In 1926, newlyweds Alva and Mildred Richardson moved to the wilds of New Hampshire. Alva was just starting a job as a U.S. Forest Guard in the recently established White Mountain National Forest (WMNF). During the next four years, Alva built and maintained trails, watched for fires, painted and put up signage, and managed campground activity, among many other duties. They lived from spring through fall at rustic guard stations: first by the East Branch of the Saco River, then for a short while at Passaconaway, New Hampshire, a short stay in Hastings, Maine, and then at the Wild River guard station in Beans Purchase, New Hampshire. On June 20, 1927, their daughter Betty was born in the guard station at the Wild River Campground. As the first baby known to be born in the WMNF since its establishment in 1918, she received media attention as the “White Mountain National Forest Baby.”
In 1930, Alva started working as a game warden for New Hampshire Fish and Game, and the family set up home year-round near the Wild River for the next seven years. Mildred’s memoir, Where the Wild River Flows: A U.S. Forest Guard’s Work and Family Life in the White Mountain National Forest 1926 to 1937, was compiled and edited by Betty’s daughter, Caroleen “Mac” McKenzie-Dudley and published in 2019 by the Bethel Historical Society in Maine. The family’s legacy along the Wild River continues today with Mac’s work as a trail adopter for the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC) and the U.S. Forest Service. Mac, a registered Maine Guide, and her husband Steve Dudley maintain more than 18 miles of trails within the Wild River Wilderness. Alva built many of these trails. Here is an excerpt from an interview with Mac, reflecting on her time with her grandmother along the Wild River, and describing her more recent experiences:
I was born and raised in Berlin, New Hampshire, and we’d always be out in back hiking or hunting. We had lots of trails in the back, what I called the Back 40, and streams we’d always be hanging out at. We didn’t call it the backyard; it’s the backwoods. I remember my grandmother used to keep us kids when my parents were working, and she took care of just about everybody’s kids who worked. I was about 4 or 5 years old, and I would take those kids out in the woods to explore. I was always the guide, so I think it was in my blood.
The Wild River Campground was still pretty rustic back when I would go camping with my grandparents. They would have the whole family in this big, old canvas army tent. After my grandfather died when I was 9 years old, my grandmother decided that she would continue camping, and I spent a lot of time camping with her. At that time my grandmother had a Scotty Camper. It was a big step up from the old, heavy canvas tent. When I was 13 or 14, it was just her and I. We would mostly stay at the Hastings Campground just below the Wild River Campground. My grandmother talked about all these stories out there from her time living in the White Mountain National Forest. Years later, after my grandmother passed, my mother handed me a box of my grandmother’s recollections and photos of her time living along the Wild River.
My mother was a lot like my grandmother. I was sorry she didn’t get to see the completed book, but she did get to edit it. On her 90th birthday, she was honored as the White Mountain National Forest Baby. I put together a big birthday party for my mom and had a band that her youngest brother organized, and he played the banjo. Some of the people from the Forest Service also came and spoke, so it was a good last thing I could do for my mom. She came from the woods, she was born in the woods, she lived on a dirt road by herself out in the middle of the woods, at the edge of the Forest, right up ’til the day she died. She was a pretty hardcore lady.
My grandparents were really unique in that they took so many photos, and they wrote on the back of them, thank God, so that I could put this book together. I inherited that and all the photos because I think nobody really wanted to deal with it. And I’m so glad that I did. I learned so much of my own family history, their legacy. And some of the interesting people that were part of their life, or part of my family.
My involvement as a trail adopter for the Appalachian Mountain Club (AMC) started with George Brown – a volunteer trail maintenance section leader for AMC. My husband and I had become friends with George after I became a registered Maine Guide, and we started hiking together. George asked me if I was interested in adopting this little mountain called East Royce, and I adopted that trail in 2005; it’s about 1½ miles and a steep little mountain. My grandfather did just about all the trails in that region. It was the most interesting trail, and it really needed some TLC; it was becoming kind of an animal path. My husband Steve came along and he helped me open it back up; we found the original trail, overgrown by about 10 feet, and also found some old stone stairways and we got the trail in great shape. The following year, AMC had their annual picnic at Camp Dodge, and we got the Rookie-of-the-Year award for clearing the East Royce Trail.
