A Hiker’s History of the Appalachian Trail with Mills Kelly, Author and A.T. Historian (Ep 82, Pt 2)
November 18, 2025 • 41 mins
The Appalachian Trail is more than a footpath - it’s a living piece of American history. Stretching over 2,000 miles from Georgia to Maine, the A.T. winds through some of Virginia’s most beautiful and rugged landscapes. But have you ever wondered how this legendary trail came to be, and who the dreamers, builders, and hikers were that shaped it?
We’re hiking through history with someone who knows the Appalachian Trail like few others do. My friend, Mills Kelly, is a historian, archivist, podcast host, lifelong hiker, and author of the new book, A Hiker’s History of the Appalachian Trail. His book captures the A.T.’s history, not just as a collection of facts and dates, but as a human story about purpose, adventure, and our search for meaning in the mountains.
Mills shares fascinating stories from the trail’s early days and how it has changed over the past century. And when you think about how far we’ve come - from hikers in wool suits carrying canvas packs filled with fresh produce, to today’s ultralight gear and freeze-dried meals - it’s amazing to see how the trail has evolved right alongside us.
Mills reminds us that the A.T. wasn’t built for heroic end-to-end treks, but for ordinary people to breathe easier and feel a little wilder for a few hours or a few days. That simple idea still shapes lives, towns, and trail culture across Virginia and beyond.
The story of the Appalachian Trail is as much about the people and their experiences as it is about the path beneath their feet. So join us as we hike back through time on the world’s most iconic long-distance trail. Let’s Go!
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Episode 43. Virginia’s Lost Appalachian Trail with Mills Kelly
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Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
From the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Chesapeake Bay,
Virginia is a Mecca for outdoortravel and adventure.
Virginia Outdoor AdventuresPodcast is your local guide for
hiking, camping, kayaking,travel, and so much more.
Get the information and theinspiration to plan your own
adventure.
Right here in Virginia.
(00:22):
I'm your host, Jessica Bowser.
The Appalachian Trail is morethan a footpath.
It's a living piece of Americanhistory.
Stretching over 2,000 miles fromGeorgia to Maine, the AT winds
through some of Virginia's mostbeautiful and rugged landscapes.
But have you ever wondered howthis legendary trail came to be
and who the dreamers, builders,and hikers were that shaped it?
(00:46):
We're hiking through historywith someone who knows the
Appalachian Trail like a fewothers do.
My friend Mills Kelly is ahistorian, archivist, podcast
host, lifelong hiker, and authorof the new book, A Hiker's
History of the AppalachianTrail.
His book captures the 80shistory not just as a collection
of facts and dates, but as ahuman story about purpose,
(01:09):
adventure, and our search formeaning in the mountains.
Mill shares fascinating storiesfrom the trail's early days and
how it has changed over the pastcentury.
And when you think about how farwe've come, from hikers in wool
suits carrying canvas packsfilled with fresh produce, to
today's ultralight gear andfreeze-dried meals, it's amazing
(01:30):
to see how the trail has evolvedright alongside us.
Mills reminds us that the ATwasn't built for heroic
end-to-end tracks, but forordinary people to breathe
easier and feel a little wilderfor a few hours or a few days.
That simple idea still shapeslives, towns, and trail culture
across Virginia and beyond.
(01:51):
The story of the AppalachianTrail is as much about the
people and their experiences asit is about the path beneath
their feet.
So join us as we hike backthrough time on the world's most
iconic long-distance trail.
Let's go! This is part two of atwo-part episode.
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How has the trail shaped smalltowns throughout Virginia?
SPEAKER_00 (03:18):
Yeah, you know, it's really a great question because
Makai, when he proposed thetrail, that was not one of his
interests.
He really didn't think of it ofthe trail as an economic engine
for rural America.
But it turned into thatbeginning in the 1960s when
hiking really took off.
Before that, you know, I mean,people who own the local store
(03:38):
or the local cheeseburger placewere happy to see a few hikers,
but that's what they saw was afew hikers.
Um now they're tr they're smalltowns that are just, you know,
they're entirely oriented aroundthe hiking community.
Damascus, Virginia is probablythe most famous of those because
they have the Trail DaysFestival every year in May,
where thousands of people come.
It's kind of like a NASCAR racefor them in terms of its
(04:00):
economic impact.
But all up and down the trail inVirginia, small towns have
really benefited from thepresence of the hikers, whether
they're just there for the day,the you know, the weekend, or
longer distance.
So, for instance, you know, Ilive in Linden, Virginia, just
outside of Fried.
And at the bottom of themountain from us is the Montre
store.
(04:20):
And it's just a little tinystore.
And uh, but if you go in, youcan tell that they're set up for
the hikers because you can buyPop Tarts, sleeves of Pop-Tarts,
not a whole box of Pop Tarts.
You can just buy an individualsleeve, you know, and and you
can buy oatmeal packets, notlike a whole box of instant
(04:42):
oatmeal packets.
And and um and they have paintedon the back of the building,
like you know, AppalachianTrail, and they have on Friday
nights, they often have abonfire out back to and to
encourage the hikers to come.
And and it's just about a milefrom the trailhead.
So it's a popular little stop.
And and you've been to that thatintersection, there's like
nothing there except there's auh like a vegetable stand across
(05:05):
the street in a post office, andthat's it.
Yeah, so so that little store itreally benefits from the
presence of hikers.
SPEAKER_01 (05:14):
I love that little store.
I stop in every time I'm in thatneighborhood.
SPEAKER_00 (05:18):
Yeah, they have a great cat.
They have a wonderful cat.
So it's that's the that's likethe smallest example, but and
Damascus is probably the thebiggest example, but really all
up and down the trail.
And and I don't know how longago the the officially
designated Appalachian TrailCommunity Program began with the
ATC.
(05:38):
But once that began, then thethe Appalachian Trail
Conservancy started reallyhelping towns like Front Royal
here where I am to become trailcommunities.
And they had to agree to youknow have a certain number of
services.
You should have a camping store,you should um provide shuttles
to hikers who want to come intotown.
But that really helps thesetowns uh which have struggled.
SPEAKER_01 (06:00):
Yes.
And you talked too in your bookabout how it wasn't just towns,
but sometimes individualfamilies who didn't even know
that the AT was nearby wherethey lived until hikers started
appearing and what that meantfor them to, you know, start
offering lodging and food andand shuttle services and
different things that hikersneeded.
SPEAKER_00 (06:19):
You know, before Airbnb was something that people
said in, you know, in the samethey said Airbnb in the same
sentence.
The trail guides, going backinto the 1930s, they listed the
names of people who would takein hikers and as boarders,
overnight boarders.
And so like I can remember, youknow, reading there was a
family, the Reed family down inSouthwest Virginia, who would
(06:41):
and it was great because there'sa five-digit phone number in
those days.
And you know, you call CaledusReed, and he or his wife would
come pick you up and take you totheir house.
And for a dollar or a dollarfifty, you get dinner, you get
to spend the night, and then yougot breakfast, and then they
took you back to the trail.
And they did that because adollar fifty was a lot in the
Great Depression.
SPEAKER_01 (07:00):
Really interesting.
And you were also saying that alot of the shelter logs, that
some of the notes that peopleleft in there was about who was
friendly to hikers and wherethey could find lodging and
where they could find mealsbased on who they had come
across in the past.
So they were basically passingon that information to other
hikers.
SPEAKER_00 (07:18):
Yeah.
And like who was making applebrandy out in the barn without a
license, you know, to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (07:24):
That's where I would have gone.
Yeah.
And I think also this is whatmade your last book so
interesting when you talkedabout Virginia's lost
Appalachian Trail, is how thetrail was such became an
economic driver and what itmeant to the communities in
Virginia when the trail gotrerouted, right?
Because then the the towns hadstarted to rely on hikers coming
(07:46):
in no longer had that anymoreand what that meant for them.
SPEAKER_00 (07:50):
Yeah, I mean, it was very painful for them to have
the trail rooted away.
And it would be today if thatwere, you know, if that were the
case.
And uh it's been a littlecontroversial in Maine because
the trail used to run rightthrough the town of Monson,
Maine, which is at the beginningof the hundred mile wilderness,
the last hundred miles beforeyou get to the northern terminus
at Katain.
(08:10):
And just several years ago, theConservancy rooted the trail,
and the Maine Appalachian TrailClub root rooted the trail
around the town on the premisethat they want the trail to be
as wild as possible instead ofgoing through town.
And that was really hard on themerchants in in this little tiny
town of Monson who for decadeshad been, you know, supporting
(08:31):
the hikers as they headed offinto the hundred mile wilderness
and uh or as they staggered outif they were southbounders.
And so they were kind of unhappyabout it.
And uh and so they've uh lastsomebody told me recently, they
put up signs like here's how youget into town.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
I think I'm gonna drop a link in the show notes to
that previous episode where youtalked about Virginia's lost
Appalachian Trail.
So if anyone wants to learnmore, check your show notes and
click that link.
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I would love to talk about howfolks can get on the AT and you
(10:16):
know any tips and advice youhave there.
