Thoreau Trail Walk

On July 19th, DCR Park Interpreter Mike Whalen led a hike on the Bellows Pipe Trail. He talked about the connection of this location to the writing of Henry David Thoreau. Thoreau, born in Massachusetts in pointed out that Thoreau, born in Massachusetts in 1817, is credited with influencing later thinkers as diverse as Mohandas Ghandi, Martin Luther King, Jr, Leo Tolstoy, and Frank Lloyd Wright. In 1844, Thoreau climbed Mt Greylock at least partly on a route that is now the Bellows Pipe Trail. A few things we learned:

The Bellows Pipe Trail is in land once owned by Jeremiah Wilbur, who arrived in 1767, on a donkey.  Over time, Jeremiah acquired land stretching from the intersection of today’s Notch and Reservoir roads to the summit of Mt Greylock. He pastured cattle at the top of the mountain in summers, and operated a grist mill, a saw mill, and a maple sugaring operation, among other ventures.

Cellar hole from Eddy house on Bellows Pipe Trail. Hard to see amid summer greenery, it’s the depression behind the tree trunks and jewelweed.

At the time Henry David Thoreau walked the trail (1844), there was a house standing approximately at the red X on the map below.  The cellar hole is still there.  Thoreau wrote of meeting a young woman there, combing her hair in the yard. Her name was (most likely) Rebecca Darling Eddy, which discovery our interpreter attributed to local historian, Sue Denault.

Aerial photo from Google showing Notch Reservoir, Bellows Pipe Trail, and a little red x at the approximate location of the foundation of the former Eddie farm house.

Landing area (one of four) emphasized with red "L", on published operations map for the 2024 logging plan

Incidentally, the logging plan stopped in 2024 called for a landing area at roughly this same location. That particular landing area was not marked on the ground, so it is impossible to know whether it would have respected the foundation hole, or to what degree it would have changed the topography at the intersection of the old farm road with the current Bellows Pipe Trail. But we can say with confidence that a landing area for logging is, categorically, disrespectful of historical artifacts.