Bellows Falls is a great village, and has a history that goes back to it’s Abenaki populace who were lured here by the great falls, extends past White settlement who built an industrial canal to bypass the affor-referenced falls and continues today through its resurrection as a tourist area and waypoint community for the Connecticut River Byway.
There is a cool mid-century mural painted on a wall downtown that nostalgically reads Bellows Falls is a good place to hang your hat. It’s also apparently a good place to chisel your petroglyphs.
They’re a Vermont curiosity that’s surprisingly unknown to many. In the olden days, quite a few folks flocked to these strange petroglyphs and tried to decrypt them, but to this day, they’re still managing to confound those that know about them.
Stirring the mystery even more, local native Americans aren’t fessing up to doodling them, and have no idea who did, or what they’re supposed to mean. So how did they get here, and why?
The Bellows Falls petroglyphs are located on a few large boulders found in the dramatic gorge below the defunct Vilas Bridge.
Basically, the carvings are an arrangement of rough circles with three dots inside, with some containing pairs of lines that radiate out from the top. It’s surmised that they depict a cluster of 24 odd sized faces, but there is some disagreement on exactly what they are, with arguments for human, animal, extraterrestrial, or other. The lines atop the circles prove to be just as interesting. It’s said that they could be anything from hair of that era, feathers from headdresses, deer antlers, sun rays, or alien antennas. But no one can say for sure.
We don’t even know how old they are, with estimates ranging from 300 to 3,000 years old – some considering them the oldest pieces of art existing in Vermont. What we do know, however, is that they were made known in 1789, when visiting reverend David McClure from Dartmouth College wrote about them in his notes, and suggested that they were made by the Abenaki, the native people of the area.
The explanations of these cryptic images are plentiful. McClure speculated that they could be translated as an Abenaki warning that the site marked the location of “evil spirits”, a shamanistic idea that came from associating places like river gorges and waterfalls as a place to communicate with the spirit world.
But that was contested by an Englishman named Edward Kendall, who while traveling through Bellows Falls in 1808, believed that they were nothing more than the banal doodles of a bored Abenaki fisherman on a slow day at the river.
Plenty of other theories have morphed since then and include everything in between, from grave markers, religious symbols, aliens, memento mori from an important battle, depictions of people who had drowned in the rapids, and the carvings from Abenaki shaman who recorded their visions while hallucinating on the river’s edge.
But it may be the orientation of the petroglyphs which may tell us something of their significance. They face west, towards the village. If this isn’t just a coincidence, Abenaki lore dictates that west is the direction where an Abenaki soul travels after death, meaning that they may be preternatural wayfinding signs for their departed.
Interestingly, the artificial industrial island made by the Bellows Falls Canal was at one point an important Abenaki burial ground. For decades afterward, development on the island and local road construction projects would continuously surprise the laborers who unearthed numerous skeletons and artifacts, and became sort of a local spectacle.
Here’s where things get interesting. McClure’s description only mentions three faces, which are greatly more detailed than what can be found on the bottom of the gorge today, leaving some to postulate that counterfeit ones have been added over the years.
In the 1930s, some misguided locals got together and had the carvings deepened to preserve them from the constant erosion of the river, damaging their value as historical artifacts and keeping their age and purpose still in the realm of the mysterious.
These were some of the carvings that didn’t make it into the 21st century. Image: History of the Town of Rockingham, Vermont including the villages of Bellows Falls, Saxtons River, Rockingham – Cambridgeport and Bartonsville.
It actually amazes me that these petroglyphs have survived at all. During the nineteenth century, the Bellows Falls river/canal area was a hive of rambunctious industrial activity. Much of the river gorge was permanently reconstructed by dynamite blasts that were used to clear away log jams, which is a real disappointment, because it seems that those cliffs held more than a few curiosities.
One sad account comes from sometime in the 1800s. A fascinating curiosity was found embedded in a rock near the Connecticut River; a baffling fossil of a five foot, clearly defined footprint that looked like it came from a bird, but the species was unknown. This caused quite a stir in both the scientific community and the local one. What could have possibly made a footprint that big? Unfortunately, we’ll never know. Word of this important discovery got out and a group of rowdy locals found it first and dynamited it out of existence. It’s very possible that there may have been more of these petroglyphs as well, that were destroyed to make a few bucks.
The petroglyphs are pretty easy to find. They’re located at the end of Bridge Street near the Vilas Bridge, which is the indefinitely crumbling bridge with grass growing through its deteriorating surface, and not the other better-kept bridge that crosses the canal onto the island.
Once you get to the “Bridge Closed” sign, they’re down in the gorge to the right of the bridge. The rocks have been marked with strips of yellow paint to guide you to their location, and if you have a camera with a good zoom lens, you should be able to see them. Or, you can do what I did, and take the “trail” to the left of the bridge, which I guess is a very debatable definition, and really was more of a distinguishable area of low brush that meandered between taller thick adjacent brush and trees, which eventually dropped you down a steep rocky embankment and into the gorge. From there, it’s all boulder clamber underneath the Vilas Bridge, but from this approach, you can get right next to them. My scratched and bleeding legs were worth it.
What I loved best about these petroglyphs, besides how they are still a lingering mystery, is the obscurity of them. There are no fences around them with colorful “keep out” signs, and no logos from local universities slapped down anywhere. They simply exist just outside town, quiet and more or less undisturbed.
The Bellows Falls Train Graveyard
In the cold days of winter in 2013, I explored and photographed scores of abandoned train cars that lined both sides of the Connecticut River. The yards and the scrapped rail cars are owned by the Green Mountain Railroad, which has a long history of perpetuating industry and travel in the Bellows Falls area, and as rail travel became secondary to the automobile, it left quite a few old passenger cars from the 40s and 50s parked along the river banks, slowly eroding with idle time.
Driving Around Bellows Falls
One of my favorite adventures in Bellows Falls was just driving aimlessly around the narrow streets that climb it’s steep terraced hills above the river, checking out the different neighborhoods, which managed to be so enjoyable that it almost blocked out my friend Daniel blasting dubstep on his car stereo and serially asking me “Chad! Is this your jam man? I bet you know all of these lyrics!”
A Bellows Falls attraction or service?
One of my favorite finds in Bellows Falls – A 275-foot railroad tunnel running underneath a section of the downtown district. Built in 1851, this tunnel is a rather impressive reminder of when three railroad lines were brought through Bellows Falls, helping industrial growth and creating one of the most important railroad junctions in New England. What’s striking about this tunnel is that its partially cut through solid rock and reinforced with massive stone blocks. Today, these tracks are more or less quiet, a reminder of how the automobile overtook rail travel.
The oldest canal in the United States is here, completed in 1802 to bypass the pesky great falls, which was a successful barrier to travel. The canal was a humongous boon and industrialized the village, creating a cool downtown district at the foot of a bluff (which legend holds is still honeycombed by Victorian tunnel systems) and a surprisingly stunning residential district up the hill.
The canal created an artificial island called Factory Island. For years, out of place figures have been spotted within the buildings on the island, including this old paper company. They’re reported to be person sized gray shadows that appear to be the long-haired forms of American Indians. When seen inside the old factories, their legs are imbedded in the floorboards, as if walking on the ground beneath. Maybe theyre heading towards those mysterious petroglyphs near the Villas Bridge…
Hayes, Lyman Simpson, 1907 History of the Town of Rockingham, Vermont including the villages of Bellows Falls, Saxtons River, Rockingham – Cambridgeport and Bartonsville. 1753-1907 with family genealogies. There is a digital copy online you can view, if you’re so inclined.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
Most people my age aren’t likely to recall Frontier Town, a once-prominent destination turned ghost town in the woods of tiny North Hudson, New York, but there are plenty of people who will tell you that it used to be great, and integral to the once-thriving Adirondack tourism heyday of the mid 20th century.
The Adirondacks are the rugged mountain range that makes up a the eastern half of upstate New York, and most of those mountains are within the 6 million-acre vast and often desolate Adirondack Park, an area about the size of my home state of Vermont and is the largest park within the lower 48.
I’ve mentioned Frontier Town before in an earlier blog entry, but never truly got around to exploring it until recently.
Frontier Town is a massive place, it’s kitschy-cool ruins stretch unassumingly from the roadsides of Routes 9 and 84, and far back out of sight on the sprawling property at the bottom of shady hollows and a myriad of cold swamps that pulse with mosquitoes in the summers. Even in its decay, it still had a wondrous vibe to it that really stuck with me as I wandered around.
Because the property is so large, it’s very difficult to get a good idea of just how much there is to see, until you start exploring for yourself. It’s taken me 3 trips to see a good deal of it, and I still feel like I’ve been unprepared with every visit.
My trips started back in 2012, which were focused on the assortment of abandoned motels and cabins lining Route 9 that once served the motel, and slowly, I would explore my way inwards.
The story of these curious ruins are actually pretty extraordinary. It’s one of those anecdotes that stumbles its way onto the altar of the American Dream and became a venerable benchmark – something that I could file away in the “anything’s possible” camp of things that makes my cynicism do a double-take in a contemporary culture that’s been questioning the truth and the achievability of the American Dream.
In 1951, Arthur Bensen, a Staten Island entrepreneur who installed telephones for a living, was becoming bored with his job, so he started to tour the northeast with $40,000 to find a location suitable for building his dream project; an amusement park.
267 wooded acres in North Hudson would eventually seal the deal, and despite having no construction skills, no idea how to run an amusement park, and no real income after purchasing the property, he went to work!
He was known and admired for his amiable personality, someone who was convincing and charismatic, so much so that he sold North Hudson-ites and locals from neighboring Adirondack towns to help him build the park and eventually be employed there, despite some thinking he was out of his mind.
But impressively, his tenaciousness and optimism paid off, and his fantasy began to take shape. Using his 1951 Chevy, he would drag timber behind his car to build many of the log cabins around the site that still stand today.
Bensen was known for his ingenuity; he was thrifty, a quick thinker and good at improvisation – and it was these skills that ultimately would shape the park so many would come to love. Maybe the greatest example of that previous sentence is how Frontier Town became Frontier Town. His original vision was to build a Pioneer Village, but when opening day was looming, the thematic costumes for his employees/LARPers never arrived.
Bensen made a trip down to New York City to purchase some, but returned with Cowboy and Indian costumes instead, because according to the story, those were the only costumes he could buy in such short notice. But luckily, that just happened to be all the rage in the America of that time.
So, he made some alterations to his blueprints, and Frontier Town was born, officially opening on July 4, 1952 and would continue to expand in the intervening years.
He soon constructed Prairie Junction to keep with his new theme, which was modeled after your trope-y Main Street of a dusty wild west town, and is one of the more interesting areas of the park ruins to photograph today. The low rise wooden buildings were all connected by a broad wooden porch, consisting of a saloon, music hall and a shop selling Western-themed souvenirs and clothing.
A rodeo area was built nearby, which held two of them a day would and even had shows that allowed children to participate. Stagecoaches, replica era steam trains, and covered wagons would all transport visitors around the park, and outlaws on horseback would “rob” the trains and engage in “shoot-outs”. And it was a huge success.
Frontier Town wasn’t just loved by the tourists and generations of wide-eyed kids who made memories there, it was also loved by the locals.
The park employed many Adirondack area teens, who spent their paychecks on college tuition. Many friendships and romances were also forged here, some which would last lifelong, and would later be recalled wistfully on Frontier Town message boards and fansites that pop up on Google searches about the place.