But before we do, I want to takejust a couple of minutes to
discuss how the AT became acultural icon and its current
challenges, but in particular,how hikers can give back or even
pay it forward today.
So today we think about the ATas a global icon and people from
(10:36):
around the world come to hikeit.
So what do you think has drivenits rise in popularity?
SPEAKER_00 (10:42):
I think that the tremendous popularity of the
Appalachian Trail today isheavily influenced by social
media, you know, the existenceof smartphones, because that
made it possible to really showthe trail to a global audience
in a in a very kind of instantway.
That's kind of like the cherryon top in many ways, because it
had been that popularity hadbeen building for decades.
(11:04):
There was this kind of a mediaecosystem around the trail,
people writing books and shortdocumentaries and things like
that.
And um, and then in 1996, BillBryson published um A Walk in
the Woods, which was a runawaybestseller.
And that really brought thetrail to the attention of a much
larger audience.
And then, you know, RobertRedford made a movie about it.
(11:26):
Terrible movie, but you know,they made a movie about it, and
that expanded the knowledge ofthe trail even more.
And there is has been this kindof media ecosystem around the
trail over the years.
And, you know, and some famoushikers like Emma Gatewood,
Grandma Gatewood, they, youknow, they bring a lot of
attention to the trail.
And so it's just been kind ofbuilding over time.
(11:49):
What's especially interestingabout the Appalachian Trail is
that it's the only national parkthat is run entirely by
volunteers.
SPEAKER_01 (11:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (11:58):
You know, I mean, there there is it, there is a
superintendent, uh, NationalPark Service superintendent of
the of the park, because everynational park has a
superintendent, and they're twoaccountable two law enforcement
rangers for the whole 2,197miles.
SPEAKER_01 (12:13):
Amazing.
SPEAKER_00 (12:14):
Um, which also tells you it's a very safe place
because they only need two.
As a you know, sheltermaintainer, we have to abide by
various um park serviceregulations and um about you
know building codes and thingslike that.
And when the government shutdown recently, we had to stand
down as volunteers briefly untilwe got a ruling on whether the
insurance that covers us wasstill in effect.
(12:36):
It was, so we could go back tovolunteering.
So it is a relationship with thefederal government, but the
Appalachian Trail Conservancyloosely oversees, coordinates,
really is a better way to putit, 30 plus trail clubs who each
have a section of the trail thatthey take care of.
Um, so there are thousands andthousands of people every year
who volunteer on the trail andtell their friends about it.
(12:58):
And and they're proud of thatservice.
So that really helps a lot too.
SPEAKER_01 (13:02):
Earlier you mentioned that places like
McAfee Knob here in Virginiawere dealing with overcrowding
and littering, and we still seethose problems today.
So, what can be done to balanceaccess with preservation?
SPEAKER_00 (13:16):
Yeah, it's a that's a constant debate.
It's a been a debate in theAppalachian Trail community
since the 1970s, really.
Um before Leave No Trace becamea thing, littering was really
common everywhere in in theUnited States.
I'm old enough to remember it.
And the amount of litter andjust kind of destruction of
things like shelters and picnictables and things like that was
(13:38):
getting out of hand.
And a number of the trailvolunteers started advocating
for the removal of all the trailshelters as a way of cutting
down on the vandalism and trashand partying and all that.
And uh fortunately, it wasn't amajority of trail volunteers who
felt that way.
It was more like say 30%.
But there was a seriousdiscussion about whether to
(13:59):
remove all of those shelters,and out of that discussion came
efforts between the trail clubs,the ATC, the forest US Forest
Service, the CR Club, and othersto develop a set of wilderness
ethics guidelines, which todaywe call leave no trace, and the
ridge runner system along theAppalachian Trail with paid
employees of the ATC who go upand down the trail and help
(14:20):
people and advise them aboutwilderness ethics and and not
littering.
You know, but I would say thatthe biggest thing that can be
done is if you're out on thetrail and you see a piece of
litter, pick it up.
And if you see someone drop apiece of litter, you can just
say, hey, you dropped something.
Not not like, hey, what's wrongwith you?
You don't have to confront them.
(14:40):
You know, you can just say, Oh,you dropped your water bottle.
Like, of course you would wantto pick that up and they pick it
up immediately because they knowthey're not supposed to do that.
Uh uh, the one thing that drivesme completely insane is the dog
poop bags.
Yes.
Because and on our podcast, youknow, I had a discussion with
the Smithsonian's uhconservation biology center
small mammal expert.
(15:01):
So he's like the guy.
And and he's works for theNational Zoo in the Smithsonian,
he knows it all.
And and I asked him, I said, Isit okay to take a stick and just
flick your dog's poop off intothe woods?
And he said, Absolutely it is.
It's totally fine.
That dogs don't transferpathogens to other man mammal
species.
So yeah, just flick it off,which is better than taking your
(15:23):
little green dog poop bag,filling it up, and then setting
it down on the trail, which iswhat people do.
SPEAKER_01 (15:28):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (15:30):
Because they believe they believe that there is a dog
poop, a poop bag fairy, right,that flies flies down the trail
every night picking those thingsup, which there isn't.
SPEAKER_01 (15:38):
So yeah, and who wants to be the volunteer
picking up dog poop of allthings?
SPEAKER_00 (15:42):
Other people's dog poop, you know.
It's bad enough to pick up likeI hate doing it with my own
dogs.
It's worse if it's somebodyelse's dog.
So uh but so really if you seesomebody like fill up their
little dog poop bag and set itdown, you can say, well, you
know, there's not a poop bagfairy.
And so, but really, just if yousee a piece of litter, just pick
it up.
It's just not that hard.
It makes a big difference.
It all it all adds up.
(16:04):
Everything you pick up is oneless thing that other people
have to deal with.
SPEAKER_01 (16:09):
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Trail clubs have been around fora really long time.
What role do trail clubs playtoday?
SPEAKER_00 (18:22):
So the trail clubs are essential to the history of
the Appalachian Trail.
Several of the clubs predate thetrail.
The Appalachian Mountain Club,for instance, the Green Mountain
Club both predate the trails.
The Dartmouth Outing Club does.
These are all clubs that helpmaintain the AT, among many
other things that they do.
The Smoky Mountains Hiking Clubpredates the trail.
(18:43):
The Carolina Mountain Club does.
But most of the trail clubs wereformed, like the Potomac
Appalachian Trail Club here inNorthern Virginia, were formed
to build and then maintain theAppalachian Trail.
And that's what we do.
I mentioned I'm a trail, ashelter maintainer, so I take
care of the Manassa ScampShelter.
I go at least once a monthduring peak hiking season, more
like twice a month.
(19:04):
I pick up trash, I clean theprivy.
If something's broken, I fix it.
SPEAKER_01 (19:08):
We cut out invasive species.
Remember, you put me to work.
You were like, here's a saw, gostart cutting tree of heaven.
SPEAKER_00 (19:14):
That's right.
That's right.
We remove a lot of tree ofheaven, a lot of garlic mustard
plants, uh, you know, thingslike that.
So, you know, we do all thosethings.
Um, but also, and I've been atrail maintainer, not on the AT,
but on some trails in the PrinceWilliam Forest Park that the
PATC cares for, you know, you uhit's mostly erosion control and
uh making sure the trail's noteroding away.
(19:36):
And but trail clubs buildbridges, they put up signs along
directional signs along thetrail.
They they they really make itpossible for the trail to be as
accessible as possible to asmany people as possible.
SPEAKER_01 (19:47):
From your perspective as a historian,
Mills, what do you think BettonMackay, the trail's founder,
would say about the AT today?
SPEAKER_00 (19:56):
So that's a great question because um Mackay was
incredibly proud that his ideabecame this big deal because he
lived into the 1970s.
He was 95 years old when hedied.
And so by the time he died, thetrail had become very popular,
and he was really proud of that.
And he also liked beingconsidered the founding father,
(20:17):
you know, gave him some personalsatisfaction to be kind of a
celebrity, but he also had akind of mixed feeling about the
way the trail ultimatelydeveloped because he wanted it
to be a truly wilderness trail.
And other people who werebuilding the trail, like uh
Myron Avery with the ATC and thePATC, they wanted it to be a
(20:40):
completed trail.
And if that meant road walking,if that meant being close to a
road, that was okay with thembecause that would get the trail
done.
And Makai was kind ofscandalized by that because you
know, if you're walking down thetrail and you can hear cars,
well, that's not a wildernessexperience.
And so in the 1930s, he andAvery actually had a big falling
(21:01):
out.
Makai kind of self-exiledhimself from Appalachian Trail
until after Avery's death.
And the um and he went off witha couple of other people to form
the Wilderness Society, whichwas much more focused on
preserving truly wild places.
On the one hand, he would be, Ithink, really thrilled to see
how popular his trail had becomeand how many people used it
every year because the originalintent was was being realized.
(21:25):
And on the other hand, I thinkhe would be a little
disappointed by um howcommercialized it's become.
How many people hike on thetrail as a way of promoting
their businesses and theirbrands.
And he actually, in his originalproposal in 1921, he warned
about that.
