Mon. Nov 25th, 2024
Three people sit on grass with backpacks, two on the left and one on the right listening to the person in the center playing a string instrument; trees and rocks are in the background.
Three people sit on grass with backpacks, two on the left and one on the right listening to the person in the center playing a string instrument; trees and rocks are in the background.
The Three Musketeers (from left, Catherine Robbins, Hilda Kurth and Kathleen Norris) became the second, third and fourth people ever to hike the Long Trail from end to end, a feat they accomplished in 1927. Photos and details of their trek were printed in newspapers across the country. Photo courtesy of the Vermont Historical Society

This is the second in a two-part series about the first people to hike Vermont’s Long Trail from end to end. 

Kathleen Norris had an audacious idea. The 18-year old would hike Vermont’s aptly named Long Trail, starting at the Massachusetts border and traveling north to where the path petered out just shy of the Canadian border. It was 1927, and only one person had ever hiked the roughly 255-mile-long route from end to end. 

Norris and her father had planned to hike the Long Trail together after she graduated high school, but he tragically passed away during her senior year. Still, she decided to stick with the plan and hike the trail in his honor. 

Norris mentioned the idea to her teacher Hilda Kurth, who eagerly agreed to join her. Together they discussed who else should accompany them. For safety, people advised them to have four members in their party. They ended up adding only one more, but it was a well-informed choice. The previous summer, Kurth had hiked extensively in Alaska with Vermonter Catherine Robbins, a teacher in Brandon, so they asked Robbins to join the expedition. Though the women never sought attention for their hike, the press eventually got wind of it and dubbed them ‘The Three Musketeers’. 

Three women in outdoor clothing stand by a building with "W.M. Johnson Auto-Repairing SOCONY" sign in the background, circa early 20th century.
July 25, 1927, Williamstown, Massachusetts, the morning the three women started their Long Trail hike. Hilda Kurt left, Kathleen Norris, center, and Catherine Robbins. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

In 1927, newspapers had been running stories about Charles Lindbergh’s historic flight across the Atlantic, the impending executions of Italian anarchists Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, and Babe Ruth’s assault on baseball’s home run record. To these they added regular updates on a Massachusetts man’s breakneck race along the Long Trail. The previous summer, Irving Appleby had become the first person to hike the trail from end to end; now he was trying to do it even faster. Capping this serialized saga, newspapers reported on July 14 that Appleby had finished the route in just over 10 days, shaving two days off his previous time. 

National press attention had been drawn to Appleby’s mission by James P. Taylor, founder of the Green Mountain Club, which built and maintained the Long Trail. He saw it as a great way to foster tourism in the state—Taylor was also secretary of the state Chamber of Commerce. When he learned about the women’s plans to take to the trail, he saw it as a great way to keep Vermont in the national spotlight. When he fed the story to reporters, they ate it up. “ ‘The Three Musketeers’ have come to life again,” proclaimed a wire service article that ran in multiple newspapers. “But this time they appear as young women instead of the swash-buckling heroes of the Dumas novel.”

Two vintage black-and-white photos of a person in hiking attire holding hiking gear, standing on rocky terrain. The right image has a decorative floral border.
Wire service photographs of Irving Appleby appeared in many American newspapers, including the St. Louis Post-Democrat, left, and the Minneapolis Star Tribune, right. Images via newspapers.com.

But while the press had covered Appleby’s expedition from even before he set foot on the trail, there were no news reports when the Three Musketeers started hiking north from Massachusetts 12 days after Appleby completed his race. Stories about the women’s trek were only published when they neared the end of the trail, Taylor perhaps having withheld word of their trek until that point. In a paternalistic society, supporters like Taylor might have harbored concerns that the women would give up along the way. Womanhood wasn’t widely seen as being compatible with such rigors as outdoor adventure. After all, just eight years earlier women were still being denied the right to vote in national elections. A San Francisco Examiner headline about the Three Musketeers’ expedition contained a fair share of amazement: “They Carried No Firearms, and Had No Male Escort.”  

Two people stand by a wooden signpost labeled "Long Trail" in a grassy area, with hills and trees in the background.
August 11, 1927, Catherine Robbins and Hilda Kurth at Brandon Pass, known today as Brandon Gap. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

When the Three Musketeers later recounted their time on the trail, however, there was no doubting their outdoor skills or their resolve. The women had planned carefully. While Norris and Robbins carried knapsacks and Kurth wore a pack basket, they made sure to keep their loads reasonable—no more than 25 pounds. They did so by shipping food ahead to post offices near the route. Their supplies included dehydrated vegetables, powdered milk, bacon, baking and pancake flour, macaroni and cheese, as well as cornmeal, oatmeal, raisins, crackers, chocolate and a product called Mapleine, from which they could make a maple-flavored syrup by adding sugar and water. It was a far more interesting and varied diet than the rice, bacon, cornmeal and raisins that Appleby had subsisted on.