Employees wore period garb and would teach bemused sightseers how to do thematic daily tasks that our frontier predecessors did back in the day to survive. Stuff like churning butter, demonstrating how yarn was spun, or cook pea soup in an iron kettle over a fireplace, which was said to be a favorite of loggers in the Adirondacks.
Unfortunately, like real western frontier towns, New York’s Frontier Town would also go bust after it came to its peak popularity in the 1960s and 70s. The times were changing. The construction of the Adirondack Northway would lure traffic to bypass North Hudson and would make a large reduction in travel time. Now, sojourners no longer needed to depend on Route 9 to get to the Adirondacks from New York City and any point in-between.
Some speculate that the park really declined when a new transgressive era ushered in parents becoming uneasy with their kids playing with guns, which was more acceptable when Westerns were all the craze on TV and the silver screen.
As one Frontier Town enthusiast wrote on a comment thread; “Cowboys and Indians were big time. Every kid had a gun and a cowboy hat”. Others blame broader travel opportunities that came with the construction of interstate highways and air travel, making places like Frontier Town obsolete.
In 1983, a tired Art Benson sold Frontier Town to another development firm, and would pass away 5 years later. The park was closed until 1989, re-opening with additions, such as a miniature golf course. But it was a short rejuvenation, and in 1998, Frontier Town closed for good due to failing finances and weak attendance.
The property was seized in August 2004 by the county for past-due property taxes. The stagecoaches, trains, buggies and the tracks were all scrapped and sold, as well as other paraphernalia. Collectors can still find mementos at Gokey’s Trading Post just down the road, which is where a lot of Frontier Town relics ended up during the massive auction after the park’s closing and appears to be one of the few remaining businesses in town.
Today, awkward and fantastical ruins falling apart in silence underneath the Pines are all that remains of Frontier Town. A walk around the property reveals the tragic process of disintegration and entropy which is both sad and breathtaking to behold and makes me reflect on society’s impermanence.
I visited during the dark wintery cold of January, and returned during a far more pleasant 50 degree April Sunday, so my photos are a mixture of winter and early spring shots.
When I took my research to the internet, I found a cool Facebook page, Frontier Town Abandoned Theme Park Now And Then, with tons of great old photos to gaze at. It’s incredible what the transformative power of nature can do to a place in a short time.
I was really charmed by this place and its story. Researching it had a certain inspiring magic. I love how one guy who was a layman just decided to go for it, and managed to create something that’s had a humongous impact and subsequent ripple effects on the Adirondacks, and a generation of people who were coaxed by its remarkably creative atmosphere. It’s a genuine example of the American dream. Who knows, maybe Arthur’s story can help inspire future dreamers (or amusement park builders).
Since I’ve posted this – the New York Department of Environmental Conservation and the Adirondack Park Preserve have rehabbed Frontier Town into a really cool looking campground and equestrian center – and named it in the park’s honor. I’m a bit sad to see it go but was excited to hear that the property is now fun and beneficial to town of North Hudson.
Frontier Town in its Postcard Prime
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Frontier Town, 2015
Joining me for my adventure was my friend Bill Alexander, creator of Vermonter.com, who filmed our walk around the grounds. Check out his write up and video below!
Return, Summer 2015
As much as I openly complain about Facebook, and how I find social media more unnourishing and exhausting for me, I have to admit that it’s also been a huge boon in terms of networking and keeping this blog’s momentum in a direction that’s not backwards. Making friends when your an adult is a hard gig. Thankfully, I was able to network with and befriend other explorers over Facebook who dwell all over the east coast. Eventually, we started to organize meet ups with willing participants. In June, 2015, I would meet two cars worth of previously virtual photographer and explorer friends, and Frontier Town was one of our stops on a full day excursion. But, a day of exploring before we arrived in North Hudson had drained my camera batteries, so I only was able to get a few pictures under the coolness of a soft summer evening.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
“NEW ENGLANDERS They buried their emotions deep, Long years ago, with care; And if a stranger dares to dig He finds but granite there. — Catherine Cate Coblentz — Driftwind, May 1925”
A few days ago, I was traveling through New Hampshire’s White Mountains, a compelling region that I wish I had taken the time to explore more of when I was a college student in the Northeast Kingdom, far before the ugly reality of adulthood trimmed the fat off things. While Vermont tends to have a more gentle feel at times, New Hampshire is crucially different, it’s north country is essentially one giant patch of wilderness, which some say is roughly the size of Wales.
Part of the great Appalachian chain, it’s difficult not to be in awe of the rugged magistery of the White Mountains, whose hulking mountaintops rise out of view above the clouds, or the deep V-shaped natural excavation of Franconia Notch, it’s walls carved from the oldest rocks around.
The small town of Bethlehem, New Hampshire, has been around since 1774, and in the last days of 1799, it would adapt it’s current moniker, shared with the city of the same name on the other side of the world, though the origins behind the naming of New Hampshire’s settlement are a bit of a mystery. A drive down Route 302, the main drag in town, reveals one of the most architecturally impressive Main Street’s I’ve visited. A great collection of showy Victorians with some of the most ornate and complex woodwork that I imagine a human mind could ever devise. Busy roof lines punctured by wandering tactile patterns that sat next to humble Bungalows that have been very well preserved. Bethlehem’s exceeding aesthetics can be owed to the town’s heyday as an early tourist destination.
In 1805, the Old Man Of The Mountain was discovered, and by 1819, a path was created that carved its way up to the summit of Mount Washington. The White Mountains, their fresh air, craggy and almost daunting landscape and the mystique of their geographic curiosities were beginning the shift into a tourist area, and Bethlehem found itself conveniently in the middle of it’s many prominent attractions, which proved to be good for business.
In 1867, the railroad came to town, bringing tourists from the urban hubs of Boston and New York City. By 1870, a building boom period began, which would eventually create 30 grand hotels that lined Bethlehem’s streets which were all fiercely competitive against another. Each establishment tried to out-do each other in garish grandness and opulence, and they had to, because with a lodging bubble, standing out from everyone else was paramount.
Seven trains a day roared into the village, dropping of scores of passengers at five depots. Bethlehem must have been doing something right, because eventually, well-heeled east coasters took notice of the mountain town and decided to build their “summer cottages” here, which were blown up to colossal sizes and scaled up the hillsides that rose out of town. This included the likes of the famous Woolworth family and the enterprising swindler P.T. Barnum, the fellow who allegedly popularized the phrase “there’s a sucker born every minute”.
So many affluents would build here that an event called “the Coaching Parade” was conceived, which was pretty much those aforementioned rich folk flaunting their wealth and by ornamenting their carriages as ostentatiously as possible, and then literally parading them around town, which drew larger spectator crowds by the year, and led Barnum to call “the second greatest show on earth”.
But the decline of the White Mountains would have the same story that parallels other American vacation destinations of the same era and caliber; the rise of the automobile in the early 20th century would be the beginning of the end, as tourists were now no longer limited to only seeing places the railroads could bring you. When the automobile and their infrastructure worked its way up into the formidable highlands, the grand hotels eventually became ghosts, and the tourism culture changed to what pretty much is today.
One of these hotels was The Maplewood.
The Maplewood Hotel, circa 1905. Via Wikipedia.
Opening in 1876, this hotel would soon become a showpiece, your textbook example of an incredibly lavish 19th-century resort which unabashedly marketed itself as “The Social and Scenic Center of The White Mountains”. It would eventually grow to ginormous proportions, encompassing its own 18 hole country club, casino, cottages, and was served by its own train station, Maplewood Depot. I guess I can see how their claim could hold it’s own. As a friendly New Hampshirite pointed out to me; in the glory days of rail travel in the White Mountains, the small Victorian station rivaled the most revered and fabled of north country stations, such as Crawford and Fabyan.
A historical postcard of Maplewood Station for comparison
Maplewood Depot was abandoned in the early 20s in the wake of the automobile, and the hotel it served would function for a few more decades, before burning to the ground in January 1963. Today, the grounds have been revitalized as the Maplewood Country Club, with striking views of the Presidential Range. But sitting in the woods behind the links, the old train station can still be found, now leaning at a dramatic angle in its slow decay, wasting away in silence as the town thrives around it.
Most of the details depicted in the postcard, such as the expansive porches and apex tower have long faded into postcard memory. The former railroad line had it’s tracks pulled shortly after the station went defunct, but the right of way can still be detected, a ruler-straight path that is slightly less overgrown than the woods around it.
The station truly appears ghostly, skulking in the middle of the woods. Minus a few new-ish looking armchairs that have been toppled over, and most likely an addition to the building after it’s abandonment, it’s completely hollowed out, with empty doorways and tall, narrow windows. Inside, time has not been kind to the wooden structure. Much of it had long succumbed to weather damage and vandals, and portions of the original wooden floors had been ripped upwards as the building slowly sagged over the years, forming a jagged rip that ran the partial length of the room. I was a bit surprised at how clean this place was still, completely void of the graffiti and beer can piles which are found in many abandonments. I was still able to climb the narrow wooden stairs that curved around a brick chimney, revealing three rooms that were more or less intact, apart from some holes in the floor.
It’s a spooky place, especially as the winter winds hit the building, creating strange noises. I’m sure it takes on a far different atmosphere once the leaves fill out on the trees, blocking out even more light from reaching it. It’s almost startling to think about the fact that this place used to be a train station, and today it’s nothing but a trembling corpse that gives almost no clues to it’s former life. And at the rate that the place is leaning, I’m rather amazed that it’s still standing.
Maplewood was also apparently featured in the short concept film American Ruins, and after glimpsing the short trailer, it’s completely sold me. The effects and videography are mind blowing, which no doubt took hours and hours and hours of patience, producing and editing. Maybe someday I’ll aspire to creating something great like this.
[vimeo 25832079 w=500 h=281]
Over The Notch
Route 3 used to be the main route to get from the top to the bottom of New Hampshire, and still pretty much is, though it’s a bit quieter today in light of the construction of Interstate 93 which practically parallels the road. Both routes are pushed together when they run through mountainous Franconia Notch, joining to form the Franconia Notch Parkway, the main access road to all of the scenic points in Franconia Notch State Park, and the tourist attractions and motels farther south in the town of Lincoln.
Passing through the notch, I couldn’t help but gaze at the jagged stump where the Old Man of The Mountain used to be, now being battered by fierce mountain winds and the puffs of snow spray they send. The famous rock profile crumbled in 2004, and after much controversy, the state decided not to synthetically re-create it. Despite the formation’s disappearance, the Old Man is still used as a state marketing icon, and can still be found awkwardly on a variety of things from license plates to state route shields. It will be weird to think about there being a day where no one remembers seeing him in person.
In Lincoln, I stopped at an Irving Station to get gas and a coffee, and got an unexpected surprise in the form of a rather large mural of what looked like a seemingly friendly alien who was hitchhiking, which took up a rather large chunk of wall near the entrance of the store. Not exactly what I’ve came to expect from a stop at a gas station. On the top of the painting were the words; “First Close Encounter of the Third Kind, Betty and Barney Hill, Sept. 19th, 1961.” I recognized the names. The Barney and Betty Hill abduction case is the most infamous in all of UFOlogy.
My amusement was carried from the wintery cold to inside the store, where I noticed the extraterrestrial theme continued in the form of wall to wall paraphernalia, photocopies of newspaper articles and other copied information related to both the Betty and Barney Hill case, other alleged incidents, and an assortment of fan images from science fiction TV shows and movies.