He used that he used a 1921 termYegmen, Y-E-G-G M-E-N, which I
(21:48):
had to look up.
I'd never heard that one before.
And it really means kind of ascam artist and uh and like a
snake oil salesman.
And so he would have been um, Ithink, really scandalized by the
number of people who used thetrail to promote a personal
brand.
SPEAKER_01 (22:02):
Gosh, that one just hit home because I see that
happening so often.
And yeah, wow.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00 (22:09):
Yeah, I mean, there was like there was a couple a
few years ago who threw hike,they wore purple the whole time,
and and they played music, theykeep backpacked with guitars,
and they are promoting theirCDs, their or their you know,
music, you know, stream ourstream our music.
SPEAKER_01 (22:24):
Yeah, or social media influencers who are using
it to get attention, to get morelikes and follows on their pages
and YouTube.
SPEAKER_00 (22:31):
And here's the thing he yeah, and here's the thing he
really would not have beenimpressed by was people who are
going after the fastest knowntime.
Oh yeah.
He was he was fond of sayingthat he wanted to give an award
to the person who took thelongest to hike the trail.
He said this over and over andover because he said if you walk
slowly, then you're trulyobserving nature.
(22:52):
If you're trying to get from oneplace to another really fast,
you're missing the whole point.
SPEAKER_01 (22:57):
Yes, I couldn't agree more with him.
SPEAKER_00 (22:59):
Yeah, he would have hated that.
SPEAKER_01 (23:01):
I think that there are plenty of people who would
love to hear some practicaladvice and inspiration for
experiencing the AT forthemselves.
Now, let's start by just sayingthat Virginia has more miles of
the AT than any other state.
Why is that significant forhikers in Virginia?
SPEAKER_00 (23:18):
Well, because it means that you know there are
525 or so miles of the 2,000plus miles are in Virginia, a
little over a quarter of thetrail.
So that means that wherever youlive in the Commonwealth, you
have reasonable access to thetrail.
I mean, if you're in, you know,Chesapeake, Virginia, the trail
is a ways.
Yeah, sure is.
(24:12):
That's what you need.
That's the extent of yourequipment.
You know, you want the bug spraybecause you don't want ticks or
biting insects.
And and um you want to dress forthe weather because anytime you
go hiking, you want to dress forthe weather and you have to have
water because don't drink thewater you find on the trail
unless you can purify it.
And that's all you need.
SPEAKER_01 (24:30):
And and we're not talking about hiking the entire
distance of the AT through thestate of through the
Commonwealth of Virginia, excuseme.
Like this was meant to beaccessible to everybody for day
hikes, a couple of hours, forexample.
Like it doesn't need to be asection hike.
SPEAKER_00 (24:48):
Yeah, no, it doesn't.
So that's the first thing.
And then the second is um, youknow, if you want to go further,
the easiest way to do that is togo with another friend who also
has their car, and you park onecar at one end and the other car
at the other end, and you hiketo the other car, and then you
drive back and get the firstcar.
And so, you know, you could do10 miles in a day and but have a
(25:09):
car waiting for you at the otherend.
And um, so that's also easy.
I mean, there are very fewsections of the trail in
Virginia that are reallyphysically challenging.
There's some for sure.
SPEAKER_01 (25:22):
There are some, yes, definitely.
SPEAKER_00 (25:24):
There are some for sure.
But like in Shenandoah NationalPark, um, which encompasses
about a hundred plus miles ofthe trail, you know, there's
definitely some uphillstretches, but they're not
killers.
And so um, if you're evenreasonably fit, it's just not
that hard.
And and so, and you don't needto go out and invest in special
clothing, special boots, that'sthat sort of thing.
(25:45):
I mean, through hikers hike intrail runners.
Yeah, many.
They they don't wear boots andum they just mostly wear trail
runners.
So I see people hiking in inTevas.
So it's uh you really don't needsuper specialized equipment.
And the trail is just reallyinviting in that sense.
SPEAKER_01 (26:03):
Do you have any favorite sections of the trail?
And then I also would love toknow, because we just talked
about challenging sections, whatthose challenging sections are,
because I know a lot of them arereally popular, and I don't want
anybody to get caught up in theall trails craze of oh,
everybody's doing this hike, andthen they realize it's too
difficult.
SPEAKER_00 (26:22):
There are a couple of really challenging sections.
Um, anything in the GraysonHighlands has the potential to
be very challenging.
And uh, I mean, there's sectionsin the Grayson Highlands that
are not so bad.
Uh, they can be bad from aweather standpoint.
Like I walked from Massy Gap tothe uh partnership shelter on to
on Mount Rogers because I wantedto go to the summit of Mount
Rogers.
(26:42):
And the hike itself wasn't allthat hard.
What was bad was I had earlyOctober and I experienced every
single weather that you couldexperience.
SPEAKER_01 (26:49):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (26:50):
I had sun, I had fog, I had rain, I had sleet, I
had snow, I had thunder andlightning, I had heavy winds,
all in the space of like sixhours.
SPEAKER_01 (26:58):
I've I've been there done that.
SPEAKER_00 (27:00):
Yeah.
So um, and it was a wonderfulhike.
I loved it, but if I hadn't hadthe appropriate clothes, I would
have been really sad.
I could have gottenhyperthermia, you know.
So um, so but but there'sstretches in the Grayson
Highlands that are very up anddown, and um, so that's hard.
The three ridges in um along theThai River, it depends on which
(27:20):
direction you're going.
Um, if you start, if you'regoing southbound and and you
start at at the sort of northend of the three ridges
wilderness, then you walk downthe three ridges, and that's not
so bad.
If you if you start at the ThaiRiver and go the other way, it's
really challenging because it'syou know, it's in many of it's
like a 30-35% grade, and um it'snot well switchbacked.
(27:44):
And so that's really hard.
Um, the priest um is a reallypopular hike to hike from it's
one the other the other way fromthe three ridges and um from the
Thai River.
And there are something like 95switchbacks on your way up to
the summit of the priest, and uhand it's about a 2,000-foot
gain, 2,500 foot gain.
And um, so that's for the fit.
(28:05):
And uh that is a hike for thefit.
Um it's a beautiful hike, butit's it's definitely for fitter
people.
So, you know, so there arestretches like that, and it's
it's advisable to as you'relooking at a section of the
trail, you have to know your ownpersonal fitness and you know
how you feel about hiking uphillor downhill, and then you can
get an elevation profile of anystretch of the trail.
(28:26):
They're all available online,and so you can say, Oh, oh, I
see that's like really steepright there.
So I'll skip that part um ifthat's what you want to do.
Um, those are those are some ofthe more challenging parts.
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delivery.
Now, you Mills are fond of solohiking, I happen to know.
What advice would you give tosolo hikers, especially those
exploring the AT for the firsttime?
SPEAKER_00 (29:37):
Yes, I love to hike by myself.
For me, it's a kind ofmeditation.
And uh, and my wife worriesabout that because I'm a little
klutzy and I fall down, andshe's always worried I'm gonna
fall and like break a leg orsomething.
SPEAKER_01 (29:48):
I love the way you walk, it's so enjoyable to walk
behind you and what and likejust watch your gate.
It's it's so interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (29:55):
I I don't lift my feet as much as I should, and so
I trip over things, but what Itell My wife, all the time, is
that with the exception of acouple of stretches of the AT in
Virginia down in the south, theAppalachian Trail is really a
highway, and um there are lotsand lots of people out there.
And so if I did fall and break aleg, probably within a couple of
hours, and no matter what,within 24 hours, somebody would
(30:17):
walk by and find me.
And so, um, but also most of thetrail now has cell coverage,
most of the trail.
And there are plenty of sectionsthat don't.
Even in Shenandoah NationalPark, there are a few stretches
that don't.
Like the face that face the eastface of the mountains in
Shenandoah National Park,especially around Madison
(30:39):
County, um, there just aren'tcell towers down below.
Um, and so you don't get cellservice on the east side of
Skyline Drive.
But if you cross over to thewest side of Skyline Drive, then
you're picking up all the celltowers in the Shenandoah Valley.
And so you have great service,like you know, like you're in
Northern Virginia.
So cell phones work generallyreally well too.
Um but the other thing is, andthis is really important, is
(31:02):
that if you're gonna go hike byyourself, tell someone what
route you're going to take, andthen stick to that route.
Many is the time that I've beenhiking by myself that I saw what
looked like a much moreinteresting route that I wanted
to take, but I had told eithermy wife or my kids, this is the
route that I'm going to be on.
And so I didn't deviate.
(31:23):
I just made a note that the nexttime I go here, I want to go the
other way.
Absolutely, if you don't showup, they know where to look for
you.
SPEAKER_01 (31:28):
I know that you and I both believe that making
connections with nature and inthis case with the trail is
super important for all of ustoday and making connections
even from the past to thepurpose of the trail today.
So in your book, you write aboutthe AT as a place where people
(31:49):
find solutions to whatever ailsthem.
What does that mean to youpersonally?
SPEAKER_00 (31:54):
I'm retired now, so my life is a lot less stressful
than it than it was up untilFebruary of this year.