They brought a small tent, but slept mostly in shelters under their blankets. They also carried flannel pajamas, ponchos, three compasses, two axes, a hatchet and a Kodak camera. The compasses came in handy when they lost the trail one night. Another day, Robbins used the hatchet to kill a porcupine, as the Green Mountain Club encouraged hikers to do at that time to prevent the animals from damaging shelters along the route.

During the hike, they were occasionally caught in the rain and later recalled being “always wet,” especially their 14-inch-tall hiking boots. Their one luxury was a four-ounce ukulele. When they grew tired, they’d rally by playing it and singing the “peppiest songs they could think of” or composing one on the spot.  

The women spoke warmly of interesting encounters along the trail. Before departing, they had been warned they might meet unsavory “fern pickers” who lived in backcountry camps and collected in-demand species for shipment to florists around the country. Ignoring the advice to avoid them, the women “found that these fern-pickers were very interesting, and treated them with more hospitality than people in some of the cities.” The fern pickers were staying in a disused lumber camp with some surprising luxuries, including electric lighting and even a Victorola, at a time when many Vermont communities still had no electrical service.

Three women in hiking attire stand arm in arm, smiling for the camera, with trees in the background. The caption reads, "Never quite so Happy! Never quite so Glad!.
July 25, 1927, Catherine Robbins, Hilda Kurth and Kathleen Norris at the Canadian border, Troy, VT. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

Clear skies greeted the women when they summited Killington Peak. In no rush, they spent an hour on top, enjoying the distant views, then spent the weekend at the Long Trail Lodge at Sherburne Pass, where the hostess gave Norris a green felt hat as a memento. She wore it for the rest of the hike. Kurth and Robbins opted to wear bandanas on their heads. Any covering helped keep insects from biting.

The women took periodic days off to rest and let their clothes dry. “Although not in competition with Appleby’s record for speed over the trail, they are going the whole distance in comfort,” wrote the Brattleboro Reformer.

As they reached Camel’s Hump’s summit, the sun was just setting, “almost too beautiful to be real.” They camped on the mountain and were disappointed when clouds rolled in and unleashed soaking rains overnight. It was still raining when they set out in the morning for Mount Mansfield. 

They enjoyed exploring the sights and talking with people they met along the hike. At Belvidere Mountain, they toured the asbestos mine and took samples with them, then visited with the fire warden stationed on top. They were nearing the end of the trail. 

Three people in outdoor clothing and backpacks stand together, smiling with a handwritten motto "The Musketeers must get there" beside them.
Morning of August 22, 1927, leaving Ed Derby’s Farm, where the three women had slept on the milkroom floor. Photo from Catherine Robbin’s scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

Harold French, secretary of the state Chamber of Commerce, greeted the women at Hazen’s Notch. He brought along a gallon vanilla ice cream and was accompanied by a photographer, who captured some now famous photographs of the hikers.

Two days later, they reached the summit of Jay Peak, where a welcoming committee of officials from North Troy and the state Chamber met them. But they weren’t done yet. The Three Musketeers descended the mountain and then hiked another eight miles along a road, before taking a crude trail to reach the Canadian border. 

Cheerful stories and photographs of Vermont’s Three Musketeers appeared in newspapers across the country. It was everything that Taylor and other marketers of the state could have hoped. “It is a great advertisement for Vermont,” declared the Morrisville Messenger, “and also for the splendid womanhood that America is producing—her greatest and best crop.”  

Two people on a rocky summit with a tall pole, one standing and cheering, the other sitting and resting. Handwritten note reads, "A glorious view from this peak. And the wind did blow on Lincoln Mt.
Catherine Robbins waves on top of Lincoln Peak while Hilda Kurth takes a rest. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

The Messenger also noted that big city newspapers loved the story of the Three Musketeers and called for more photographs and human interest details of their trek. “Those girls have blazed the way for hundreds of equally fine girls to a real healthy vacation, at very small cost,” the newspaper wrote. “We will see a great invasion of our mountains next season.” 