The shop owner who was behind the cash register at the time, caught me staring, and enthusiastically explained to me that right across the road from that exact store, was the actual site of the abduction. However, a friend of mine, as well as some commenters over Facebook, argued this fact, and said that it actually happened a further down the road, where Millbrook Road meets State Route 175 in Thornton.
Though I can really take or leave UFOlogy (more so on the leave side) I found this offbeat memorial and it’s fanaticism interesting enough to write about.
As the story goes, on the night of September 19, 1961, husband and wife Barney and Betty Hill were traveling South on Route 3 to their home in Portsmouth, NH, when, according to their claim, were followed by a spaceship near the present day Indian Head Resort, and eventually accosted by some sort of extraterrestrial crew, taken aboard their craft, examined, and then released on the side of Route 3 in the early morning hours of September 20 as the sun’s first rays would begin to grey the New Hampshire skies.
The collection I saw above me mounted on black poster board was originally smaller in size, and more of a quirky secret, formerly located on a wall inside their unisex bathroom. The current owner of the gas station has only owned the store for a few years now, and told me how disrespectful visitors kept stealing memorabilia and eventually, he grew sick of it and moved all of it around the store, so everyone could still enjoy it, but couldn’t grab a keepsake. As an extra precaution, they also outfitted the store with lots and lots of security cameras. They apparently get a lot of interested people who stop by, so they also sell alien key chains, bumper stickers, shirts and books about the Hills near the door. I neglected to buy a souvenir, but did get my coffee.
Have a weird encounter of your own? There is also a blackboard outside to the left of the mural, where you can share your own stories. I noticed that stuff had been written there, but nothing UFO related, which I suppose didn’t surprise me.
I didn’t think of this until after I had gotten back home and was writing up this post, but I have sort of a strange tie-in to all this. A location I explored last year reported seeing unidentified flying objects hovering above the skies shortly before Hill incident happened, but as for an actual connection between the two events, that remains subjective.
If you’re interested, just take Route 3 through Lincoln, New Hampshire, and look for the Irving Station near the Indian Head Resort.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations throughout the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
Around the turn of the 20th century, there was a changing attitude on mental illness, and that created state schools. Though it’s considered a school by name, that’s a misnomer. No forms of education were carried out here, this was a warehousing facility. It was built to house around 700 residents, but shortly after it opened, it far exceeded it’s capacity, topping out at around 1,500 between the ages of 1 and 18, all housed in 13 dorms.
State schools were essentially warehouses for “feeble minded children”, or children who were infirm or autistic that parents just didn’t know how to deal with. So, federal and state governments allocated tons of money for these facilities to be built, in the name of “progress” of how societies invalids were treated and supported.
Though these places were supposed to help these children grow to their potential in a safe and educated environment, the unfortunate charges who were sent to these places were most likely abused by overworked and untrained staff, lived in squalid, over crowded conditions and received no developmental services.
While many of these institutions were brought forward with virtuous intentions, social philosophies would soon change towards World War 2, when the American Eugenics Movement and Darwin’s theory of natural selection would become popularized and propelled by misguided politicians, scientists and physicians. These “schools” became laboratories, and the unfortunate inmates would become test subjects, because once you were locked away in these sort of places, it was easy to carry out these sort of ghastly things that says a lot more about the human race than I’m comfortable with, without the general public getting word of it.
This undisclosed 876 acre state school was constructed in 1922 to serve these troubled youth, and would expand to 50 buildings. While many institutions before this one were centered around magnificent Kirkbrides, times had changed, and this facility was streamlined, focusing more on functionality in the form of duplicate buildings in a colonial brick style with white trim, which were pretty admittedly pretty drab.
The usual suspects – overcrowding and understaffing, lead to the campus to sink into deplorable conditions. Because employee responsibilities were stretched so far, treatment of the those in their care became atrocious. Many of the children were left unattended, and would wonder the halls, moaning, and covered in their own excrement. Others who were physically handicapped would be simply left restrained to their beds and forgotten, often for weeks. Sometimes, if a stubborn inmate was really unlucky, all their teeth would be removed to make feeding them easier, especially force feeding. If they weren’t neglected, many staff members would physically beat them to keep them under control, or worse, because they felt like it. If this wasn’t bad enough, the buildings were deteriorating because of neglect and no funding to maintain them, and eventually, that lead to a vermin infestation.
Though this article wasn’t written about this particular psychiatric facility, it miserably details a personal experience living in one of these state institutions by a former patient.
Conditions and life here were unknown to the outside world, until 1971, when the father of a patient filed a class-action lawsuit against the school, claiming that its young residents were not only the victims of sexual abuse, but were also living in horrific conditions. He wrote of abhorrent things like; “maggots wriggling inside or crawling out of the infected ears of several helpless, profoundly retarded persons while they lay in their crib-beds.” Investigations began making their way in, as public outrage exploded.
Rampart lawsuits and scandals in the later half of the 20th century began the slow process of these snake pits shutting down, and becoming abandoned, as people began to get an idea of what life was really like in these campuses. The fate of this hospital sadly followed many in the United States, and the stuff that was brought to the surface is horrible.
But despite these disturbing discoveries, this school awkwardly hobbled along, sinking further into a spiral of decline until all operations officially ceased in 1992 – almost 2 decades later, leaving a maze of rotting wards and tunnels behind.
A Winter Visit
I heard the end was coming. Asbestos abatement had began in a few buildings, and plans had been announced to slowly begin demolition on the school. I didn’t have to sneak around much. Though the entire property was covered in snow drifts that often came up to knee deep levels and filled my boots, the attitude here was relaxed. Other photographers meandered their way around various buildings, and a few people were walking their dogs.
A majority of the buildings were sealed up, but a good amount had their doors torn open, and security was nowhere to be seen. Many of the buildings were boarded up and were pitch black. If it wasn’t for the wintery cold, the mold and asbestos inside would have probably been insufferable. Others had entire sections which had completely collapsed.
Though there was much to see, most of the buildings were void of anything of interest. The auditorium was by far the most splendid place to explore, and also the most dangerous. The overcast and bleak landscape made the cavernous interior more sad and dreary that day. The entire building was coated in a dangerous layer of ice, so moving around the collapsing structure had to be done carefully and methodically. Some of the wooden floors were more soggy than I felt comfortable with trusting, and every staircase was coated so thickly with ice that I had almost debated not taking the risk climbing them. I was already exploring an abandoned hospital, I didn’t need to visit a real one! But I took the risk, and I’m glad I did. The floor plan kept continuing, and became a bit of a maze as more hallways and staircases kept revealing themselves.
Below the rotting auditorium was one of the better finds, the old gymnasium, a spacious area outfitted in grungy yellow hospital tile that was coated with mold and rot. The basement area consisted of two levels, and it was inky black. The lowest level was filled with knee deep water, with a layer of ice underneath, making passage treacherous. With the aid of our maglites, we made it into the gym. All I could hear was a roaring cacophony of dripping water raining down from the decaying abyss above our heads which ran down the back of our necks. It was so cold downstairs that I could see my breath in the beam of my flashlight. A friend of mine later told me that it wasn’t much different during the warmest months of the summer.
Another find worth photographing was the large cafeteria building far back, and the old power plant complete with dysfunctional and rusting machines sitting in dark spaces. The wooden floors in there were suspicious so I didn’t spend a great deal of time inside. Though I had arrived relatively early, I was surprised at how much time I spent shooting here, and now I was loosing daylight. Between that, and the effort it took to trudge through the snow, I was exhausted.
But I’m glad I got to see such a place, an epoch of human history and how far we’ve came, or maybe how far we still have yet to go. If the powers that be stick to their schedules, it should be luxury condos and mixed use space come next summer.
I was pretty much depending on my flashlight to get me through the basement levels, which were black and icy.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
Fall was a fading thing, gusty winds showered the car with dead leaves and rattled the burly body of my friend’s 96′ Volvo. Just having left our previous stop at Fort Montgomery, it was decided that we made the most of what was likely to be the last of the year’s great weather, and further our adventure.
We were en route to the small agricultural town of Sheldon, where he grew up, and we were on a search for the forgotten.
It’s fascinating and musing to think about how much Vermont’s small towns have changed in a century, hell – even in 20 years. Today, we were met by neglected paved back roads and sprawling corn fields that had only recently been cut, the small withering stumps of corn stocks sticking up like toothpicks in graying soil. Sticking out from the countryside are newer homes with 2 car garages and out of place condo complexes that look like they would be more fitting in Saint Albans or Burlington than in the middle of farm country.
What really brings me into a reverie though, is just how much of the past is tangible to us, and how close it is. Less than a foot beneath the soil we walk on to be exact. My friend takes up metal detecting in his spare time, a very cool hobby in my own humble opinion. Guided by his innate wisdom, we pulled onto Shawville Road, which lead us into the small village of Sheldon Springs.
A Boom Town
The name Sheldon Springs is of obvious origins, it was named after the springs found off the Missisquoi River, which were responsible for the growth of the community. In it’s interim, there were multiple springs hotels and a train depot, built to exploit the springs and their lure of tourism.
In the 1860s and 70s, a boom period sparked in Sheldon Springs as more eager tourists came to take “the waters”, and 11 hotels were all built around the Missisquoi, some of them featuring over 100 rooms and billed themselves as having luxurious accommodations equal to big city hotels.
Analyzed by a New York chemist, the springs contained chloride of sodium, carbonate of sodium, chloride of magnesia, carbonate of magnesia, chloride of lime, alumina, sulphate of lime, silica, carbonate of iron, carbonic sulphoric acid, carbonate of manganese and hydro-chloric acid.
Around 4 “tubing” operations were set up at the springs, and bottling plants soon followed, selling the Sheldon Springs waters. Professedly marketed boldly as a miracle remedy for cancer, scrofula, and other diseases of the blood, bottles could be shipped across the country, thanks to a train depot and proximity to the former Richford branch of the Central Vermont Railway (refurbished as the Missisquoi Valley Rail Trail). But like most boom periods, people eventually lost interest. Sheldon Springs tendered it’s resignation in the early 20th century because of the collapsed tourism industry, but the name still remains printed on the usual green aluminum signs off Route 105.
Today, Sheldon Springs is pleasantly quiet, a weird dissimilarity to bustling Route 105 nearby. On our walk around the village, only 2 cars passed us, kicking up leaves. With his collection of 19th century maps of Franklin Country from the Beers atlas, he is able to locate what once was, and what is mostly impossible to find today. One of the old springs hotels is now an unremarkable gravel parking lot next to a small church. It was called Congress Hall, and was one of the hotels to have it’s own bottling plant. From old photos I was able to find online, it seemed like quite the ceremonious place. But like many wooden buildings of that time period, the hotel burned down circa 1909 in an act of arson, set by a disgruntled employee. From all my Vermont research, it seems that fires hate hotels the most…
Congress HallPeople on the porch of Congress Hall
It’s strange to think about how such a large building is now completely untraceable. As we walked through town, he pointed it out to me. “You can see that the parking lot is almost raised above the natural geography here – like it was a foundation at one point. You can sort of see where it drops off in the back, like there were cellar walls there at one point”.
