Wild Women: The History of Women on the Long Trail
by Sarah Galbraith

View north from the summit of Camel's Humb, which the long Trail passes over.
A rugged by scenic 6.2 miles of trail takes LT hikers to the summit. photo: Jocelyn Hebert

 

Lumbering under the weight of an overstuffed backpack, I guessed at how many pounds I was carrying. I was walking my first miles of the Long Trail, having just said good-bye to my mother where she dropped me off in North Adams, Massachusetts. The plan was to hike 270 miles to the Canadian border through the mountains of Vermont. But more immediately, the plan was to make it to Stratton Mountain, where my partner and I would mail home 11 pounds of gear that seemed so important last night as we packed for our trip but that now seemed unessential on our backs.

As I did my mental math, thunder rolled in the distance. In the pit of my stomach, I felt fear. This would be our first summer storm on the trail, and we would have to hunker down out here in the woods or keep traveling through it. It started to sprinkle, and I considered taking out my rain gear but decided to wait until the sky really opened up, which it quickly did, and all of a sudden with no warning, I was soaked, and so was my pack. First lesson: Put on your rain gear at the first sign of rain.

Several miles down the trail, rain pouring over me, I started to smell the peppermint soap we were carrying. I stopped to take off my pack and investigate. Out came many items, into the rain, including the soap, which had opened in my pack and covered everything in a slimy sudsy film, including the toilet paper. Next lesson: Carry the soap—and toilet paper—in their own Ziploc bags.

We made camp that evening at the Seth Warner Shelter, a three-walled shelter with ample space surrounding it for tent camping. We were about six miles into our hike. That evening, we rinsed our gear and hunkered down in our tent, and thankfully awoke the next morning to dry air and clear skies. Though our gear still smelled like peppermint—and would for the remainder of the trip—it was at least dry, thanks to fast-drying synthetic fabrics. We ate our dehydrated oatmeal breakfast and started to hike and kept hiking until we reached Canada several weeks later.

As I plodded along on that trip, the history of the trail was apparent. Several of the shelters are original to the early 1900s when the trail and its infrastructure were being created. Memories of impactful people were everywhere: in the names of the shelters and campsites, in the names of the side trails, and throughout the guidebook that we were carrying to navigate our way.

It was the names of women that struck me most. Sure, it was one thing for me to be out backpacking, and I saw every day other women, including backpackers, day hikers, campsite and summit caretakers, and crew members working on the trail. We all benefited from modern gear and a society that accepted us being here. But what about the women who came before? These women pioneers overcame incredibly rough terrain, heavy and antiquated gear, and gender disparity. To me, they were the ultimate adventurers, and I had to know more about them.

A Footpath in the Wilderness

The Long Trail was built by the Green Mountain Club between 1910 and 1930. The 272-mile "footpath in the wilderness" was the vision of James P. Taylor in 1910, to "make the Vermont mountains play a larger part in the life of the people by protecting and maintaining the Long Trail system and fostering, through education, the stewardship of Vermont's hiking trails and mountains." The trail travels the spine of Vermont's Green Mountains from near Williamstown, Massachusetts, to the border with Canada near North Troy, Vermont. Marked by white blazes painted on trees and posts along the way, the Long Trail traverses almost all of the Green Mountains' major summits, including Glastenbury and Stratton Mountains, Killington Peak, Mount Abraham, Mount Ellen, Camel's Hump, Mount Mansfield, and Jay Peak.

The Green Mountain Club continues to maintain the trail, decades later, in cooperation with others, such as the Green Mountain National Forest and the State of Vermont. The nonprofit organization's website (www.greenmountainclub.org) provides this accurate description of the trail: "This 'footpath in the wilderness' climbs rugged peaks and passes pristine ponds, alpine sedge, hardwood forests, and swift streams. It is steep in places, muddy in others, and rugged in most."

Pictured left to right are Kathleen Norris, Catherine Robbins, and Hilda Kurth, known as the Three Musketeers. At the time, Robbins and Kurth, both age 25, were schoolteachers, and Norris, 18, had just graduated from high school. They were the first women to hike the Long Trail in its entirety, covering 280 miles in 27 days. The sign behind them reads: "Long Trail North to Jay Peak." Photo courtesy of Green Mountain Club

Pioneers and Musketeers

With their newly earned right to vote and changing societal roles, the "new women" of the 1920s challenged the role of the traditional woman. They enjoyed increased access to electricity, a quickly rising presence on college campuses and in the workforce, and some of the first forms of media and mass advertising directed at them. They cut their hair short, wore makeup, and shortened their skirts. Women were making names for themselves as movie stars, writers, fashion designers, and intellectuals.

Out of this time of the Roaring Twenties, jazz music, and flappers, came Hilda M. Kurth and Kathleen M. Norris, of New York, and Catherine E. Robbins, of Vermont, dubbed "the Three Musketeers" when they became the first women end-to-enders on the Long Trail. Norris, 18 at the time, had just graduated from high school, while the other two, both 25 years old, were schoolteachers. They hiked without male companions, garnering them extensive attention in the national news—despite disapproval from some—and helping to put the Long Trail on the map.

The three set out on July 25, 1927, each carrying 20 to 25 pounds in their packs. Dressed in knee-high boots, knickers, and bandannas, they appear in every image smiling and looking lighthearted and invigorated. But instead of lightweight technical gear, they carried ponchos, blankets, and axes. They mailed food packages ahead to farms along the way to resupply and help keep their pack weight down.