But, you know, I mean, I've hada lot of different kinds of jobs
that were pretty stressful.
And so for me to be able to goout into the forest and just
decompress has has beenessential.
And whether it was here, youknow, along the Appalachian
Trail or we've lived in avariety of different places
(32:18):
where I had to go find parks todo that.
You know, the Japanese have thisconcept of forest bathing.
And um, which you would think islike, oh, it's Japanese, so it's
an ancient thing, but it's not,it's a much more recent
phenomenon.
There's a lot of work incognitive science to show that
forest bathing actually doeswhat people think it does, which
is it reduces your stresslevels, it you know, just sort
(32:40):
of calms you in general, itleads to sort of better
cardiovascular health.
It's just in general, it's justreally good for you.
And so that's what it's meantfor me.
Um, for a lot of people,especially long distance hikers,
um, going out on the AppalachianTrail was also an opportunity to
either redefine themselves,become a different person than
(33:00):
the one they were, or to managea life transition.
And my my friend Dips, who Imentioned before, in her case,
it was a recent divorce.
You know, she had to kind offigure out like who am I going
to be now?
And um, she didn't want to be adifferent person, but it was
more like how am I going tonavigate the new version of my
life.
And it really helped her withthat.
And other people, you know, it'sthey've retired or they've lost
(33:23):
a job or they've had a death inthe family or whatever.
And in the case of EarlSchaefer, the first through
hiker, he lost his best friendin the Battle of Okinawa.
Um, he was killed in a foxhole afew feet away.
And and uh Schaefer couldn't getover it.
And and so, and he tried avariety of things, and that was
before we had the idea of PTSD,but for sure that's what he had.
(33:45):
And he finally decided that whathe was going to do was, as he
put it, walk the war out of mysystem.
He decided to start walking inin Georgia and walk to Maine,
and he figured by the time hegot to Maine, he would be
better, and he was.
Wasn't cured, but he was better.
SPEAKER_01 (34:02):
And this was before Forrest Gump came along, too.
So nobody was thinking about itat then.
Um yeah, but this concept ofredefining yourself or studying
personal challenges and goalsthat you can conquer and what
that means for your mentalhealth and your physical health.
It's um it's significant for alot of people.
So you have been studying andhiking the AT for many, many
(34:27):
years.
What continues to draw you backto the trail?
SPEAKER_00 (34:30):
Um, well, for me, I mean, it's just been so much a
part of my life since I wasyoung.
But it was, uh and I would say,you know, I had kind of a, on
the one hand, I had a verystable childhood.
My parents stayed marriedforever.
They were married 59 years.
Uh, we lived in the same housepretty much my whole life.
So outwardly pretty stable, butinwardly it wasn't so stable.
(34:50):
My mother had narcissisticpersonality disorder, my father
drank and traveled, and and um,so my home, and I was an only
child, so I kind of got thebrunt of all of it.
And so going off into the forestwas a way to get away from all
of that craziness in the house.
And uh, and so the woods becamemy happy place where none of
that mattered.
And um, you know, my parentswere very loving, they just had
(35:12):
their own problems, and uh sothe uh the forest was like I
say, it was just it was my happyplace and it has maintained that
status in my life.
You know, so if I lived on theon the west coast, I'd be
hiking, you know, the ColoradoTrail or the Pacific Crest Trail
or something else.
I just I just really uh it justgives me peace.
And so that's what keepsbringing me back.
SPEAKER_01 (35:33):
Mills, in your opinion, how can history deepen
our appreciation for the trailthat we hike today?
SPEAKER_00 (35:38):
The Appalachian Trail is a trail that runs
through a part of Virginia thathas been inhabited for thousands
of years.
It's very difficult to findevidence of the indigenous
presence along the trail.
I mean, you really would have tobe an expert to find it.
However, most of those oldabandoned roads that we talked
(36:00):
about earlier, uh, many of them,maybe not most, but many of them
were laid down by colonialsettlers over old indigenous
trails, because indigenouspeople were really good at
picking out a route for a trailthat was sheltered from the
weather and, you know, and tookadvantage of the contours in the
land.
And so a lot of the trail thatwe walk on today is on top of
(36:21):
old roads built by colonialsettlers, which were built on
top of paths carved outthousands of years ago by
indigenous people.
So as you're walking on thetrail, you can think about it in
that sense that there are allthese layers of history that
you're walking through.
And then, especially here innorthern Virginia, the trail
north of Shenandoah NationalPark, uh, up to Harper's Ferry,
(36:41):
a lot of that section of thetrail was part of the
Underground Railroad.
You know, the UndergroundRailroad is not well mapped in
any way.
But like I live on Blue Mountainhere in Linden, and there's some
kind of vague maps of therailroad uh that show it going
right up here over thismountain.
And so it's probable that you'realso, if you're in northern
Virginia anyway, you know,you're walking on the same
(37:03):
routes that people took, fleeingenslavement.
And you know, you can seeespecially not so much in
Virginia, but in Maryland, youcan see Civil War fortifications
and and um so you know, Americanhistory is just sort of there in
layers and layers all along thetrail.
And so understanding that kindof deep rootedness of the
history, um, I think really uhenhances our appreciation of the
(37:26):
place that we're walking.
SPEAKER_01 (37:27):
Where can listeners find your new book, A Hiker's
History of the AppalachianTrail?
SPEAKER_00 (37:32):
It is everywhere you might want to look for a book,
um, you know, all the onlineplatforms and that kind of
thing.
But I will say that I am a hugesupporter of woman-owned
independent bookstores,independent bookstores in
general, and I'm especially afan of women-owned independent
bookstores.
And so if you go to my website,MillsKelly.net, I have on the
homepage uh links to threedifferent um bookstores that I
(37:54):
happen to love.
The thing that I didn't knowuntil I published my first book
about the trail um is thatthere's an organization called
bookshop.org.
It's a nonprofit that um thathelps independent bookstores
make money on book sales.
And so if you have anindependent bookstore in your
community that you that youpatronize, that you support,
(38:14):
just go to bookshop.org andsearch the name of that store
and it will take you to theirquote unquote shop on the
platform.
And then you search Hiker'sHistory of the Appalachian
Trail.
And and when you purchase it,they get they actually get a lot
of the sale price and from that.
And um and and I'll say I getlike 25 cents more than I would
(38:36):
get if you bought it throughAmazon.
So not a ton more, but a littlebit more.
And um it all adds up, right?
It all adds up, yeah.
So um, but mostly what's reallyimportant about that is
supporting our independentbookstores.
SPEAKER_01 (38:48):
I just recently became familiar with that
website because another one ofmy guests who talked about
mushroom foraging, she has abook that just came out and she
recommends it too.
So I started looking on there,I'm like, this is fantastic.
You know, like it's sometimeshard to get to your independent
bookseller, like you have tomake the extra trip, and you
know, maybe there's not onenearby, depending on where you
(39:09):
live.
You hop right on there andyou're still supporting those
small local shops.
SPEAKER_00 (39:13):
Right, right.
And it could be a shop that youknow you used to go to when you
were a teenager and it's stillthere, um, you know, in a part
of the state that you used tolive in and or a part of the
country.
And so, yeah, bookshop.org isone of my most favorite
platforms.
SPEAKER_01 (39:28):
And becoming mine too.
How else can listeners connectwith you?
SPEAKER_00 (39:33):
I'm, you know, of course, all over social media.
Instagram is probably the bestway.
Um I'm telly7029 on Instagram.
That was the what was availablewhen I set up my Instagram.
So t Kelly7029.
Um uh on Facebook, you know, I'mthere under Mills Kelly.
And um, and then, you know, onmy website, uh Mills Kelly.net.
(39:54):
Those are all the best ways tofind me.
SPEAKER_01 (39:56):
And is your podcast still available?
SPEAKER_00 (39:58):
It is.
So our podcast, the Green TunnelPodcast, which has 50 episodes
on the history of theAppalachian Trail, is still
fully available.
Um, you know, we finished theshow, we did kind of the whole
history and then we stopped anduh last year.
And um, and so you can justsearch the Green Tunnel podcast
on any of the podcast platformsyou might use, and it's easily
findable.
(40:19):
Or the website um for the studiowhere it was produced is R2,
like like the number R and thenumber two, studios.org.
SPEAKER_01 (40:28):
Fantastic.
I put we'll put links to all ofthose things in the show notes
so people can find them easily.
Mills, thank you so much forcoming back on Virginia Outdoor
Adventures to talk about yourlove and passion for the
Appalachian Trail.
I wonder how many other peoplehave as much knowledge and
information about the ATE as youhave, Mills.
SPEAKER_00 (40:47):
Not many.
I know one for sure, Brian King,um, who was the longtime
publicist of the AppalachianTrail Conservancy.
He still knows about 10 timesmore than than I do, but but I'm
getting up there.
SPEAKER_01 (40:58):
Well, I think we are super lucky to have you here in
Virginia.
SPEAKER_00 (41:01):
Thanks so much, and thanks so much for having me on
the show.