But what was more interesting to me, was what Congress Hall left behind. I guess the saying “one’s man’s trash is another man’s treasure” is pretty accurate in these circumstances. Back in 19th century Vermont, we didn’t have the so called Green culture inserted in our state’s virtues like we do today. Instead, if you needed to get rid of something, you just threw it out. Most commonly on your farm, or down into a ditch or a river, and left it there. Congress Hall also thought this convenient method was the most efficient way of getting rid of one’s problems, and dumped all their garbage down a steep bank near the Missisquoi River. Today, this garbage once thrown out, is now desirable and waiting for a respectable act of disinterment. Remnants of 19th century relics remain hidden beneath layers of soil, trees, erosion and dead leaves. The most significant feature here though, are Sheldon Springs mineral water bottles. There is literally a mound of hundreds – somewhere, in the woods and slopes of Sheldon Springs, and if what my friend tells me is accurate, an intact bottle can bring a good sum of money on eBay.
Walking a few feet down the road, we came to a Missisquoi Valley Rail Trail crossing. In an open field area directly paralleling the tracks, he pointed out that the former rail depot used to stand somewhere in the vacinity. Today, that’s completely unrecognizable, unless if you have an old Beers atlas of course. He’s metal detected around there, and told me he’s found quite a few old coins around the area, from former passengers dropping them from their pockets. Some he discovered were freshly minted at the time they were dropped, and sat there ever since as the years went on.
Across the road sat an unremarkable old ranch house lined with brawny old Maples that exploded in bright oranges and reds, beginning to shed their jackets upon the lawn. It used to be the home of his childhood friend, and he had metal detected on their lawn as well. About 4-7 inches below the surface he dug up more interesting artifacts. Coins, buttons, old tools, and other various things from a time long ago.
He recalled one time on a patch of farmland a few miles from there, he was digging and came across an old pipe, which he guessed probably ran to the river at one point, but now ran to nowhere. Through a rusted hole in the pipe he hit, was an old wrench which was quite large. He was able to determine that it was from circa 1930s. From what he speculates, the laborer that built the pipe literally dropped his wrench during construction, and it stayed there all these years until he unearthed it.
Haunted Rope Swings and Swimming Holes
Taking a short drive from the hotel ruins turned parking lot, we drove out of the village on an old steel truss bridge that crossed a temporarily placid pool held back by the dam, before the water tumbled over and down the falls. We pulled over and he pointed out areas he used to play as a kid. Climbing down the steep banks, there was an original brick pump house constructed almost directly into the rock face of the upper gorge, dated 1911. Kids in town used to make the seemingly dangerous climb on top of the building demonstrating their bravado, and maybe they still do. Though I now have a better knowledge of tempting or choosing my fate, I did stuff like that in my youth as well.
There were still some large foundations of the former hotels and mills nearby the gorge. He also pointed out that nearby, there used to be a “sketchy rope swing” that local kids would climb too and jump off of, plummeting down into the cold Missisquoi River below. A great Vermont summer tradition that is still popular today.
The rope swing was no longer there, vanishing after recent work to the truss bridge (which was much needed), but he could point out the branch it once was tied too. The rope was described as fraying and awkward, and the branch’s ability to support the weight of countless reckless youth was also questionable, but it held, and the kids used it. There was a weird detail though. Some kids around town thought there was something amiss about that old rope swing.
The rope swing has a spook story attached to it. Allegedly, kids had seen it swinging by itself, moved by unknown forces on still windless summer days, with no logical explanation to it’s movement. Maybe a tragic story from over 20 years ago could link to the peculiar attributes. As my friend informs me, two kids drowned there in the 80s, which may be that connection to it’s seemingly phantom movements. Regardless of empirical evidence or folklore that could clarify the phenomena, it’s certainly interesting, and possibly Vermont’s only haunted rope swing. Or, at least that’s been documented in a blog such as this one.
Boarding houses and School houses
Heading back into town, we passed Boarding House Road, which deadpans it’s namesake. He pointed out a restored 3 story building that used to once be a boarding house in town, giving lodging to laborers and workers that once worked at the Missisquoi Pulp Mill, another life blood of the community. The pulp mill was built in 1894 and still remains as an important employer of the village today.
The boarding house was abandoned when he was a kid, and he and his friends recalled exploring it, and getting creeped out by it’s unsound condition and ghostly appearance inside. Today, it has been restored as a private residence, and doesn’t look at all like a menacing or dangerous place. From the outside. Other vestiges of the mill remain around town, in the form of almost identical looking houses built along the main street that once housed the mill workers. As a matter of fact, he grew up in one of those houses, and they have since became Sheldon landmarks.
Nearby, past the mill, he pointed out another parking lot, this one more recent, storing rows of 18 wheelers. He recalled that used to be an abandoned schoolhouse when he grew up, and what a place it was. It was 3 stories and in a bad state of dilapidation. There used to be a sizable auditorium out back, and him and his friends would go inside and hang out on the rotting stage and rows of decaying seats, before going off to explore the dark hallways and dusty classrooms. He told me that there were definitely creepy feelings inside, especially in certain parts of the school. At times, they didn’t like going into certain areas and avoided them. The schoolhouse was sadly torn down by now, which was a disappointment to me after I had excited asked him if he could show me where it was. But even staring at the parking lot, the story remained robust.
A Walk In The Woods
But the next place we ventured too was enigmatic, it had no history we knew of, or a real road that lead us to it. It was in the middle of the woods, far from anything. It had the appearance of a southern shotgun house, but the inside proved to be a little more spacious than I had thought. It was a simplistic country house, done in traditional horsehair plaster and subtle wainscoting accents, sort of everything you’d expect to find in an abandoned Vermont farmhouse. Parts of the ceiling and floors had started to cave in at various rates and were covered in layers of plaster dust and disintegrating miscellaneous. All of the furniture had long been removed, leaving no relics behind apart from a few rusted cans in a pantry and the more modern Natural Ice cans. The house once had a front porch, but that has long wasted away from the front. The side of the house was also interesting, because it looked like two identical houses had been pushed together to make one house, judging by mismatching siding. But on the other side of the house, it was all uniform greenish siding. Back then, Vermonters had ingenuity, and if a job needed to be done, they did it in any available method to them. This might have just been a way to finish siding the house.
There was an abandoned garage nearby, which felt sort of strange to see in the middle of the woods with no driveway or path leading up to it’s double doors. I suppose my mind has been strongly trained to make assumptions. Inside, there was a collecting of disused tires buried in leaf fall.
Around the house, and underneath my boots, were a collection of a familiar Sheldon relic, bottles. Plenty of old glass bottles were laying around the house, many of them weathered beyond legibility. Just to the right of me was a steep bank that tumbled down into a stream below. Wooden retaining structures had been built in certain places down the streamfall. My friend informed me that those were an old way of guiding and controlling water current. He also told me that somewhere down that steep bank was a pile of bottles that was almost baffling in size, knee deep and stretched several feet across the slippery banks. But the freshly fallen leaves completely obscured it from view, and he didn’t quite recall where it was. I decided not to climb down the bank and look for it, the ground was slick, and figured that there was more of a chance of getting hurt than finding treasure.
Before we left, he had one last thing to show me. Following a barely visible set of tire tracks, which I thought was so bizarre to find in the middle of the woods, we came to the shell of an old 58′ Plymouth. The tracks started at the house, traveled about 100 yards, and ended directly at the car, in the middle of a sizable forest far away from any back road or farm. Due to my love of old cars, abandoned and functioning, I was very pleased to photograph it. It had been sitting there for quite some time though. The frame was in the late stages of decay and corrosion, and the inside was completely gutted, no relics were left behind.
This trip was one of my most memorable. Though it wasn’t a tremendous abandonment, my experience just walking around the quiet and increasingly mysterious town of Sheldon on a very enjoyable Fall afternoon really sparked layers of curiosity in my mind that will now be forever associated with the community. And I want to uncover more.
There was so much information that I left out of this blog post. As it is, I already wrote far more than I expected to. I’m in the process of planning another trip up to Franklin County, and actually trying my hand at metal detecting. If all goes well, I hope to write about it, and finish this great story.
This massive old fuel tank was found in the woods near Sheldon Springs. This picture doesn’t do the size any justice. Standing next to it, the side vents came up to my head. My friend told me that he remembers once when he was a kid, that his brother crawled into the tank. I could smell the coal and the oil residue that assaulted my nose and I couldn’t imagine myself ever crawling inside the dark of that tank. Now that would be impossible. Someone came out and overturned the tank, covering the entrance. And because it’s so heavy, I doubt anyone will want to put the effort into tipping it back over…
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
Stumbling my way around the impressively dangerous ruins of Fort Montgomery, as my presence disturbed hundreds of Pigeons that are now the fort’s permanent residents, I was nothing short of awe inspired. Though only 1/3rd (give or take) of the fort actually remains, it was immense in anyway you can measure it up. Stone and brick walls several feet thick, uniform archways framing collapsing brick ceilings and leafy hardwood trees lead into cavernous casemates that entombed a dank chilliness that left residue on the aging stones, regardless of the out of seasonal 80 degree fall day that we chose to explore.
For being an abandoned relic relatively hidden in plain sight and yet, out of the way, it’s evident it receives a lot of foot traffic. Its arched hallways have almost no wall space left intact, covered by layers of graffiti, going back to as early as 1971. Or – the earliest we were able to find at least. Countless names, cultural expressions, slanderous accusations of obvious enemies and the occasional term of endearment could be read as you wondered around the property, which was pretty stimulating and could easily stand out alone as part of the experience.
Fort Montgomery was quite the fascinating place – something that I could explore, but in a sense, never be able to relate too. It was built during a time of when America had real fears of being invaded by the British via Canada, and our independence was actually in jeopardy.
But despite the resilient bones gently losing their will to fight mother nature, the fort has a rather underwhelming and ironic history, which would explain it’s rather unintimidating nickname, as far as forts go.
Its location was strategic, where Lake Champlain empties into Quebec’s Richelieu River, right on the Canadian Border between New York and Vermont. Construction on the unnamed fort began in 1816 and called for an octagonal structure with 30-foot walls. However, when President James Monroe visited the location in 1814 to see how the progress was going, he discovered they had made a huge mistake. Because of survey errors, the fort was inadvertently built in Canada. Oops. The resulting mistake lead to the fort’s nickname, Fort Blunder, which carried on into the 21st century. Construction was immediately halted and the fort was abandoned.
After much dispute between Canada and the United States over the sloppy boundary agreements and who owned what, the Webster-Ashburton Treaty of 1842 finally would resolve the problem for good, annexing Island Point – the location of Fort Montgomery, as part of the United States.
It was decided again that a fort should be constructed there, and in 1844, laborers broke ground on what would be known as Fort Montgomery. Fort Montgomery was a “third system” fort, or, one of the forts that were being built along the Northern frontier. Work on the fort was continuous through 1870, as the civil war raged on and another fear of a possible British invasion (the bad type) had everyone panicking. And when the Saint Albans Raid happened in 1864, that fear seemed very reasonable now.
During the 30 year construction period, the attention to detail was immaculate – nothing was left unplanned, and with cutting edge military tactics and a round-the-clock labor crew of 400 of the best stone cutters and masons working at the site, it was intended to be a showpiece, a symbol of brazen resilience.
The fort also had a rare feature that only 9 forts in the United States possessed at the time; a moat. With the moat dug around the fort, it was situated on it’s on private island, with a drawbridge and a stone causeway it’s only land entrance. The moat can still be seen today, though, now filled in with layers of mud and runoff, with the creeping forest getting ever closer to ramble down it’s dirty stone retaining walls. The drawbridge also had a very unique feature – it acted essentially like a seesaw, being able to teeter on both sides with a central balance point.
