Huts and glory: Years of connection and change

AMC Outdoors, July/August 2000

Since the AMC first undertook to lay stone upon stone in 1888, millions of hikers have sought the shelter and good company provided by the huts. Much has changed over the years: Bunks lined with pine boughs now sport traditional mattresses. Candlesticks are less common than solar panels. The position of sole (male) summer caretaker has expanded to a co-ed crew.

And those crews face different duties. Today's huts place a strong emphasis on education and conservation, with a naturalist at each hut, whereas any such information dispensed by hut crews in the past was done so informally. Crews also lacked standardized first-aid kits and training, while today they assist in an average of 70 search-and-rescue actions a year.

But some things stay the same: The "stern beauty of the rocks," as early hiker Zilpha Smith put it. The fellowship of tired, hungry hikers. The abundant food. Those wool blankets. And the knowledge that a night or two spent among the clouds contributes to a love of the mountains and a desire to help conserve them. It was that knowledge, and the support of those who've learned it firsthand, that helped the AMC earn a renewal of its 30-year permit to operate the huts from the U.S. Forest Service last year.

A half-century after meeting those gun-toting Brits on a high mountain path, Red Mac reflected on some of the pleasant moments of those early days in a 1966 Appalachia:

A big stag who came over the height-of-land in the early evening to get a drink from our brook, sleeping out under the stars on clear nights when they seemed almost within reach, the northern lights streaming up to a center overhead . . . the whitethroats singing in the evening, greeting the camps and other guests and being entertained by songs they sang and tales they told, learning much about the mountains, getting acquainted with many fine people and learning from them many flowers and some of the geology of the region, swimming in the lake after getting black from packing charcoal, and these years at Carter and Lakes being the beginning of years of connection with the AMC.

 Huts and Glory, main article  | A considerable undertaking  | Pack it in, pack it in  | 
Mountain hospitality in the Whites  | Years of connection and change