It's a real pleasure.
SPEAKER_01 (41:04):
Absolutely.
Thank you for being a guest,Adventure On.
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listeners like you, which is whyyour messages and feedback mean
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(41:25):
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(41:47):
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Thanks for listening.
Until next time, adventure on.
From the Blue Ridge Mountains to the Chesapeake Bay,
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Virginia Outdoor AdventuresPodcast is your local guide for
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Get the information and theinspiration to plan your own
adventure.
Right here in Virginia.
(00:22):
I'm your host, Jessica Bowser.
The Appalachian Trail is morethan a footpath.
It's a living piece of Americanhistory.
Stretching over 2,000 miles fromGeorgia to Maine, the AT winds
through some of Virginia's mostbeautiful and rugged landscapes.
But have you ever wondered howthis legendary trail came to be
and who the dreamers, builders,and hikers were that shaped it?
(00:46):
We're hiking through historywith someone who knows the
Appalachian Trail like a fewothers do.
My friend Mills Kelly is ahistorian, archivist, podcast
host, lifelong hiker, and authorof the new book, A Hiker's
History of the AppalachianTrail.
His book captures the 80shistory not just as a collection
of facts and dates, but as ahuman story about purpose,
(01:09):
adventure, and our search formeaning in the mountains.
Mill shares fascinating storiesfrom the trail's early days and
how it has changed over the pastcentury.
And when you think about how farwe've come, from hikers in wool
suits carrying canvas packsfilled with fresh produce, to
today's ultralight gear andfreeze-dried meals, it's amazing
(01:30):
to see how the trail has evolvedright alongside us.
Mills reminds us that the ATwasn't built for heroic
end-to-end tracks, but forordinary people to breathe
easier and feel a little wilderfor a few hours or a few days.
That simple idea still shapeslives, towns, and trail culture
across Virginia and beyond.
(01:51):
The story of the AppalachianTrail is as much about the
people and their experiences asit is about the path beneath
their feet.
So join us as we hike backthrough time on the world's most
iconic long-distance trail.
Let's go! This is part two of atwo-part episode.
Virginia Outdoor Adventures issponsored by Brakes Park and
(02:15):
Heart of Appalachia.
Known as the Grand Canyon of theSouth, Brakes Park is a hiking
destination in the Heart ofAppalachia.
You'll find trails for everyskill level featuring geologic
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Stay close to the adventure withlodges, cabins, and campgrounds
(02:36):
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Beyond the breaks, the heart ofAppalachia invites you to hike
and bike through breathtakingmountain landscapes, paddle
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hop on an ATV to conquer therugged spearhead trails.
Take a scenic drive, embark onan elk tour, and explore
Virginia's treasured southwest,where you'll also find vibrant
(02:59):
local dining, shopping, andcelebrations.
Your next outdoor adventurestarts in the heart of
Appalachia.
Tap the links for Brakes Parkand Heart of Appalachia in your
show notes.
How has the trail shaped smalltowns throughout Virginia?
SPEAKER_00 (03:18):
Yeah, you know, it's really a great question because
Makai, when he proposed thetrail, that was not one of his
interests.
He really didn't think of it ofthe trail as an economic engine
for rural America.
But it turned into thatbeginning in the 1960s when
hiking really took off.
Before that, you know, I mean,people who own the local store
(03:38):
or the local cheeseburger placewere happy to see a few hikers,
but that's what they saw was afew hikers.
Um now they're tr they're smalltowns that are just, you know,
they're entirely oriented aroundthe hiking community.
Damascus, Virginia is probablythe most famous of those because
they have the Trail DaysFestival every year in May,
where thousands of people come.
It's kind of like a NASCAR racefor them in terms of its
(04:00):
economic impact.
But all up and down the trail inVirginia, small towns have
really benefited from thepresence of the hikers, whether
they're just there for the day,the you know, the weekend, or
longer distance.
So, for instance, you know, Ilive in Linden, Virginia, just
outside of Fried.
And at the bottom of themountain from us is the Montre
store.
(04:20):
And it's just a little tinystore.
And uh, but if you go in, youcan tell that they're set up for
the hikers because you can buyPop Tarts, sleeves of Pop-Tarts,
not a whole box of Pop Tarts.
You can just buy an individualsleeve, you know, and and you
can buy oatmeal packets, notlike a whole box of instant
(04:42):
oatmeal packets.
And and um and they have paintedon the back of the building,
like you know, AppalachianTrail, and they have on Friday
nights, they often have abonfire out back to and to
encourage the hikers to come.
And and it's just about a milefrom the trailhead.
So it's a popular little stop.
And and you've been to that thatintersection, there's like
nothing there except there's auh like a vegetable stand across
(05:05):
the street in a post office, andthat's it.
Yeah, so so that little store itreally benefits from the
presence of hikers.
SPEAKER_01 (05:14):
I love that little store.
I stop in every time I'm in thatneighborhood.
SPEAKER_00 (05:18):
Yeah, they have a great cat.
They have a wonderful cat.
So it's that's the that's likethe smallest example, but and
Damascus is probably the thebiggest example, but really all
up and down the trail.
And and I don't know how longago the the officially
designated Appalachian TrailCommunity Program began with the
ATC.
(05:38):
But once that began, then thethe Appalachian Trail
Conservancy started reallyhelping towns like Front Royal
here where I am to become trailcommunities.
And they had to agree to youknow have a certain number of
services.
You should have a camping store,you should um provide shuttles
to hikers who want to come intotown.
But that really helps thesetowns uh which have struggled.
SPEAKER_01 (06:00):
Yes.
And you talked too in your bookabout how it wasn't just towns,
but sometimes individualfamilies who didn't even know
that the AT was nearby wherethey lived until hikers started
appearing and what that meantfor them to, you know, start
offering lodging and food andand shuttle services and
different things that hikersneeded.
SPEAKER_00 (06:19):
You know, before Airbnb was something that people
said in, you know, in the samethey said Airbnb in the same
sentence.
The trail guides, going backinto the 1930s, they listed the
names of people who would takein hikers and as boarders,
overnight boarders.
And so like I can remember, youknow, reading there was a
family, the Reed family down inSouthwest Virginia, who would
(06:41):
and it was great because there'sa five-digit phone number in
those days.
And you know, you call CaledusReed, and he or his wife would
come pick you up and take you totheir house.
And for a dollar or a dollarfifty, you get dinner, you get
to spend the night, and then yougot breakfast, and then they
took you back to the trail.
And they did that because adollar fifty was a lot in the
Great Depression.
SPEAKER_01 (07:00):
Really interesting.
And you were also saying that alot of the shelter logs, that
some of the notes that peopleleft in there was about who was
friendly to hikers and wherethey could find lodging and
where they could find mealsbased on who they had come
across in the past.
So they were basically passingon that information to other
hikers.
SPEAKER_00 (07:18):
Yeah.
And like who was making applebrandy out in the barn without a
license, you know, to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (07:24):
That's where I would have gone.
Yeah.
And I think also this is whatmade your last book so
interesting when you talkedabout Virginia's lost
Appalachian Trail, is how thetrail was such became an
economic driver and what itmeant to the communities in
Virginia when the trail gotrerouted, right?
Because then the the towns hadstarted to rely on hikers coming
(07:46):
in no longer had that anymoreand what that meant for them.
SPEAKER_00 (07:50):
Yeah, I mean, it was very painful for them to have
the trail rooted away.
And it would be today if thatwere, you know, if that were the
case.
And uh it's been a littlecontroversial in Maine because
the trail used to run rightthrough the town of Monson,
Maine, which is at the beginningof the hundred mile wilderness,
the last hundred miles beforeyou get to the northern terminus
at Katain.
(08:10):
And just several years ago, theConservancy rooted the trail,
and the Maine Appalachian TrailClub root rooted the trail
around the town on the premisethat they want the trail to be
as wild as possible instead ofgoing through town.
And that was really hard on themerchants in in this little tiny
town of Monson who for decadeshad been, you know, supporting
(08:31):
the hikers as they headed offinto the hundred mile wilderness
and uh or as they staggered outif they were southbounders.
And so they were kind of unhappyabout it.
And uh and so they've uh lastsomebody told me recently, they
put up signs like here's how youget into town.
SPEAKER_01 (08:46):
I think I'm gonna drop a link in the show notes to
that previous episode where youtalked about Virginia's lost
Appalachian Trail.
So if anyone wants to learnmore, check your show notes and
click that link.
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I would love to talk about howfolks can get on the AT and you
(10:16):
know any tips and advice youhave there.
But before we do, I want to takejust a couple of minutes to
discuss how the AT became acultural icon and its current
challenges, but in particular,how hikers can give back or even
pay it forward today.
So today we think about the ATas a global icon and people from
(10:36):
around the world come to hikeit.
So what do you think has drivenits rise in popularity?
SPEAKER_00 (10:42):
I think that the tremendous popularity of the
Appalachian Trail today isheavily influenced by social
media, you know, the existenceof smartphones, because that
made it possible to really showthe trail to a global audience
in a in a very kind of instantway.
