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Sunday, July 20, 2003
Journey of a lifetime
Copyright © 2003 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. | ||||||||||||
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Also on this page: History of Baxter State Park | |||||||||||
TOWNSHIP 3 — A hazy sun dipped behind the pine and fir trees, out of view of the loons, waders and fishermen at Kidney Pond in Baxter State Park. It was a day denied a clear horizon, but that hardly mattered. The view was still solemn and surreal: Katahdin, Maine's largest mountain, loomed over the waters, the dense forests and the wildlife, dominating everything around it. It is a scene that awes sportsmen today just as it did Percival Baxter a century ago, when the 26-year-old Portland man first saw Katahdin from Kidney Pond and was inspired to preserve it for the people of Maine. Baxter's fishing trip in 1903 to Kidney Pond with his father, James, sparked his radical quest to preserve more than 200,000 acres at a time when land conservation was a new concept. Today, some 75,000 people visit Baxter State Park each summer, and 50,000 hike on the mountain. Baxter's extraordinary gift of land created a legacy of conservation and helped cast Maine in the national consciousness as a place of wild beauty. On this 100-year anniversary of Baxter's first journey to the forests and ponds below Katahdin, the Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram retraced the historic fishing trip that became an odyssey unlike any other: a lifelong quest by a visionary to keep a special piece of Maine forever wild. No one knows what crossed Baxter's mind in 1903 as he first gazed up at Katahdin. Baxter, who later became a Maine governor, mentioned his first trip to the Katahdin region only once, in a speech in 1967. It was for the dedication of the Togue Pond Gate House, when he described reaching the area by "railroad, tote team and on foot." A journey to Kidney Pond from Portland 100 years ago was a two-day expedition to the exotic and unexpected. There were no SUVs or highways to get there. No coolers, bug spray or flashlights to light the way to the outhouse at night. The journey for Baxter began at his father's house at 61 Deering St. in Portland. Together, the two fishermen boarded a train that led to Norcross, a town southwest of Millinocket, on the Bangor and Aroostook Railroad line. Baxter then boarded a slow-moving steamer that traveled up to Ambajejus Falls at the top of Ambajejus Lake. A host of sporting camp guides paddled sportsmen to several camps along the system of lakes and rivers around Katahdin. The canoe trip taken by Baxter ended at the outlet of Nesowadnehunk Stream, where the final stage of the journey to Hunt's Camp for most sportsmen at that time was by foot, while a horse "tote" carried the baggage on a path that led to the campsite. There, by 1903 standards, Baxter found himself in a jungle. Today, Hunt's Camp at Kidney Pond still exists, but has become the Kidney Pond Campground, with modern expansions and renovations. The same woodland path that sportsmen took at the turn of the last century also is there, much of it now part of the Appalachian Trail.
To approach Kidney Pond through the park as Baxter did, it's necessary to hike through the park down to Nesowadnehunk Falls, where the Penobscot River meets the Nesowadnehunk Stream. This is where Baxter most likely stepped out of a canoe and traveled by foot up along the stream. Today, the Appalachian Trail follows the east side of the stream; this was the likely path sportsmen took to Kidney Pond in the early 1900s, according to park forester Jensen Bissel and John Neff, who is researching a book on Katahdin. This roughly three-mile stretch along Nesowadnehunk Stream is a rugged walk over a boulder- and root-ridden path. It's a cool area flanked by ferns and large evergreens. The incline along the stream moves high above a series of falls, such as Little and Big Niagara, and is surrounded by high boulders. It's an unusual and popular picnic spot for park visitors looking for a cool release from summer heat. Rising high above the stream, the path winds past the cacophony of rushing water. Those traveling on to Kidney Pond can cross one of the slimmer sections of the stream. Today the stream is bridged by primitive log planks. But it is not hard to wade across, as many fly fishermen do. From there the path around the edge of Kidney Pond changes to a softer trail with partial views of the pond. Most of the path is flat, an easy walk carpeted with pine needles. There are sounds of wildlife, including toads, chipmunks and many songbirds. The pond trail is worn, but in the heat of summer it seems deserted. There are cobwebs in places, old leaves matted in small piles. At the end of this trail, Kidney Pond Campground appears suddenly through a modest clearing in the forest. First a few small cabins along the pond seem to offer unexpected welcome. Then in no time the entire campground unfolds. Seeing the view of it spread out neatly around a lush green common beside the pond is like waking up after a sound night's sleep. In 1903, this hike for Percival Baxter probably came at the end of nearly two days of travel. Baxter may have been exhilarated as he reached Hunt's Camp, but he also must have been weary. The quiet of the place creates the magical, faraway experience Baxter would have had fishing in the shadow of Katahdin, canoeing past loons and swimming through Kidney Pond. Maybe this gracious silence rises out of a respect for nature Baxter has passed on to us. Maybe the park's limit on visitors or request for quiet late at night assures it. Whatever the reason, what evolved out of Percival Baxter's vision that the park shall "forever be kept and remain in the natural wild state" is an unusual place that caters to the solitary and happy outdoors spirit. Today, the