Though it was intended to house 800 men, the fort never actually saw battle, and was really only used as a form of visual intimidation at the border – allowing your mind to really do the rest. One man manned the fort, and lived in a caretaker’s house nearby. Because the fort never saw battle, some surmise that this was also the reason why it was bestowed the notoriety of the nickname “Fort Blunder”. However you look at it, both of these huge mistakes are fitting reasons.
The fort officially went defunct in 1926 when it became obsolete, and the government sold it. Residents of Rouses Point took it upon themselves to salvage material from the fort, considering it was great material, and most importantly, free. Stone, brick and wood were used for construction projects all around town. Houses, sidewalks and retaining walls can still be seen today that incorporate a little Fort Montgomery in them. My friend, who is also an adventurer and who was playing the role of tour guide that day, said that he remembers someone in Alburgh he knew with original wood from the fort inside their farmhouse.
The fort was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977, and today, the property is actually for sale, and as far as I know, it hasn’t received any offers. Admittedly, the remains of a 19th-century fort in your backyard would be a far cooler feature than lawn gnomes or pink flamingos. While tromping around the overgrown grounds, we were discussing other great uses for the property, like a great outdoor music venue location.
My friend was the perfect tour guide. He used to come here back in high school, along with many of his friends, back when the fort was really forgotten. They had paintball matches here, which seems like an ideal location for such activities, and just generally hung out underneath the brawny yet ethereal stone archways. Countless area kids (and adults like myself) would also hangout there, as evident by the plethora of graffiti and Natural Ice cans left behind. Modern day relics. Walking around, he knew many of the names spray painted on the walls. One person in particular he recalled getting hit by a train when she was walking her dog years ago. Less poignantly, he also pointed out where his high school band rebelliously self-promoted themselves on a wall inside.
The ruins of the fort were disorienting, something else I didn’t expect. The place was so overgrown, that there were times while exploring the upper levels, that you actually perceived as just a walk in the woods, until you looked over and noticed you were actually 30 feet in the air, above a row of arches vanishing into thick vines and forests shedding their Autumn jackets. At times, literally climbing up earth banks to get to the second floor, you notice a black hole beneath your feet, with crumbling bricks falling into the dark and the deep below, reminding you that you are on a man-made structure.
And of course, walking through the airy hallways as the fragrant breezes blasted through the windows, countless Pigeons would swiftly bolt down the hallways, coming very close to smacking me in the face. Sort of an Alfred Hitchock type of situation, except, this was real.
Walking back across the moat and down the access road – which was no more than a 4 wheeler trail at this point, we noticed the old trees that lined the path had white chalky residue over their aged bark, evidence of the water levels of the lake. The lake was incredibly low this Fall, some of the lowest we’ve seen it we both agreed. It was sort of strange to see those marks well at waist level as we walked by.
“Fort Blunder” certainly added another layer to my prowess, an intimidating ruin that was both venerable and deceitful. But honestly, I enjoyed hearing the stories from my friend and his personal accounts there far more than it’s faded history – it somehow adds an entire new layer of mystery and character to it – something that is a little more tangible to me as I trudged through piles of dead leaves on the way back to the car.
I can’t help but think. What will archaeologists be able to uncover about our time in the distant future, and what will those things say about us?
Through-out the fort, there was this sort of undulating stone used, with ambiguous patterns found in their surface. Me and my friend speculated they might be fossils from the Champlain Sea, which once covered the area we walked on 480 million years ago. If these fossils can be found in Isle La Motte, which is nearby, it may be possible that the same rock was quarried and used in the fort walls. Or, so we assume…
A feature of the fort I liked. It once had duel stone spiral staircases linking top to bottom. Today, both have collapsed, but the remnants of some steps still remain, retaining their circular motion down curved stone walls. One of them (not this one) was filled with so much earth and compost that it was still usable for a trip up and down.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
It’s hard to describe a place like the deteriorating ruins of The Cold Spring House, especially if you’ve never had the experience of visiting it yourself.
The remaining residue of The Catskill Mountains and their heyday as a resort destination – hotels such as this one once catered to primarily Jewish clientele during the 20th century, looking for a little relaxation from the turbulence of New York City in the scenic Catskills.
Driving through the gripping, winding road through the Kaaterskill Forest, with wild rivers cutting through steep hardwood shrouded peaks that resembled worn saw teeth, it wasn’t hard to see the allure.
This is the first time I had ever been to the Catskills region before, and my target village of Tannersville made an attractive first impression, which I was incredibly relieved with after the problematic start to my day. It almost seemed like I would never make it to the Catskills, as numerous setbacks, construction projects, and traffic jams kept delaying travel time, each hour of precious daylight being swallowed by the oncoming October evening. Because we were making a 5-hour drive down from Vermont, I was determined to make this count.
Navigating the highways of New York, we passed by many derelict structures and sordid towns that were more depressing than anything, reminders of the decreasing amount of tourists in the region. It’s one thing to figure a portrait of a place from conversations with friends who grew up around there, and a few things I’ve read, but it was another type of cool entirely to gaze at what was coming through the view of the windshield.
As we approached Tannersville, the comedown daylight was filtered through a black sky foreshadowing fury that never seemed to come. The air was crisp, carrying the smell of dead leaves, as chilly mists began to settle on our faces. It felt like it was going to rain, but it never came, and the mists continued to be misleading.
There we were, staring up at the imposing ruins of the Cold Spring House, and it’s various stages of decay.
The slumping roofs and bending wooden frame ripped open several holes in the building, giving off dead weight that popped out windows and pushed various items through the glass. It was well into the evening now, but we had made it, with just enough light to photograph and do a little exploring. But the question was, where do I even start?
From what I know about the place, it was one of the earlier Catskills hotels, on the outskirts of the Borscht Belt, an area once a dazzling vacation-land now reincarnated as a collection of behemoth and storied abandonments. The Cold Spring House was a grand showpiece, which was very different from the closet cottages and revelrous resorts the area was known for at that time.
Built on what is now Spruce Street in the 1890s, it was the second largest hotel in Tannersville, as well as the first Jewish hotel in town – able to accommodate 200 guests at the base of mountains rising to around 2,200 feet. It started as a hotel called Bieber’s Cold Spring House but was sold in 1922 to Saber Khouri, and re-branded simply as The Cold Spring House.
According to a 1904 advertisement I was able to find online, the property featured expansive lawns, offering tennis and croquet grounds, surrounded by old trees offering comfortable shade on summer days. There were farms on the property that supplied the hotel with fresh milk and vegetables everyday, which were paired with what the ad boasted as excellent table service in the form of German and Hungarian cuisine. And of course, fresh spring water was offered – from the springs which the hotel derived its name from.
The hotel was also widely regarded for its popular classical concerts on the lawn. Two signature towers at opposite ends of the building, now slumping dangerously, were once observatories, giving guests extensive views of the mountains. Today, that view would be worth the price of your life.
What I found interesting about the advertisement was that it boasted such amenities as “sanitary plumbing and fire extinguishers on every floor” – items that we take for granted today, but around that time period, were new features and were only beginning to be enforced by laws. I’m sure that was a selling point – definitely a plus when I choose a hotel. But it makes sense. The time period was a time of transition. There was a nationwide push that required to implement such systems, but it was a costly expense to outfit these old buildings, and many old hotels couldn’t afford keeping up with the competition.
The advertisement also stated that the hotel was continuously expanding as it’s increasing popularity was luring more and more people to stay there each season. Older photos showed a much different building, with only one tower, and most of the western wing not yet added. The final product was a much larger and grander property – the brooding structure you see today.
But times certainly have changed. During the late 20th century, much of the region fell out of favor as a vacation destination. With an increase of automobile travel and an ever-burgeoning highway system, more Americans were driving, and could travel farther distances and see more places. Now, they no longer had to settle for the closest area available – a trend that I’ve seen so many times in humbled abandonments I’ve visited. Tannersville was no exception. Many vacation homes eventually were abandoned and hotels were shuttered. The Cold Spring House fell into the trend and was abandoned in the 60s, leaving quite the compelling ruin in its wake.
It literally hunches over Spruce Street in its old age, leaning in all directions. A symbol of human progress and the change of the times, something inevitable that tends to leave growing pains on the often bumpy road of advancement and the fodder of bandwagon fads. In an ironic sense, this more offbeat form of tourism can also serve as a poignant melding of public awareness, a chance to learn from our past.
Today, Tannersville is more known for it’s proximity to Hunter Mountain Ski Area than a summer destination, but while many Borscht Belt towns are still struggling, Tannersville seems to be in the middle of some sort of revival. As it was explained to me, people started to rediscover the town and were taken by its natural beauty. Old vacation homes began to be fixed up at expensive costs because of the bad shape they had deteriorated to, and more businesses have opened up on Route 23A.
As for the Cold Spring House though, I had the pleasant chance to speak with photographer Linda O’Donnell, who has been researching and documenting the building’s deterioration for the past several years. She informed me that the place has been scheduled for demolition since 2012, but demolition by neglect may happen before any actual bulldozers arrive on the property. It makes you wonder, when will the familiar become just history?
Dying Light
This was truly one of the most spectacular places I’ve had the chance to photograph (and a great change of scenery from Vermont!), but with its awe-inspiring profile came very tangible dangers. As I walked around and got to know the place better, I was able to recognize something very quickly. The building was far too dangerous to venture inside, and because of our late start, there was little daylight left. Peeking in through an opened window, I was met with an interior of collapsing floors, wooden walls intended to support the structure were crushed into an accordion-like resemblance, and various artifacts collected in indistinguishable piles of fragments covered in dust and lead paint speckles. The weight was so great in some places that many things had actually been pushed through the floor, which was already cracking on the added weight of my body. That musty old building smell wafted out from the opening, mixed with a heavy damp musk. To my far left, a staircase, illuminated by the dull light of broken windows, climbed above the wreckage and into the mysterious upper floors. Or what was left of them. Though I ached to go inside, that would have been an idea that probably would have been counterproductive to my travel plans, which were to leave intact and alive.
For a relatively rural back street, the traffic was thunderous, a constant roar of pick up trucks going by, and slowing down when they noticed me with my camera. Because New York State has very unforgiving rules against trespassing, and with me being in such a surprisingly public area where I would no doubt be trapped should I be caught, the odds were stacked against me.
I had no choice but to keep a safe distance. But the exterior alone was worth the drive. The tops of the building still wore it’s yellow paint job, the original color of the hotel, while the lower levels were weather worn into a dull grey and showed signs of various stages of rotten cavities that completely ate through the walls. Older photos showed a sign that read “Cold Spring” that hung over the porch near the front entrance, but when I visited, that was also long gone, the last clue to its identity.
Signs of human presence were everywhere. Graffiti was found on many of the upper windows, but not the good kind of graffiti. That also meant that some adventurous intruders made the trip to the upper floors…
I often find strange items left behind when I explore – and this was no exception. There was an interestingly large collection of abandoned records found all around the hotel, most on the front lawn, tangled in tall grass and cedar trees. Some of them were arranged specifically, with various items such as kitchen utensils and bottles filled with suspicious colored liquids in them, propped purposely around the sides. I didn’t recognize any of the artists – but some looked like they would have been right at home in some embarrassing 70s porno.
