ltd. There was as a result an awareness of the splendours of Yosemite National Park, the first reserve of its sort in the world, established in California in 1890, so the perennial watercourse which created Minnehaha Falls was named Yosemite Creek. (Fox, Upper Blue Mountains Geographical Encyclopaedia, 117, 174; Woods, Yellow Rock to Green Gully, 112, 177)
The present track along the east side of Yosemite Creek to the Minnehaha Falls was constructed in 1894, when Minni Ha Ha Road was probably also named, and soon afterwards, in October 1895, the area of 18.6 hectares along the creek, including the falls, was gazetted as a Recreation Reserve. The track was improved in 1903 by John Cliff. (Fox, 116; Woods, 112; Woods, Street Whys, 74)
Recently the Minnehaha Falls Landcare Group has erected admirable signage at the southern end of the track.