That's kind of like the cherryon top in many ways, because it
had been that popularity hadbeen building for decades.
(11:04):
There was this kind of a mediaecosystem around the trail,
people writing books and shortdocumentaries and things like
that.
And um, and then in 1996, BillBryson published um A Walk in
the Woods, which was a runawaybestseller.
And that really brought thetrail to the attention of a much
larger audience.
And then, you know, RobertRedford made a movie about it.
(11:26):
Terrible movie, but you know,they made a movie about it, and
that expanded the knowledge ofthe trail even more.
And there is has been this kindof media ecosystem around the
trail over the years.
And, you know, and some famoushikers like Emma Gatewood,
Grandma Gatewood, they, youknow, they bring a lot of
attention to the trail.
And so it's just been kind ofbuilding over time.
(11:49):
What's especially interestingabout the Appalachian Trail is
that it's the only national parkthat is run entirely by
volunteers.
SPEAKER_01 (11:57):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (11:58):
You know, I mean, there there is it, there is a
superintendent, uh, NationalPark Service superintendent of
the of the park, because everynational park has a
superintendent, and they're twoaccountable two law enforcement
rangers for the whole 2,197miles.
SPEAKER_01 (12:13):
Amazing.
SPEAKER_00 (12:14):
Um, which also tells you it's a very safe place
because they only need two.
As a you know, sheltermaintainer, we have to abide by
various um park serviceregulations and um about you
know building codes and thingslike that.
And when the government shutdown recently, we had to stand
down as volunteers briefly untilwe got a ruling on whether the
insurance that covers us wasstill in effect.
(12:36):
It was, so we could go back tovolunteering.
So it is a relationship with thefederal government, but the
Appalachian Trail Conservancyloosely oversees, coordinates,
really is a better way to putit, 30 plus trail clubs who each
have a section of the trail thatthey take care of.
Um, so there are thousands andthousands of people every year
who volunteer on the trail andtell their friends about it.
(12:58):
And and they're proud of thatservice.
So that really helps a lot too.
SPEAKER_01 (13:02):
Earlier you mentioned that places like
McAfee Knob here in Virginiawere dealing with overcrowding
and littering, and we still seethose problems today.
So, what can be done to balanceaccess with preservation?
SPEAKER_00 (13:16):
Yeah, it's a that's a constant debate.
It's a been a debate in theAppalachian Trail community
since the 1970s, really.
Um before Leave No Trace becamea thing, littering was really
common everywhere in in theUnited States.
I'm old enough to remember it.
And the amount of litter andjust kind of destruction of
things like shelters and picnictables and things like that was
(13:38):
getting out of hand.
And a number of the trailvolunteers started advocating
for the removal of all the trailshelters as a way of cutting
down on the vandalism and trashand partying and all that.
And uh fortunately, it wasn't amajority of trail volunteers who
felt that way.
It was more like say 30%.
But there was a seriousdiscussion about whether to
(13:59):
remove all of those shelters,and out of that discussion came
efforts between the trail clubs,the ATC, the forest US Forest
Service, the CR Club, and othersto develop a set of wilderness
ethics guidelines, which todaywe call leave no trace, and the
ridge runner system along theAppalachian Trail with paid
employees of the ATC who go upand down the trail and help
(14:20):
people and advise them aboutwilderness ethics and and not
littering.
You know, but I would say thatthe biggest thing that can be
done is if you're out on thetrail and you see a piece of
litter, pick it up.
And if you see someone drop apiece of litter, you can just
say, hey, you dropped something.
Not not like, hey, what's wrongwith you?
You don't have to confront them.
(14:40):
You know, you can just say, Oh,you dropped your water bottle.
Like, of course you would wantto pick that up and they pick it
up immediately because they knowthey're not supposed to do that.
Uh uh, the one thing that drivesme completely insane is the dog
poop bags.
Yes.
Because and on our podcast, youknow, I had a discussion with
the Smithsonian's uhconservation biology center
small mammal expert.
(15:01):
So he's like the guy.
And and he's works for theNational Zoo in the Smithsonian,
he knows it all.
And and I asked him, I said, Isit okay to take a stick and just
flick your dog's poop off intothe woods?
And he said, Absolutely it is.
It's totally fine.
That dogs don't transferpathogens to other man mammal
species.
So yeah, just flick it off,which is better than taking your
(15:23):
little green dog poop bag,filling it up, and then setting
it down on the trail, which iswhat people do.
SPEAKER_01 (15:28):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (15:30):
Because they believe they believe that there is a dog
poop, a poop bag fairy, right,that flies flies down the trail
every night picking those thingsup, which there isn't.
SPEAKER_01 (15:38):
So yeah, and who wants to be the volunteer
picking up dog poop of allthings?
SPEAKER_00 (15:42):
Other people's dog poop, you know.
It's bad enough to pick up likeI hate doing it with my own
dogs.
It's worse if it's somebodyelse's dog.
So uh but so really if you seesomebody like fill up their
little dog poop bag and set itdown, you can say, well, you
know, there's not a poop bagfairy.
And so, but really, just if yousee a piece of litter, just pick
it up.
It's just not that hard.
It makes a big difference.
It all it all adds up.
(16:04):
Everything you pick up is oneless thing that other people
have to deal with.
SPEAKER_01 (16:09):
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Trail clubs have been around fora really long time.
What role do trail clubs playtoday?
SPEAKER_00 (18:22):
So the trail clubs are essential to the history of
the Appalachian Trail.
Several of the clubs predate thetrail.
The Appalachian Mountain Club,for instance, the Green Mountain
Club both predate the trails.
The Dartmouth Outing Club does.
These are all clubs that helpmaintain the AT, among many
other things that they do.
The Smoky Mountains Hiking Clubpredates the trail.
(18:43):
The Carolina Mountain Club does.
But most of the trail clubs wereformed, like the Potomac
Appalachian Trail Club here inNorthern Virginia, were formed
to build and then maintain theAppalachian Trail.
And that's what we do.
I mentioned I'm a trail, ashelter maintainer, so I take
care of the Manassa ScampShelter.
I go at least once a monthduring peak hiking season, more
like twice a month.
(19:04):
I pick up trash, I clean theprivy.
If something's broken, I fix it.
SPEAKER_01 (19:08):
We cut out invasive species.
Remember, you put me to work.
You were like, here's a saw, gostart cutting tree of heaven.
SPEAKER_00 (19:14):
That's right.
That's right.
We remove a lot of tree ofheaven, a lot of garlic mustard
plants, uh, you know, thingslike that.
So, you know, we do all thosethings.
Um, but also, and I've been atrail maintainer, not on the AT,
but on some trails in the PrinceWilliam Forest Park that the
PATC cares for, you know, you uhit's mostly erosion control and
uh making sure the trail's noteroding away.
(19:36):
And but trail clubs buildbridges, they put up signs along
directional signs along thetrail.
They they they really make itpossible for the trail to be as
accessible as possible to asmany people as possible.
SPEAKER_01 (19:47):
From your perspective as a historian,
Mills, what do you think BettonMackay, the trail's founder,
would say about the AT today?
SPEAKER_00 (19:56):
So that's a great question because um Mackay was
incredibly proud that his ideabecame this big deal because he
lived into the 1970s.
He was 95 years old when hedied.
And so by the time he died, thetrail had become very popular,
and he was really proud of that.
And he also liked beingconsidered the founding father,
(20:17):
you know, gave him some personalsatisfaction to be kind of a
celebrity, but he also had akind of mixed feeling about the
way the trail ultimatelydeveloped because he wanted it
to be a truly wilderness trail.
And other people who werebuilding the trail, like uh
Myron Avery with the ATC and thePATC, they wanted it to be a
(20:40):
completed trail.
And if that meant road walking,if that meant being close to a
road, that was okay with thembecause that would get the trail
done.
And Makai was kind ofscandalized by that because you
know, if you're walking down thetrail and you can hear cars,
well, that's not a wildernessexperience.
And so in the 1930s, he andAvery actually had a big falling
(21:01):
out.
Makai kind of self-exiledhimself from Appalachian Trail
until after Avery's death.
And the um and he went off witha couple of other people to form
the Wilderness Society, whichwas much more focused on
preserving truly wild places.
On the one hand, he would be, Ithink, really thrilled to see
how popular his trail had becomeand how many people used it
every year because the originalintent was was being realized.
(21:25):
And on the other hand, I thinkhe would be a little
disappointed by um howcommercialized it's become.
How many people hike on thetrail as a way of promoting
their businesses and theirbrands.
And he actually, in his originalproposal in 1921, he warned
about that.
He used that he used a 1921 termYegmen, Y-E-G-G M-E-N, which I
(21:48):
had to look up.
I'd never heard that one before.
And it really means kind of ascam artist and uh and like a
snake oil salesman.
And so he would have been um, Ithink, really scandalized by the
number of people who used thetrail to promote a personal
brand.
SPEAKER_01 (22:02):
Gosh, that one just hit home because I see that
happening so often.
And yeah, wow.
Oh my god.