Just gazing up at the place and looking in the numerous windows offered many things to see. Radiators that had fallen out broken windows. A glimpse of a bedpost. Dark rooms with holes in the ceiling letting in the dying daylight. Old glass bottles left on windowsills. Then the wind blows, and the eerie creeks of a shutter can be heard, before it bangs loudly against a wall several stories above, you see the movement, and your pulse quickens as you jump to conclusions. Despite the reliable hum of noise outside, closer to the hotel, things faded into an uncomfortable silence that was almost loud in itself. It was quite startling considering it was just a short walk down the lawn that offered such a fast transition.
Not wanting to draw attention by staying too long, we left and began the journey back to Vermont, the Cold Spring House leaving a lasting impression.
These are some great historical photos of the Cold Spring House in its heyday, which I found online accidentally and was kindly given permission to re-link by Flickr user Linda O’Donnell. Not sure of the dates, but it really gives you a sense of what this place used to be like.Used with permission from Flickr user Linda O’DonnellUsed with permission from Flickr user Linda O’DonnellUsed with permission from Flickr user Linda O’Donnell
The Cold Spring House Today
Information:
There doesn’t seem to be a lot of information on this place. Most of what I was able to compile in this post came from speaking with various people, and a good article I found online from the Register-Star
There is also a group on Flickr I found, dedicated to sharing memories and photos of it.
To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
It was the mid 1950s, and the United States and The Soviet Union were in the middle of the Cold War. The race was on, both nations stockpiling enough firepower to wipe out most major cities, vaporized in a discharge of enormous mushroom clouds. The ensuing radiation would take care of the rest. According to those in the know, if a nuclear bomb was dropped, the result would be an obliterating flash of light, brighter than a thousand suns.
Paranoia gripped the nation, and preventative measures were taken by the government. Vermont’s desolate Northeast Kingdom became one chosen location to detect and be an early warning against the end of the world.
The United States Air Force chose East Mountain, a 3,438 foot sprawling ridgeline surrounded by some of the most remote wilderness in all of Vermont, to be the site of a radar base. Construction started in 1954, and by 1956 and 21 million dollars later, the North Concord Air Force Station was functional. The base was designed to provide early warning signs and protection from nuclear fallout, as well as sending information to Strategic Air Command Bases.
About 174 men lived in the base in a village of tin and steel Quonset Huts known as the administration section, situated on a mid-mountain plateau surrounded by almost impenetrable bogs. Their job was to guard the radar ears, which resided in massive steel and tin towers on the summit of East Mountain – constantly straining to hear the first whines from Soviet bombers coming from the skies above. The giant buildings were topped with large inflatable white domes that protected the radars. The government spared no expense protecting the United States from a possible Soviet attack. People were urged to build bomb shelters in their basements, “duck and cover” drills were actually implemented in school kids’ curriculum, and almost every town had a fallout shelter (which everyone was encouraged to memorize the location of).
The Quonset village offered amenities such as a store, bowling alley and theater, barber shop and mess hall. But the wilds of Vermont were a tough place to live, especially in the winters, when snow drifts could often reach the edge of the roofs. Sometimes, the air boys would be stuck on the mountaintop when the mountain road became impassible, and would have to wait out the storm up there. Some enlisted men dreaded serving their time in Vermont because of this, but it was the city boys who hated it especially – many who served from the Chicago area. A mural of Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive once covered an entire wall of the mess hall in an effort to make the men feel more at home (but that mural can’t be anywhere near detected today). The base also provided a bus that drove to Saint Johnsbury every night, for a little stress relief and therapeutic contact with civilization, so the men could see a movie and hit the bars.
At first, there was only one way to access the base, a dirt road that traveled through tough mountain valleys and up steep slopes to the base, a 9.3 mile drive. In the winters when the snow drifts gained mass, army personnel would have to phone the base from the bottom of the mountain to let them know they were on their way up, because the road was so narrow it only offered room for one vehicle traveling one way at a time, and if you ran into someone else, well, good luck.
Later, a paved road was constructed from East Haven on the mountain’s western slope, offering another approach. Though the base was a cold functioning monument to man’s urge to destroy itself and the trembling hands of fear, it also offered a boost to the area’s economy as well as social impacts to area towns. In 1962, the base’s name was changed to the Lyndonville Air Force Base.
But the functional life of the East Mountain Radar Base was brief, as expensive costs to keep it running were adding up, and advancing technology made it obsolete before construction was even completely finished. It officially closed in 1963. Since then, its became the idol of local legends. Strange stories of death, UFOs and unknown characters skulking behind rusting ruins and evergreen forests slowly began to haunt the place.
The weirdness started before the base even closed. In 1961, a strange object – which many speculate was a UFO – was identified in the skies above East Mountain, which the military reported as lasting for around 18 minutes. A few hours later, Barney and Betty Hill were allegedly abducted by a UFO near Franconia Notch, New Hampshire, which lead some to believe there is a connection between the two coincidental events.
In 1965, Ed Sawyer of East Burke bought the property from the government for $41, 500, and what a purchase it was. The base was in pristine and authentic condition at the time, and he loved it. Sawyer made money by selling surplus equipment and scrap metal. He moved into one of the Quonset Huts and also ran a woodworking shop there. In 1969, a group of snowmobilers rode onto the property without permission. As they were traversing the lengthy access road, one of them hit a chain slung across the road as a makeshift gate, and was decapitated.
Not long after, trespassers and vandals discovered the base, and started making trips up into the vast wilds of the mountains hoping for an adventure. Sawyer installed several gates going up the roads to deter people from coming up, but he would numerously find several padlocks had been pried off and ruined. Sawyer had to replace about 35 padlocks a year. He would eventually result in shooting at trespassers to protect himself when menacing visitors became destructive and violent. He had even been threatened before.
Not only would they loot and steal everything from wiring and original furniture, but they destroyed the buildings. There was even an account where he woke up one night to a bunch of snowmobilers who were able to ride over the roof of his building because the snow drifts were so high!
The constant influx of vandalism and weather took its toll on the radar base, which has since further deteriorated and taking on a forlorn, haunting appearance underneath bounding hills and silent forests.
The property was put on the market, and remained unsold for many years, until recently when Matthew Rubin purchased it, who envisioned building a wind farm on the site, and anyone who has been on East Mountain would understand why. But after years of attempting to get permits from the state, he postponed the project indefinitely. The property has since been added to Vermont’s list of hazardous places, for massive soil contamination from oil and other motor fluids.
Around 1990, another person met their own mortality on East Mountain, when they fell from one of the radar towers and was killed. To add to the radar base’s already mysterious reputation, it’s been said that the rotting ruins have also been home to hobo camps and a hideout for the Hells’ Angels at one point.
Today, the radar base, known variously as East Haven, East Mountain, Lyndonville, and Concord, sits abandoned in a nebulous haze that hangs over the kingdom forests, the incongruous ruins littering the mountain top – the eerie silence is occasionally broken by the winds and the scraping sounds of rusted metal. A disconcerting and questionably regressive riddle to the end of one apocalyptic dream, and the uncertainty of what the future will bring.
The Quonset Village, Circa 1961-62The radar towers on the summit
The East Mountain Radar Base – satellite view. The Quonset living area is in the lower left corner, and the radar towers are in the upper right, to give you a sense of scale.
The East Mountain Radar Base was one of the most unique places I have ever gotten the chance to explore, and that adventure started even before we arrived there.
We approached our destination from the small town of Victory underneath the bravado of September skies and rambling mountains. Victory has one of my favorite names for a town in Vermont – it’s one of the few place names in the state that derives from an idea rather than a person or place. A suggestion for the cool name may date back to 1780, when settlers across New England were caught up in a general sentiment of Victory after the tides were beginning to turn against the British, especially after the French had decided to join the American cause.
It’s stand out name is kind of ironically fitting for it’s it’s admittedly stand out culture as a place of uninviting destitution, the power of it’s isolation is irrefutable. There are no state routes or paved roads – only unkempt dirt roads that are rutted into a landscape of hills with mangy looking forests partially scarred by ugly logging activity and expansive bogs with heavy moose traffic. The town is remote, even for Vermont’s idea of the term. It has none of the things that many towns have to formulate an identity; it has no post office, general store, gas station, school, police station, fire department or churches. Instead, a cluster of trailers in various states of upkeep huddled together at the bottom of a steep hill is the closest thing the community has to a village center, an area called “Gallup Mills”, which are what VTran’s green reflective way finding signs direct you to as opposed to Victory.
It does have a town hall though – in a restored one-room schoolhouse, which apparently sees far more feuding amongst the 62 people that live in Victory than actual productive town business affairs. I’ll take a quote from Victory resident Donna Bacchiochi in a Seven Days article that I think sums up the town; “You see how lonely it is, how out of the way it is? The reason we moved here is we aren’t social. People in Victory are like that. They don’t visit each other, they don’t kibitz, they don’t do anything like that. It’s vicious.”
In 1963, Victory made local and national news by becoming the last town in the state to get electricity, and that was pretty much owed to the by then defunct radar base being nearby. With millions spent running power up the mountains to the base, Victory took advantage of a fortuitous situation and made connections down to the valley from the existing grid.
Traveling off into the hills of Victory, we made our way up Radar Road which was built parallel to the bouldery banks of The Moose River and underneath fallen trees that hung over the road, as our tires jarred into pothole washouts. As I’m writing this, I can’t think of accurate words to describe the sense of isolation we felt up in the mountains of East Haven. Miles away from anywhere, no cell phone service, no sounds of the familiar world to ground you and give you a sense of place.
Eventually, we came across a weedy clearing in a sea of Green forest, the formidable forms of the Quonset Huts with their rusted steel facades and broken glass skulking behind the fading colors of early autumn. We had reached the former living area of the base – the sentinel forms of the radar towers high above us could be seen on a steep ridge where congested softwood forests climbed out of the swamps. Many of the huts had been razed already, leaving cement slab foundations choked with weeds. One of them was dismantled and given to the Caledonia County Snowmobile Club, where it was re-assembled. The remaining buildings were low profile, almost completely obscured by the forest that was slowly reclaiming what it once had.
A walk through the buildings was a sentient experience over broken glass, soggy and exposed insulation, a storied compendium of generations of graffiti, and evidence of human habitation, arson and partying.
Administration Section – Fall, 2014
The Motor Pool.Every building on the base was fueled and heated by it’s own enormous oil tank, which also result in the heavy soil pollution there today. The tank pictured here was probably more towards the mess hall – but the new property owners have since moved it to block the road just beyond the administration section, to prevent people from driving up to the towers on the summit now. The only way up is via a 2 hour hike, or if you have 2 wheels.
We didn’t know this at the time, but the cumbersome Formica board leaning inside one of those busted bathroom stalls is the former control board interface for the radar computers up on the top of the mountain. The unexposed side still had it’s typography, button slots and sconces where light bulbs were. It has since been removed.
Return to Radar Mountain – Mothers Day Weekend 2016
On mothers day weekend, I met up with a few friends and we ventured up to radar mountain. It was 72 degrees – perfect for a road trip – and I really needed to get out of the house.
Although, a late start ensured that we got up on the mountain just an hour or so before sunset, but that didn’t stop us from having a little fun. We got a campfire going and my friend hooked up his record player to some period-accurate loud speakers, and played era-appropriate music from the 50s, when the base would have been in operation. “I only have eyes for you” was playing as I shot this, making eerie tin can sounds and tossing them across silent swamps and the silhouettes of nearby mountains – which we joked was the radar base theme song. It was an extraordinarily cool night.