campsite lacks many of the refined touches that were added in 1903 to make the well-to-do feel at home. Then, only the wealthy made such lengthy trips to sporting camps, with guides. These first sporting camps rose from lumber operations, but they were places of primitive elegance and rustic privilege. A trip to Kidney Pond Campground's primitive cabins today provides a wilderness-like experience for visitors, especially since the park forbids any motor homes, trailers or motor boats. There are no showers or bathroom facilities with plumbing in the camp. For those who care for basic comfort, it's lovely. The log cabins along the pond are simple, small and spread out, dressed up by the green lawn and the wild orange and yellow hawkweed buds that are everywhere in early summer. These accommodations, run by the park, are sparsely furnished, but even simple random hooks are a help when there are wet clothes, bathing suits and towels that need drying. The furnishings - plain wooden chairs and a metal and linoleum table - are adorned only by cotton curtains that flutter in the windows. The community fire pits made of stone and metal in the common area are flanked by wooden picnic tables that sit in blackness after night falls, forcing late fishermen to eat dinner by flashlight. The sounds of park visitors seem to evaporate in the amphitheater of the pond. While wooden doors slam and hiking boots thud across porch floors, the raised voices between paddlers on the pond and those relaxing in Adirondack chairs on the shore are nonexistent. It's not uncommon to find campers mixing quietly with neighbors both at night, after a day of fishing, or early in the morning, when fresh coffee is shared and passed around. Photographs from the early 1900s kept in the ranger station at Kidney Pond show the sporting camp then had linen or lace tablecloths and old-fashioned phonographs to provide music. There are other relics from a more gracious past. Wooden bowling balls from the nearby private Colt camp, owned by a relation of Samuel Colt, inventor of the Colt 45, are kept at Kidney Pond still. Legend has it they were used in Colt camp's two bowling alleys. Farm animals were kept in cleared areas left rough and rooted. Cows, pigs and chickens were brought in to provide sumptuous feasts so patrons would have the fresh meals to which they were accustomed. According to a 1907 advertisement for Hunt's Camp, it had "the best camp accommodations; table fare includes fresh milk, eggs, vegetables . . . large icehouse filled with pure ice." Such luxuries tell of a backwoods lifestyle unlike the pack-in, pack-out philosophy that exists at the park today. However, Maine's native wildlife roamed around the camp then, reminding camp patrons of the true nature of the setting they were in. Deer, moose, beavers and snowshoe hares would have been seen by campers then as now. The 1904 travel guide "In the Maine Woods" advertised that "Mount Katahdin can safely be said to mark the center of Maine's best moose country." Few who visit Baxter State Park today can pass a view of the mountain without looking up. For Mainers entering the park for the first time, it's a curiosity, an oddity in a state best known for its woodland and rocky coast. Because of the presence of Katahdin, the park today is considered a remarkable state jewel. The park also is a place where moose wandering roadways are as common as loons cruising around the many remote ponds in Baxter. Two weeks ago, while a group of swimmers from New Jersey puzzled over the leeches as they waded in, fewer than a half-dozen anglers slowly patrolled the pond for fish rising as the evening sun dropped. A lone swimmer moved across the famous fishery, past a bathing loon, to a large boulder just beyond the tiny peninsula known as Colt Point. It's easy to visualize Baxter swimming the same passage 100 years ago. In his journal entry on Sept. 12, 1903, James Baxter described his son as an adept swimmer who swam that morning from Mackworth Island to the Falmouth shore, a sizeable distance. For such a strong swimmer, crossing the width of Kidney Pond would have been easy - and would have taken in Katahdin. The view of the mountain from Kidney Pond is no less magnificent than at other park sites. But from the waters below the soaring peak, one also has a deeper sense of the mountain's wildness and mystique. Katahdin draws attention skyward, where its dark trunk and speckled peak loom large. Baxter's experience of Katahdin in 1903 was the beginning - if not the epiphany - that led to his wondrous wilderness gift. Sadly, we may never know specifics about what Baxter thought and did on that first trip to the land he eventually gave to the state. Knowing what we do about Baxter as an outdoorsman and philanthropist, his experience at Kidney Pond must have moved him, as he focused on this part of the state to save for the people here. Twenty-seven years after that trip, in 1930, Baxter made his first land purchase of nearly 6,000 acres. He paid $25,000. The sale included Katahdin. A year later, he gave the land to the state; in 1933 the area was officially named Baxter State Park by the Maine Legislature. Even then, Baxter's benevolence was only beginning. He continued to buy and donate land to the state until 1962, until he had protected more than 200,000 acres that he asked to be kept in the "natural wild state." Whatever inspiration formed within Baxter's spirit in 1903, one thing is clear: While fishing, hiking and canoeing in the ponds around Katahdin, he was moved by the music in the waterways and touched by the teeming wildlife in the area he decided to save for us. Why else would he have worked so hard the rest of his life to purchase and protect that land, to remind us of what is meant by "forever wild"? Staff Writer Deirdre Fleming can be contacted at 791-6452 or at:
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