James P. Taylor, the founding visionary of the Long Trail, helped spread the word and bring media attention to the women as a way to gain publicity for the trip and promote the trail. The women were frequently met along the way by reporters or photographers, one of whom even brought along a gallon of ice cream that the women ate together on the spot.

In 1932, a 12-year-old girl completed the trail with her family, and in 1933, two women again hiked the trail in its entirety. Marion Urie and Lucile Pelsue wore woolen clothes and ate oatmeal, mac and cheese, rice, dried fruit, and chocolate, among other things. They each carried on their belts a knife, a light ax, a canteen, and a pistol. Urie wrote eloquently about their trip in the The Vermonter, where she explained the pistols were for killing porcupines, "or any other pest that sought our company too persistently."

In some ways, these early pioneers had an experience very similar to my own on the Long Trail. They endured the same steep climbs, navigated sections of trail rendered impassable by storm blowdowns, and dealt with the same porcupines and mice in the shelters. They also enjoyed the same summits, streams, and forests. But in other marked ways, the women experienced a version of the Long Trail we can never go back to: for one, their views were never spoiled by the 10 ski resorts and countless high-altitude vacation homes that now dot the landscape.

 

Pictured is the white blaze of the Long Trail on Jay Peak, which is the last summit near the northern
terminus of the trail on the Canadian border, near North Troy. photo: photo: Jocelyn Hebert

 

Supporting Roles

In addition to the women making their way along the trail, many women contributed to the creation and maintenance of the Long Trial. For example, several shelters are named for important women who were active in their local GMC chapters and in the headquarters office, such as the Laura Woodward Shelter north of Jay Peak, the Lula Tye Shelter formerly at Little Rock Pond, and the Minerva Hinchey Shelter south of Clarendon. There are also shelters named for women whose families contributed money to the cause, such as the Emily Proctor Shelter in the Breadloaf Wilderness, Butler Lodge on the north side of Mount Mansfield, and the former Fay Fuller Camp near Bennington.

Two side trails connecting to the Long Trail are also named for women: the Laura Cowes Trail on the western side of Mount Mansfield is named for a prominent GMC section leader and outdoorswoman, and the Clara Bow Trail, in Nebraska Notch, is named for the "beautiful but tough" silent film actress Clara Bow.

Women dot the time line of the entire history of the Long Trail and Green Mountain Club. Emily Proctor contributed $500 (equivalent to about $10,000 today) for the construction of shelters. In 1916, Joanna Croft was elected president of the Burlington section of the GMC. Katherine Monroe was one of the earliest trail workers in the 1920s, and Edith Easterbrook and Mabel Brownell were the first women on the GMC board of trustees in 1926. In the 1940s, the first end-to-end reports arrived from women hiking the trail alone. In 1969, Shirley Strong became the first woman president of the GMC. In 1973, Wendy Turner and Susan Valyi became the first women caretakers on the trail and were stationed at Taft Lodge. In 1990, Sue Lester became the first woman field supervisor, and from 1990 to 2013, Susan Shea served as the first woman GMC director of conservation.

Fast-forward to today, and many women hold the titles of staff, crew member, caretaker, volunteer, trip leader, officer, and thru-hiker. In fact, there are so many that my own thru-hike wouldn't result in a news headline but rather a small listing of my name in the Long Trail News among the roster of 2001 end-to-enders, right alongside many other women. It's a place in the history of the Long Trail in which I'm happy to find myself.

 

On the Trail

The following is an excerpt from an interview with Catherine Clifford (née Robbins), recorded in 1987 for the Green Mountain Chronicles radio series and archived by the Vermont Historical Society (http://wildlensinc.org/eoc-051-the-three-musketeers-on-the-long-trail-in-1927/). Clifford was one of the first three women—dubbed the Three Musketeers—to hike the Long Trail end to end, in 1927.

We were headed for a 5 day hike [between weekly resupplies]. Five day hike and it was raining. So we went in the rain and we hiked. We came to the lookout and you could see nothing so we just hiked along…. We kept going and got to this pond, I think it was Bourn Pond, and there were three buildings right up there, three houses, and a big sign that said "Long Trail, your camp is the last one. Use your own camp." So we go down to the third one, and we look in.

There's not one stick of dry wood inside. The rule days leave dry wood, you know. So we went to the middle one and peaked through the window, didn't look interesting. We went to the first one, and my dear, you could see rocking chairs like they used to have on the porch. Two or three. And two doors open where there were beds in there with blankets on them, and a stove and dry wood. Well, it was dark, raining, it would be dark early and we're wet and hungry. Well we discovered it was very easy to push up a window right there off the porch and you could get in that way and somebody could unlock the door and we could all go in. Which we did. It was Sunday night and we didn't expect anybody to be coming in on a Sunday. Saturday night we probably wouldn't have dared done it. Then we went down to this old lumber place and hauled out a lot of wood, three arms full, to leave. We built a fire, and we cooked our self a supper and we sat in those rocking chairs. And nobody knew where we were, not a soul. And we sat there and we enjoyed that so much. Oh, that was a wonderful night.

I just loved it, being away from the mob. A chance to be alone. A chance to think, a chance to do some thinking. You had two other girls with you, but they were thinking, too, I guess. I just loved the outdoors. I still do.

 

A woman section hiker ascends Mount Mansfield via the Long Trail. Photo: Jocelyn Herbert

 

 

 

Sarah Galbraith is a freelance writer and avid outdoorswoman living in Marshfield, Vermont.