Among the stranger things that we have found inside an abandoned location, my friend said that one of his more uncomfortable finds happened here in the asbestos dusted mess hall – when he found a pair of contact lenses on the gritty floor tiles a few years back.
“Horse Man”
Furnace. When the building caught fire, the asbestos did what asbestos does, and prevented the hazard from spreading, but in the process, it was also left horribly exposed, making the building a hazard of different proportions.What I found really interesting about the construction of the administration area, was that because it was literally built over a mountain swamp, some of the terrain had to be leveled to accommodate the foundations, but that terra-forming was only done around the sites that they were working on, leaving the rest of the area more or less as they found it, as evidenced here by the swampy stand of birches (there are a lot of birches up there) next to a more leveled cinder block construction. I speculate that if this base were to be constructed today, the entire property would just be flattened.We know that all sorts of people come up here for various reasons that one would want to come up to a defunct radar base far from the concept of society and law. Plenty of them have firearms. But in this case, these strangers were inside of the building as they were shooting up the walls. My camera lens was staring at bullet exit holes.The former gymnasium and theater building. I had never seen it before without all the leaves on the trees. This structure arguably had the largest of all the fuel needs for the administration area, and probably the most asbestos contamination. So big that the gym had it’s own furnace and power plant wing build behind it. Today, the swamp behind the gym is an impenetrable, scrubby and foul area that is burdened by plenty of oil contamination after the base closed.Behind the gymnasium, you can still trace the tennis courts. Remarkably well. Though the base has been defunct for 53 years now, it’s paved extremities like the road itself, and this tennis court, have held up very well over the intervening years all things considered. Though, the paved surface is breaking out in isolated subterranean build ups that make rounded protrusions and bumps through the tarmac. Parts of surviving property delineating chain link fence were even still standing.
The old guard shack, which is slumping a bit more as the years go by. Radar Road’s 1960’s pave job still holds up better than many of Vermont’s roads that VTrans dubs as “usable”.
The radar base was already proving to be a creepy area to explore. The compelling silence up there was occasionally met with auditory hallucinations – we would jump at the sound of what we thought were other people lurking somewhere nearby, or the oncoming roar of a motor of a passing vehicle, only to be greeted by nothing but our own fears and the self imposed things that crawled into our heads.
From the administration section, we climbed back in the car and drove up the remaining stretch of Radar Road, and were immediatly met with the most imposing road I’ve ever traveled on. The forest literally was swallowing the road – the cracked paved surface immediately pitched upwards on a grueling steep grade that kept on climbing – the growth was so thick that tree branches came in through our open windows and began to smack us in our faces, until we were forced to roll up the windows. The road was only wide “enough” for one car, and that was even far fetched. There was no place to pull over, no place to turn around. If another car was coming in the opposite direction, especially around one of the many blind hairpin turns that also happen to travel uphill, you would be screwed. One of you would have to give. At this point, the orange glow of my friend’s low fuel light illuminated on the dashboard, giving us another reminder of just how far away we were. If we ran out of gas up here, it would be a very long walk back to civilization.
But the drive to the top was exhilarating – the intoxicating scent of Spruce and Balsam trees blew in the winds and filled the car. Soon, the trees became stunted and the horizon began to open up from the dark forests, and the shapes of hazy blue mountains with their knife sharp ridge lines began to undulate in the horizon. All of the sudden, we were underneath the imposing steel skeletons of the radar towers. We had made it.
Summit Radar Towers – Fall 2014
Radar Road as it flattens out on the summit. From up there, you can see New Hampshire’s Presidential Range.
Almost immediately, we were greeted with a good reminder at just how dangerous this place was. Several of the floors in the steel towers were rusted through, some with holes, and others with entire sections that actually swayed and bended with each passing step. Mysterious liquids of various colors rested in odorless pools on the floors and dark spaces, as the wind howled outside and rattled the walls. Rust was everywhere, and the possibility of Tetanus discomforting.
It wouldn’t be an adventure if we didn’t find a Bud Light can along the way, which seems to be the drink of choice for people who frequent these types of locations.
This 5 story tower is the tallest structure on the base, and was never actually completed. It was halted before radar equipment was ever installed because the base was decommissioned.
The best part about the visit here was no doubt the magnificent 360 panorama of the Northeast Kingdom and New Hampshire from the top of the tallest radar tower, but getting there was a game of nerves. Climbing up the already questionable structures reverberating with the groans of rusting tin moving in the wind, and up a rusted ladder coated in a layer of mysterious slime that gave you no traction. If you slipped, you plummeted several feet down towards a hard concrete floor into pools of fluids obscuring soggy insulation and rusted objects. But once on top of the tower, as you gaze into unbroken wilderness as far as you can see, and you bask in the profound silence, it’s completely worth it.
At the summit, there were visible campsites made on the slopes beneath the towers. I couldn’t help but think about how amazing it would be to camp up here in the deep, underneath the constellation light. I’m sure it would be a spectacular experience, perhaps even unsettling. As we were leaving, another car came up the road and parked, before a group of teenagers climbed out holding quite a few packs of Twisted Tea. I guess other people are taken by the strange allure of this place as well – and it draws characters of all kinds.
Proving this point, on the way back down the road, we met up with another vehicle, its roof and grill lights flashing, and it was barreling up the road. Thinking it was the police, we found a place to pull over. As the car passed us, we clearly read the words” Zombie Apocalypse Survival Vehicle” written on the sides in police-esque decals, the car soon sped out of sight as it headed towards the mountaintop.
Sometimes, the pursuit of life can bring you to some incredible places.
Update as of August 2015
A while after I had published this post, I was amused when I saw an inbox message on the blog’s Facebook page from the owner of the “Zombie Apocalypse Survival Vehicle”, which pretty much started out with the line “Hey! I’m the guy with the car!” As it turns out, he’s also one of the members of the East Mountain Preservation Group and might just be the person who is most intimate with the place. He practically lives up there, spending his free time examining it’s ruins and doing some urban archaeology to figure out how the base functioned, and the stories behind the things I saw on my trek up the mountain. So, we struck up a casual social media friendship, which transitioned into a real time friendship, which lead to us planning a radar trip together.
He picked me up in the affor-referenced Zombie Apocalypse Survival Vehicle, and we made a special trek up to the kingdom, to explore the base on the 52nd anniversary of it becoming defunct. He gave me a much more detailed tour of the place, showing me things that I had walked right by or took no notice too. One of my favorites was the collection of old cars that had been junked in a swamp that ringed the administration section. When the base was abandoned, the army trashed the place, heaping their junk and cars into the woods, and dumping lots of excess waste, such as oil and fuel tanks, into the soil. The faint acrid stench of contamination still permeates in the swamps today. Following well packed super highways made by what seem to be countless passing Moose, we were able to find the rusting remains of the vehicles. We also found an old switchboard that once controlled radar and ventilation equipment, switchboards that once served the telephones and their lead cased wires, and several old wells now contaminated with iron that stained the water a stagnant red.
But the most surprising find was what we refer to as “The Boulders”; a very literal moniker we bestowed on a man made road block just beyond the Quonset Huts. Logging equipment was used to dig a trench through the road, and then to drop four gigantic boulders into it, to prevent anyone with a vehicle from driving up the remaining two miles to the radar towers on the summit.
By far the coolest part of the trip was when we were able to get the power running in some of the buildings, after a great deal of rigging and assistance, I heard the eerie yet rewarding sound of a light that hasn’t flickered or hummed in 52 years, come to life. Not a bad way to spend an anniversary.
As it stands as I write this in 2016, the radar base and all visible surrounding property was purchased by a logging company out of Washington State. From what I was told – the company doesn’t plan on being as friendly to recreational land use as the prior landowners were. To get some tax breaks on all those acres of forest, they have to allow some, so they’re focusing on moose hunting permits. But from what I heard, all 4 gates up Radar Road will most likely be closed more than they’re open from now on, so logging and quarrying crews can do their thing without the constant interruptions of over sized trucks with out of state plates coming up the road, which surprisingly carries the traffic volume of a suburban neighborhood than a logging road in the middle of the kingdom. But, only time will tell.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
A favorite activity of mine is to go shunpiking – cruising around Vermont’s back roads and letting my eyes and mind soak up whats out there. A few nights ago while traveling down a straight-of-way in Addison County, a pancake flat paved rural roadway surrounded on both sides by expansive hay fields, I came across a forested island in the middle of a vast expanse of nothing – a small patch of surprisingly dense hardwood trees, tall grasses, and the Vermont state flower, the Clover.
Behind the growth, I noticed there was something man made here that was coexisting with the small jungle – the second story of a sordid farmhouse could be seen above a fortress of clinging vines that were almost consuming the structure. Slowing down to take a better look, I realized there was yet another abandoned house across the street that was nearly invisible, and behind it, I could make out the shapes of a scattering of barns and sheds, all falling and fading. I had stumbled on an abandoned farm.
Pulling off into what was once probably a driveway, I basked for a moment in the silence that hung around the farm. The sounds of crickets and the smell of clover came through the open windows, and the breeze gently rustled the trees. As I was sitting in my late summer reverie, movement caught my eye. From behind the abandoned farmhouse I was near, a solitary figure rode into the opening on a bike, through thick grass and tanglewoods that I assumed were probably very difficult to bike through. Manning the bike was a haggard looking fella, who appeared to be in his 40s, outfitted in moth-eaten clothing and a rather new looking bike helmet. He approached the car, and I braced for his encounter the best I could, giving him a small smile, waiting to see what was about to unfold.
“What are you doing here?” was his first question, which I predicted as much. “I’m just turning around, took the wrong road” I said calmly and cautiously. “Do you own this land? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to bother you”. “Oh, I worked here for over 30 years, so I pretty much do own the land” he began. “The farm is abandoned now, the family is pretty much all dead. I still come by almost every week and check up on things though” “Oh wow, that’s pretty incredible. This place looks like it has a lot of history” I observed. And that seemed to light an internal fire – a simple initiation of conversation, and suddenly, his reserves were taken down, and he opened up to me. “Oh man, the stories I could tell you”. I smiled at him and explained my passion for stories and history. His eyes lit up like flashbulbs. “Actually – do you have some time, I can show you around?”
Next thing I knew, I had my camera in hand, and was ignoring my better senses as I followed a total stranger through thick tall grasses, well out of sight from the relative safety of the road out front. He introduced himself as Ivan as we went to shake hands. Putting blind faith in this gentleman, I allowed him to lead me around the property and we began to talk about the shifty ways of time, his stories cutting deep into history.
“I started working here when I was 10, back in the 60s”, Ivan began. “I used to carry hay bails from the fields to the barn all day long. That’s how I got these” he snickered, as he flexed his muscles. “I used to work all day long, never took a water break. People always used to warn me I’d get dehydrated, but I never did” he said proudly.
We found ourselves standing in front of a barn. “These barns are over 150 years old, built from Oak, Cherry and Ash, all cut right here on this property. There used to be a mill over there” he gestured to now open pastureland. He walked over and wedged a sliding door open, it made a loud groaning noise as the door grinded against the building. The entire facade seemed to tremble at this disturbance.