SPEAKER_00 (22:09):
Yeah, I mean, there was like there was a couple a
few years ago who threw hike,they wore purple the whole time,
and and they played music, theykeep backpacked with guitars,
and they are promoting theirCDs, their or their you know,
music, you know, stream ourstream our music.
SPEAKER_01 (22:24):
Yeah, or social media influencers who are using
it to get attention, to get morelikes and follows on their pages
and YouTube.
SPEAKER_00 (22:31):
And here's the thing he yeah, and here's the thing he
really would not have beenimpressed by was people who are
going after the fastest knowntime.
Oh yeah.
He was he was fond of sayingthat he wanted to give an award
to the person who took thelongest to hike the trail.
He said this over and over andover because he said if you walk
slowly, then you're trulyobserving nature.
(22:52):
If you're trying to get from oneplace to another really fast,
you're missing the whole point.
SPEAKER_01 (22:57):
Yes, I couldn't agree more with him.
SPEAKER_00 (22:59):
Yeah, he would have hated that.
SPEAKER_01 (23:01):
I think that there are plenty of people who would
love to hear some practicaladvice and inspiration for
experiencing the AT forthemselves.
Now, let's start by just sayingthat Virginia has more miles of
the AT than any other state.
Why is that significant forhikers in Virginia?
SPEAKER_00 (23:18):
Well, because it means that you know there are
525 or so miles of the 2,000plus miles are in Virginia, a
little over a quarter of thetrail.
So that means that wherever youlive in the Commonwealth, you
have reasonable access to thetrail.
I mean, if you're in, you know,Chesapeake, Virginia, the trail
is a ways.
Yeah, sure is.
(24:12):
That's what you need.
That's the extent of yourequipment.
You know, you want the bug spraybecause you don't want ticks or
biting insects.
And and um you want to dress forthe weather because anytime you
go hiking, you want to dress forthe weather and you have to have
water because don't drink thewater you find on the trail
unless you can purify it.
And that's all you need.
SPEAKER_01 (24:30):
And and we're not talking about hiking the entire
distance of the AT through thestate of through the
Commonwealth of Virginia, excuseme.
Like this was meant to beaccessible to everybody for day
hikes, a couple of hours, forexample.
Like it doesn't need to be asection hike.
SPEAKER_00 (24:48):
Yeah, no, it doesn't.
So that's the first thing.
And then the second is um, youknow, if you want to go further,
the easiest way to do that is togo with another friend who also
has their car, and you park onecar at one end and the other car
at the other end, and you hiketo the other car, and then you
drive back and get the firstcar.
And so, you know, you could do10 miles in a day and but have a
(25:09):
car waiting for you at the otherend.
And um, so that's also easy.
I mean, there are very fewsections of the trail in
Virginia that are reallyphysically challenging.
There's some for sure.
SPEAKER_01 (25:22):
There are some, yes, definitely.
SPEAKER_00 (25:24):
There are some for sure.
But like in Shenandoah NationalPark, um, which encompasses
about a hundred plus miles ofthe trail, you know, there's
definitely some uphillstretches, but they're not
killers.
And so um, if you're evenreasonably fit, it's just not
that hard.
And and so, and you don't needto go out and invest in special
clothing, special boots, that'sthat sort of thing.
(25:45):
I mean, through hikers hike intrail runners.
Yeah, many.
They they don't wear boots andum they just mostly wear trail
runners.
So I see people hiking in inTevas.
So it's uh you really don't needsuper specialized equipment.
And the trail is just reallyinviting in that sense.
SPEAKER_01 (26:03):
Do you have any favorite sections of the trail?
And then I also would love toknow, because we just talked
about challenging sections, whatthose challenging sections are,
because I know a lot of them arereally popular, and I don't want
anybody to get caught up in theall trails craze of oh,
everybody's doing this hike, andthen they realize it's too
difficult.
SPEAKER_00 (26:22):
There are a couple of really challenging sections.
Um, anything in the GraysonHighlands has the potential to
be very challenging.
And uh, I mean, there's sectionsin the Grayson Highlands that
are not so bad.
Uh, they can be bad from aweather standpoint.
Like I walked from Massy Gap tothe uh partnership shelter on to
on Mount Rogers because I wantedto go to the summit of Mount
Rogers.
(26:42):
And the hike itself wasn't allthat hard.
What was bad was I had earlyOctober and I experienced every
single weather that you couldexperience.
SPEAKER_01 (26:49):
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (26:50):
I had sun, I had fog, I had rain, I had sleet, I
had snow, I had thunder andlightning, I had heavy winds,
all in the space of like sixhours.
SPEAKER_01 (26:58):
I've I've been there done that.
SPEAKER_00 (27:00):
Yeah.
So um, and it was a wonderfulhike.
I loved it, but if I hadn't hadthe appropriate clothes, I would
have been really sad.
I could have gottenhyperthermia, you know.
So um, so but but there'sstretches in the Grayson
Highlands that are very up anddown, and um, so that's hard.
The three ridges in um along theThai River, it depends on which
(27:20):
direction you're going.
Um, if you start, if you'regoing southbound and and you
start at at the sort of northend of the three ridges
wilderness, then you walk downthe three ridges, and that's not
so bad.
If you if you start at the ThaiRiver and go the other way, it's
really challenging because it'syou know, it's in many of it's
like a 30-35% grade, and um it'snot well switchbacked.
(27:44):
And so that's really hard.
Um, the priest um is a reallypopular hike to hike from it's
one the other the other way fromthe three ridges and um from the
Thai River.
And there are something like 95switchbacks on your way up to
the summit of the priest, and uhand it's about a 2,000-foot
gain, 2,500 foot gain.
And um, so that's for the fit.
(28:05):
And uh that is a hike for thefit.
Um it's a beautiful hike, butit's it's definitely for fitter
people.
So, you know, so there arestretches like that, and it's
it's advisable to as you'relooking at a section of the
trail, you have to know your ownpersonal fitness and you know
how you feel about hiking uphillor downhill, and then you can
get an elevation profile of anystretch of the trail.
(28:26):
They're all available online,and so you can say, Oh, oh, I
see that's like really steepright there.
So I'll skip that part um ifthat's what you want to do.
Um, those are those are some ofthe more challenging parts.
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Now, you Mills are fond of solohiking, I happen to know.
What advice would you give tosolo hikers, especially those
exploring the AT for the firsttime?
SPEAKER_00 (29:37):
Yes, I love to hike by myself.
For me, it's a kind ofmeditation.
And uh, and my wife worriesabout that because I'm a little
klutzy and I fall down, andshe's always worried I'm gonna
fall and like break a leg orsomething.
SPEAKER_01 (29:48):
I love the way you walk, it's so enjoyable to walk
behind you and what and likejust watch your gate.
It's it's so interesting.
SPEAKER_00 (29:55):
I I don't lift my feet as much as I should, and so
I trip over things, but what Itell My wife, all the time, is
that with the exception of acouple of stretches of the AT in
Virginia down in the south, theAppalachian Trail is really a
highway, and um there are lotsand lots of people out there.
And so if I did fall and break aleg, probably within a couple of
hours, and no matter what,within 24 hours, somebody would
(30:17):
walk by and find me.
And so, um, but also most of thetrail now has cell coverage,
most of the trail.
And there are plenty of sectionsthat don't.
Even in Shenandoah NationalPark, there are a few stretches
that don't.
Like the face that face the eastface of the mountains in
Shenandoah National Park,especially around Madison
(30:39):
County, um, there just aren'tcell towers down below.
Um, and so you don't get cellservice on the east side of
Skyline Drive.
But if you cross over to thewest side of Skyline Drive, then
you're picking up all the celltowers in the Shenandoah Valley.
And so you have great service,like you know, like you're in
Northern Virginia.
So cell phones work generallyreally well too.
Um but the other thing is, andthis is really important, is
(31:02):
that if you're gonna go hike byyourself, tell someone what
route you're going to take, andthen stick to that route.
Many is the time that I've beenhiking by myself that I saw what
looked like a much moreinteresting route that I wanted
to take, but I had told eithermy wife or my kids, this is the
route that I'm going to be on.
And so I didn't deviate.
(31:23):
I just made a note that the nexttime I go here, I want to go the
other way.
Absolutely, if you don't showup, they know where to look for
you.
SPEAKER_01 (31:28):
I know that you and I both believe that making
connections with nature and inthis case with the trail is
super important for all of ustoday and making connections
even from the past to thepurpose of the trail today.
So in your book, you write aboutthe AT as a place where people
(31:49):
find solutions to whatever ailsthem.
What does that mean to youpersonally?
SPEAKER_00 (31:54):
I'm retired now, so my life is a lot less stressful
than it than it was up untilFebruary of this year.
But, you know, I mean, I've hada lot of different kinds of jobs
that were pretty stressful.
And so for me to be able to goout into the forest and just
decompress has has beenessential.
And whether it was here, youknow, along the Appalachian
Trail or we've lived in avariety of different places
(32:18):
where I had to go find parks todo that.
You know, the Japanese have thisconcept of forest bathing.
And um, which you would think islike, oh, it's Japanese, so it's
an ancient thing, but it's not,it's a much more recent
phenomenon.