I brought my grandfather’s logbooks with me to the picnic, because I wanted to show George that my grandfather had built and named the Black Angel Trail. He worked on it from 1927 to 1928, finishing it on October 14, 1928. Before this trail was built, he would have to go from the Wild River Campground up through Moriah Brook Trail and cut across the Moriah/Carter mountains to Carter Dome to carry supplies in to Jigger Johnson, the forest guard who was manning the fire tower. It was about a 22-mile hike, may have been longer. I did the hike myself just to experience what it would have taken to pack stuff and take it all the way to Carter Dome from the campground following the old trail. My grandfather put the Black Angel Trail in to cut off quite a bit of the distance – it became an 8-mile trip, 16 miles round trip instead of 22.
I showed Justin Preisendorfer, one of the Forest Service backcountry rangers who happened to be at the picnic, the logbook and asked him if they could use an adopter on the Black Angel. I had never been on the trail, so I had no idea what it was about. He looked at me like I had three heads. I didn’t realize it would be a 3-mile hike just to start my work, 5 miles on the west side and 3 miles on the east side. I ended up adopting that on the day after, October 15 in 2008. I was a day behind the date my grandfather completed it, but it happened to be on my birthday. That’s how it all started out. Today Steve and I maintain part of the Wild River Trail, and the Black Angel; we have the Blue Brook Connector, which I named, and we do part of the Basin Trail and the Burnt Mill Brook Trail – another trail in the Wild River area that my grandfather worked on – and then the Shelburne Trail. We put in roughly 130 hours a season just clearing trails.
In the 1930s, my grandfather built the Blue Brook Shelter with other forest guards – that’s what they were called then – now they are called backcountry rangers. When the Wild River Wilderness Area was designated in 2006, the man-made structures had to be removed. But because the Blue Brook Shelter was historic, they ended up moving it and kept the structure. It takes a lot to deal with something that’s historic – anything that’s replaced in the Wilderness Area has to be natural.
I was able to work on the removal. I did a lot of the labeling and did the nomenclature with pictures and drawings to allow them to rebuild the shelter in the Wild River Campground. All the rubble, including the old metal roof put on during the 1960s, was going to be trashed. The rest was moved by helicopter and dropped at the Wild River Campground to be rebuilt. I received the WMNF Volunteer of the Year award that year.
My grandmother talked about people coming back to the Wild River Campground year after year after year. When I’m working on the trail, I talk to people and ask, so how did you come about this place? People would say, “Oh, my parents, my grandparents, used to come here,” and then I’d tell them about my grandparents, and we’d start talking about different places that they would go in the Wild River, trails that they liked, or swimming holes, or fishing holes, those kinds of things. It’s amazing how many people are returning because their parents and grandparents have taken them there. It’s kind of cool to see that tradition continuing – they’re bringing their kids in now.
I don’t get paid as a trail adopter. As a matter of fact, they used to have campsites they would set aside if they knew we were coming, and if we had to spend three or four days, they would reserve a spot. Because they have a concierge now, I have to pay for my own spot to volunteer. Which is fine. Because I’m doing something I enjoy, I’m taking care of the trails my grandfather put in, and it makes me feel like I’m still in touch with my grandfather and my grandmother. I’m doing this for the tradition, and the enjoyment of being out in the woods. At Wild River I feel like I am home.
Excerpt from Where the Wild River Flows: A U.S. Forest Guard’s Work and Family Life in the White Mountain National Forest 1926 to 1937
Soon however the sun came out bright and warm and our taste of winter was disappearing and bare spots of the ground were beginning to show through. They thought it might be a day or so before it was all gone, but we could not wait, as we had to be back at the camp. Jigger, who was the lookout man at the tower, loaned me a pair of woolen stockings to pull on over my moccasins so I would not get wet feet, and we hiked back down the mountain…I will never forget my stay at the tower. At night the moon was so bright we could see to read a newspaper without any other light. It was really beautiful there at night, as everything seemed like a beautiful wonderful fairyland. The snow glistened, the frost on the trees glittered like diamonds, and Mt. Washington seemed near enough to throw a rock onto.
Order your copy of Mildred Richardson’s memoir at: wherethewildriverflows.com