Inside was a forgotten world. Incredibly thick quilts of spiderwebs clung to brawny timber beams and fell from the ceilings like snow, getting tangled in my hair. Hay scattered on the dirt floors 30 years ago was still there, matted and molding. Certain rooms were packed wall to wall with various artifacts. wooden apple crates, tires with wooden rims, old bikes, desks and shelves filled with various artifacts and paraphernalia, accounts of over 150 years of farming now sitting forsaken underneath swirling dust and sunlight coming in through dirt streaked windows. On our way out, he noted me looking at the apple crates. “I love these things. I have a few of them in my apartment, holding books and stuff” I commented. “Oh yeah, I love those old crates too. There used to be an apple orchard right behind this barn. Over 100 trees! I remember, we all used to eat so many apples – they were great on a hot summer day. They tore them all out a few years ago, the entire orchard”
Making our way through the tall grasses, we made our way across the property. In a neighboring barn almost completely concealed by tree growth, he pointed out that that particular barn was used exclusively for trapping. The farmers used to trap unlimited beavers, otters and raccoons on their property and the nearby creek, and used to bring all the pelts to hang and dry in that barn – where a long narrow hallway ran between two sets of walls where the hooks still were hanging. “This barn used to be full of hides – all the walls would be covered” he reminisced. “We used to either eat them or sell them. Any bit of money helped” It was a strange image, staring at those filthy and barren walls that afternoon underneath filtered light streaming through broken boards. I noticed a dated industrial grain sorting machine at the very end of the narrow hall. He told me that the farm used to also produce its very own grain. The floor was still coated in ankle high piles of the stuff and it had gotten in my shoes. Standing inside, there was a moment of silence as we took in our surroundings, and weird sounds seeped throughout, the soft summer breeze clearing my mind.
Wondering back around one of the abandoned houses, he told me that after the farm started to go out, the house was rented out to people outside the family. The last occupiers apparently stole a great deal from the farm. Valuable antiques such as firearms, milk jugs and other artifacts they had been taken. Most of the original family had died off, all but one member, who is now well into her senior years, and still lives nearby. She’s tired and doesn’t have the want to upkeep the farm anymore, and is almost completely unaware of it’s slow collapse. “It’s a real shame” he said. “Once she dies, a guy wants to buy the place, come in and bulldoze all the barns, the houses, everything. They want to expand the fields and farm this area. Everything here will be lost”.
Walking across the road, he brought me over to another abandoned farmhouse. “Back in the 60s – this used to be filled with people from California. Used to come up here by the bus loads – there must have been at least 20 or so people living in this house. They were the ones who were in charge of keeping this farm running ship shape”
The door to the house opened effortlessly, swung inwards and banged against the neighboring wall – the sound was like a shotgun blast in the somber interior. Inside, the life was gone, but something kept on creeping on, the floors creaked as the past walked by. The interior was what I expected to find in an old Vermont farmhouse. Faded linoleum floors, porcelain sinks, peeling wallpaper and rooms filled with garbage. There were holes where stove pipes used to run and heat the house, and an the exposed skeletons of an electrical system that looked like it was done haphazardly years ago. “There used to be rows of bunk beds in these rooms – they all used to sleep in here” he pointed out as he swung open a door of an upstairs room.
As we walked back down the stairs, he paused at one door we hadn’t opened yet – the basement door. The entire farmhouse had shifted and slumped over the years, almost trapping the door in its frame, but after a few hard tugs, it wrenched free, sending splintered fragments of crown molding in the air. The basement was pitch black, and the old wooden stairs were no longer standing. “You know, I’ve always wondered if there was like a chest full of gold or something down there” Ivan said as he scanned the darkness with his eyes. I was now curious. Was he making a joke? But he was quick to explain. “Back when I was growing up – I heard stories that the older members of the family had hidden gold coins around the farm. There was some sort of currency scare in the 1800s where people assumed paper money was going to loose its value, so they all started to switch to gold coins. I guess I heard they had a few stashes hid around the houses” Hidden treasure was certainly intriguing to me, so I asked him if he had ever found any of these alleged gold coins perhaps hidden under a floorboard or in the pipe of a woodstove. “Nope, never. I think it’s just a story” he said. With a little research later, I discovered that there was in fact a large scale panic in the mid 1800s, The Panic of 1837, where wages, prices and profits went down, and unemployment and a general distrust of banks went up. As a result, I’ve heard other stories of old Vermonters investing in gold currency, something they were confident was dependable and safe, and kept it around the house as opposed to opening an account at a bank. Even if his intriguing story was a rumor, or if he was simply trying to spin a yarn, it did have its roots in historical accuracy.
Now outside the house, he brought me over to another barn and stared up at a rusted basketball hoop rim that was hung above one of the entrances. “Used to play here a lot as a kid to pass the time” he recalled nostalgically. “We used to have games, me and the Californians. Was thinking about going out for the basketball team in high school, but I never did”
“How often do you come by?” I asked Ivan, now curious by our chance meeting. “About every week” he replied. “I like to check up on the place, to make sure things are alright, to make sure it’s all as it should be”. It seemed Ivan was waiting in vain for something to happen – throbbing, and wincing, not knowing who to love or who to blame.
Getting ready to leave, I reached out to shake his hand, and sincerely thank him for his grand tour. It always means a lot when people open up to me – those experiences suddenly become shared experiences, and effect both parties involved. “It’ll sure be sad when this place goes, that’s for sure. Just down the road, the neighboring farm already sold parts of their land to other people, and they built houses on them” I knew too well what he was talking about. “Yeah, that’s pretty common. A lot of the farms I remember growing up around have succumbed to development now” My comment seemed to strike him off his feet. “What? Oh no…I’ve never really left town, haven’t really been anywhere I guess. So I wouldn’t really know” he said wistfully, he almost seemed to grieve from the disease of change and urbanism. I felt badly for him, it seemed all he wanted was a sense of place, but there was only silence and heavy humidity.
It’s always interesting to think about how many great stories are still existing in Vermont that have gone untold, and are in danger of completely disappearing. Images of proud men slick with sweat sticking to tractor seats and labor that would break the summer’s back. Farm life isn’t a romanticized escape from the bustle of modern life, it’s sadly an often thankless, lynchian job of back breaking work with little to show for it. But it also is a labor of love and devotion matched by earnest gazes and blue skies that have seen the same troubles as us. Exploring abandoned places like this sometimes compels you to look for answers to your own questions, but all I seemed to find is everything seems to change. As the world progresses into a future that seems like a dream now, countless more farms may find themselves like this one. It’s an experience like this in a haze of turbulent innocence, where you get a hard reminder that nothing stays the same.
Update, August 2015
A month of so after I had posted this blog post, I received a Facebook inbox message from the owner of this property. I opened it hesitantly, thinking that it’s contents would be angry and accusative, but to my very pleasant surprise, he was actually telling me he digged my blog, and loved this particular entry. But one thing was bothering him. He asked me about my tour guide, Ivan, and said that the family never employed anyone under that name on the farm before. A bit befuddled, I gave him a detailed profile of the guy. “I knew it!” He started. “His name isn’t Ivan, he lied to you. That was Tom, the town drunk. He’s the guy who set the meetinghouse on fire a few years ago, then tried to come here and light up one of our barns”. I certainly didn’t expect that.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
There is always that one place that stands out from the rest – and on a breezy August morning, I stood in front of what has to be the most unnerving house I have ever explored, and it was the question of why that really bothered me the most…
Skulking off a quiet backroad underneath the canopy of dense forests, on a slope with at least a 9 percent grade – this fading weathered house sits in the forest like an infected sore – a strange world where nature slowly undoes the deeds of man, with skin so thick, it’s empty eyes were like knives, not worried about who was receiving them.
The awkwardness started from the moment I got out of the car, and got a good look at the place over a forest of thorns and vines that had been tangled in the wind – a solitary trail sleuthed its way through the growth towards the house. Something had been through here recently. Staring up at it’s faded and splintery facade that almost matched the wilderness around it, there was something unsettling about the place. You could actually feel it’s age, and you could smell the smells – that typical old house perfume and rot that hung around the property like musk. Through the broken windows, the interior was pitch black, with secrets smothered in dirt. Though my fears weren’t routed in anything empirical, my skin was trembling.
Deciding to get a better look at the place, I proceeded to stumble through the grass. I was already regretting it. The thorns immediately sliced my arms and legs to ribbons, and I began to stumble over things that were previously hidden. Rusted trailers, oil barrels, broken glass and a knotted web of disused sap lines lay along the weedy floor, all covered in condensation which coated my boots, and made me slip more than once. Just getting over towards the place was turning into an adventure. Bees swarmed from flower to flower, and unseen creatures slithered in the grass, making the stalks snap and rustle.
Standing at the foot of it’s darkness, I noticed some things that immediately made me stop my pursuit. There was a new looking satellite dish on the side of the building, and an even newer looking utility box. But, there was no electrical hookup to the house. Some of the wires sat exposed, pulled out of the walls, and chewed on. Could someone actually live here? There were giant holes in the wall, and half the windows had long been shattered, but from my experience, that isn’t always evidence…
Upon closer investigation, I noticed an odd sight. Someone had actually taken the time to pick up the large fragments of broken window glass, and set them back into the wooden window frames. Other windows were barricaded from the inside, with chairs pushed up against them holding curtains in place. Someone made vague attempts to keep people out it seemed, but just around the corner, there was a door that was wide open, and a broken window would easily allow access. What was going on here? Peering inside a window, the interior of the house was cast in shadow, further and further, until there was nothing but strange land. A cold dampness settled on my face, and I could taste the musk as it settled in the air on my tongue.
I couldn’t explain it, I was incredibly uncomfortable at this point. I felt like something was watching me, like something was lurking just beyond the lens of my camera, offering no explanation. Though the inside of the house was smoldering in an entombed silence, there were strange noises coming from the places out of reach, like something was moving, something unknown saying, if I stay here, trouble will find me. To add to my unnerved state, tree branches around the house started to snap, but no one was around.
Eventually, I trekked back towards the road and rejoined my friend, who had opted not to go any closer to the place. I guess I couldn’t really blame him at this point. “I heard weird noises coming inside – I decided to leave” I said when I saw his questionable face. “Oh, I thought I heard something as well” he said. “I thought it was the syrup folk or something coming by” I stopped. “syrup folk?” He then pointed to the labyrinth of active sky blue sap lines that criss-crossed around the property. Though I now understood what he meant, there was something cryptic, almost ominous (and probably uniquely Vermont) about the term “syrup folk” that really stuck with me, hence the name for this blog post.
Though my trip here was discomforting, it’s these sort of experiences that often can be regarded as some of our finest ones – allowing you to discover what’s deep between your own skin and bones. And at the very least, they make for the best stories.
As we were about to leave, just to confirm my suspicions that something was inside, a raccoon popped it’s head out of the third story window, through a broken section of shutter, stared at us for a few seconds, than dipped back in to the deep cold darkness inside.
This conjured up a few “Breaking Bad” jokes.
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To all of my amazing fans and supporters, I am truly grateful and humbled by all of the support and donations through out the years that have kept Obscure Vermont up and running.
As you all know I spend countless hours researching, writing, and traveling to produce and sustain this blog. Obscure Vermont is funded entirely on generous donations that you the wonderful viewers and supporters have made. Expenses range from internet fees to host the blog, to investing in research materials, to traveling expenses. Also, donations help keep me current with my photography gear, computer, and computer software so that I can deliver the best quality possible.
If you value, appreciate, and enjoy reading about my adventures please consider making a donation to my new Gofundme account or Paypal. Any donation would not only be greatly appreciated and help keep this blog going, it would also keep me doing what I love. Thank you!
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