There's a lot of work incognitive science to show that
forest bathing actually doeswhat people think it does, which
is it reduces your stresslevels, it you know, just sort
(32:40):
of calms you in general, itleads to sort of better
cardiovascular health.
It's just in general, it's justreally good for you.
And so that's what it's meantfor me.
Um, for a lot of people,especially long distance hikers,
um, going out on the AppalachianTrail was also an opportunity to
either redefine themselves,become a different person than
(33:00):
the one they were, or to managea life transition.
And my my friend Dips, who Imentioned before, in her case,
it was a recent divorce.
You know, she had to kind offigure out like who am I going
to be now?
And um, she didn't want to be adifferent person, but it was
more like how am I going tonavigate the new version of my
life.
And it really helped her withthat.
And other people, you know, it'sthey've retired or they've lost
(33:23):
a job or they've had a death inthe family or whatever.
And in the case of EarlSchaefer, the first through
hiker, he lost his best friendin the Battle of Okinawa.
Um, he was killed in a foxhole afew feet away.
And and uh Schaefer couldn't getover it.
And and so, and he tried avariety of things, and that was
before we had the idea of PTSD,but for sure that's what he had.
(33:45):
And he finally decided that whathe was going to do was, as he
put it, walk the war out of mysystem.
He decided to start walking inin Georgia and walk to Maine,
and he figured by the time hegot to Maine, he would be
better, and he was.
Wasn't cured, but he was better.
SPEAKER_01 (34:02):
And this was before Forrest Gump came along, too.
So nobody was thinking about itat then.
Um yeah, but this concept ofredefining yourself or studying
personal challenges and goalsthat you can conquer and what
that means for your mentalhealth and your physical health.
It's um it's significant for alot of people.
So you have been studying andhiking the AT for many, many
(34:27):
years.
What continues to draw you backto the trail?
SPEAKER_00 (34:30):
Um, well, for me, I mean, it's just been so much a
part of my life since I wasyoung.
But it was, uh and I would say,you know, I had kind of a, on
the one hand, I had a verystable childhood.
My parents stayed marriedforever.
They were married 59 years.
Uh, we lived in the same housepretty much my whole life.
So outwardly pretty stable, butinwardly it wasn't so stable.
(34:50):
My mother had narcissisticpersonality disorder, my father
drank and traveled, and and um,so my home, and I was an only
child, so I kind of got thebrunt of all of it.
And so going off into the forestwas a way to get away from all
of that craziness in the house.
And uh, and so the woods becamemy happy place where none of
that mattered.
And um, you know, my parentswere very loving, they just had
(35:12):
their own problems, and uh sothe uh the forest was like I
say, it was just it was my happyplace and it has maintained that
status in my life.
You know, so if I lived on theon the west coast, I'd be
hiking, you know, the ColoradoTrail or the Pacific Crest Trail
or something else.
I just I just really uh it justgives me peace.
And so that's what keepsbringing me back.
SPEAKER_01 (35:33):
Mills, in your opinion, how can history deepen
our appreciation for the trailthat we hike today?
SPEAKER_00 (35:38):
The Appalachian Trail is a trail that runs
through a part of Virginia thathas been inhabited for thousands
of years.
It's very difficult to findevidence of the indigenous
presence along the trail.
I mean, you really would have tobe an expert to find it.
However, most of those oldabandoned roads that we talked
(36:00):
about earlier, uh, many of them,maybe not most, but many of them
were laid down by colonialsettlers over old indigenous
trails, because indigenouspeople were really good at
picking out a route for a trailthat was sheltered from the
weather and, you know, and tookadvantage of the contours in the
land.
And so a lot of the trail thatwe walk on today is on top of
(36:21):
old roads built by colonialsettlers, which were built on
top of paths carved outthousands of years ago by
indigenous people.
So as you're walking on thetrail, you can think about it in
that sense that there are allthese layers of history that
you're walking through.
And then, especially here innorthern Virginia, the trail
north of Shenandoah NationalPark, uh, up to Harper's Ferry,
(36:41):
a lot of that section of thetrail was part of the
Underground Railroad.
You know, the UndergroundRailroad is not well mapped in
any way.
But like I live on Blue Mountainhere in Linden, and there's some
kind of vague maps of therailroad uh that show it going
right up here over thismountain.
And so it's probable that you'realso, if you're in northern
Virginia anyway, you know,you're walking on the same
(37:03):
routes that people took, fleeingenslavement.
And you know, you can seeespecially not so much in
Virginia, but in Maryland, youcan see Civil War fortifications
and and um so you know, Americanhistory is just sort of there in
layers and layers all along thetrail.
And so understanding that kindof deep rootedness of the
history, um, I think really uhenhances our appreciation of the
(37:26):
place that we're walking.
SPEAKER_01 (37:27):
Where can listeners find your new book, A Hiker's
History of the AppalachianTrail?
SPEAKER_00 (37:32):
It is everywhere you might want to look for a book,
um, you know, all the onlineplatforms and that kind of
thing.
But I will say that I am a hugesupporter of woman-owned
independent bookstores,independent bookstores in
general, and I'm especially afan of women-owned independent
bookstores.
And so if you go to my website,MillsKelly.net, I have on the
homepage uh links to threedifferent um bookstores that I
(37:54):
happen to love.
The thing that I didn't knowuntil I published my first book
about the trail um is thatthere's an organization called
bookshop.org.
It's a nonprofit that um thathelps independent bookstores
make money on book sales.
And so if you have anindependent bookstore in your
community that you that youpatronize, that you support,
(38:14):
just go to bookshop.org andsearch the name of that store
and it will take you to theirquote unquote shop on the
platform.
And then you search Hiker'sHistory of the Appalachian
Trail.
And and when you purchase it,they get they actually get a lot
of the sale price and from that.
And um and and I'll say I getlike 25 cents more than I would
(38:36):
get if you bought it throughAmazon.
So not a ton more, but a littlebit more.
And um it all adds up, right?
It all adds up, yeah.
So um, but mostly what's reallyimportant about that is
supporting our independentbookstores.
SPEAKER_01 (38:48):
I just recently became familiar with that
website because another one ofmy guests who talked about
mushroom foraging, she has abook that just came out and she
recommends it too.
So I started looking on there,I'm like, this is fantastic.
You know, like it's sometimeshard to get to your independent
bookseller, like you have tomake the extra trip, and you
know, maybe there's not onenearby, depending on where you
(39:09):
live.
You hop right on there andyou're still supporting those
small local shops.
SPEAKER_00 (39:13):
Right, right.
And it could be a shop that youknow you used to go to when you
were a teenager and it's stillthere, um, you know, in a part
of the state that you used tolive in and or a part of the
country.
And so, yeah, bookshop.org isone of my most favorite
platforms.
SPEAKER_01 (39:28):
And becoming mine too.
How else can listeners connectwith you?
SPEAKER_00 (39:33):
I'm, you know, of course, all over social media.
Instagram is probably the bestway.
Um I'm telly7029 on Instagram.
That was the what was availablewhen I set up my Instagram.
So t Kelly7029.
Um uh on Facebook, you know, I'mthere under Mills Kelly.
And um, and then, you know, onmy website, uh Mills Kelly.net.
(39:54):
Those are all the best ways tofind me.
SPEAKER_01 (39:56):
And is your podcast still available?
SPEAKER_00 (39:58):
It is.
So our podcast, the Green TunnelPodcast, which has 50 episodes
on the history of theAppalachian Trail, is still
fully available.
Um, you know, we finished theshow, we did kind of the whole
history and then we stopped anduh last year.
And um, and so you can justsearch the Green Tunnel podcast
on any of the podcast platformsyou might use, and it's easily
findable.
(40:19):
Or the website um for the studiowhere it was produced is R2,
like like the number R and thenumber two, studios.org.
SPEAKER_01 (40:28):
Fantastic.
I put we'll put links to all ofthose things in the show notes
so people can find them easily.
Mills, thank you so much forcoming back on Virginia Outdoor
Adventures to talk about yourlove and passion for the
Appalachian Trail.
I wonder how many other peoplehave as much knowledge and
information about the ATE as youhave, Mills.
SPEAKER_00 (40:47):
Not many.
I know one for sure, Brian King,um, who was the longtime
publicist of the AppalachianTrail Conservancy.
He still knows about 10 timesmore than than I do, but but I'm
getting up there.
SPEAKER_01 (40:58):
Well, I think we are super lucky to have you here in
Virginia.
SPEAKER_00 (41:01):
Thanks so much, and thanks so much for having me on
the show.
It's a real pleasure.
SPEAKER_01 (41:04):
Absolutely.
Thank you for being a guest,Adventure On.
Virginia Outdoor Adventures isinspired by and supported by
listeners like you, which is whyyour messages and feedback mean
so much to me.
You can text me directly byclicking on Send Jessica a text
message in your show notes.
(41:25):
I answer questions, respond tocomments, and share your
feedback on the show.
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(41:47):
Virginia Outdoor Adventures.com.
Thanks for listening.
Until next time, adventure on.
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