Not to be outdone, Appleby wrote excitedly to the state Chamber of Commerce about the boon that news of his own hikes had brought the state. “For the first time in New England history, Vermont and the Long trail are known to the ‘man on the street,’ ” he wrote. “Half a million folks are discussing the subject, every young hiker, male and female, and half the athletes in Boston are laying plans to go over the Long trail.”

His boots, hiking equipment and photographs would soon be displayed in the window of a “big shoe store on one of our busiest corners (in Boston),” he explained. “…I estimate that over a million people will see that exhibition.”

Appleby wrote to Taylor that the Christian Science Monitor had published a story about his hike that was reprinted in newspapers “in the most important cities of every civilized country in the world…If that isn’t publicity, what is?”

Despite the exposure Appleby generated, some Green Mountain Club leaders were growing uncomfortable about having him as their mascot. His brashness and ambition rubbed them the wrong way. They seemed to prefer the image the Three Musketeers presented of the Long Trail.

In November 1927, the club asked Appleby to provide daily itineraries for his record-setting hike, saying they wanted to clarify inconsistencies in the stories he was telling reporters. Appleby was stunned. In an ill-tempered letter to Green Mountain Club officials, he reminded them how famous he was and how much free publicity he had brought the Long Trail and Vermont. The club reprinted the letter in its Long Trail News.

“Why do you not question or criticise the ‘Three Musketeers’ as to whether they ever covered the Trail or not? You didn’t question or criticise the girls for just one good reason,” he wrote, before adding some italics, “because they were girls, young, pretty, popular and unusual.”

Patches and guidebooks related to the Green Mountain Club's Long Trail in Vermont are displayed on a surface.
When Irving Appleby and the Three Musketeers hiked the Long Trail, they probably relied on the most up-to-date handbook available, the 1924 Long Trail Guide. Photo by Mark Bushnell

If Appleby was irked by the different reception the women received, he apparently felt no animosity toward them personally. In fact, he took the women out to dinner after they returned from their hike and at some point even penned a poem in honor of the second, third and fourth person ever to hike the Long Trail from end to end. 

Entitled “Modern Girls,” the poem read in part:

“Three modern girls of Viking heart
In the teeth of a mountain gale,
Singing a song as they trudge along,
Defiant of rain and hail;
True of purpose and strong of will,
Nor seeking the sheltering vale,
Fighting their way up the rugged slopes
To conquer the old Long Trail.”

Two people standing in front of a building at Webster Camp, Stratton Mountain, wearing outdoor clothing.
Catherine Robbins and Hilda Kurth in front of the New Webster Camp at Stratton Mountain. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson

The growing concerns raised by Green Mountain Club leaders were not just about Appleby, and his strong personality, but also about his “marathon hiking.” The group’s founders had conceived of the Long Trail as a peaceful refuge from the increasing pace of modern life, not as a road to be rushed down. 

Editors of the Long Trail News painted a lurid picture of the threat posed by self-promoting speed-hikers: “Unless this tendency were checked, there is no knowing to what lengths it might go…We might, in the course of a year or two, meet on the Trail student artists, with their sweaters emblazoned with the names of firms who made their boots and other articles of equipment. Record smashers would dash by, accompanied by camera men who would take motion pictures of them…Marathon runners would rush along in both directions…And the genuine nature lover, for whom the Trail was intended, would be crowded out of the cabins and off the Trail entirely.”

Despite this war of words, Appleby maintained a strong connection with hiking in Vermont and was doing just that when drenching rains caused devastating flooding around the state in November 1927. While hiking in East Wallingford, he was struck by an uprooted tree and taken to the hospital in Rutland. Newspapers reported that Appleby had helped alert Red Cross officials to the plight of more than 100 families in Johnson that had been left homeless by what would become known as the Great Flood of 1927.

If some people viewed Appleby and the Three Musketeers as presenting starkly different ways to use the Long Trail, the hikers never spoke publicly against each other. It was as though they believed the Long Trail was long enough to accommodate both types of hiking. Nearly a century later, both types of hiking coexist on the Trail. 

Three hikers with backpacks stand on a rocky peak, labeled "On Top of Our Last Mountain - Jay Peak.
August 25, 1927, Kathleen Norris, Hilda Kurth and Catherine Robbins on top of Jay Peak as they hike on their last day on the Long Trail. Photo from Catherine Robbins’ scrapbook, courtesy of her granddaughter Cara Nelson.

Even though the Long Trail today is longer than it was in his day, reaching all the way to the Canadian border, the end-to-end record that Appleby established has been repeatedly shattered and now stands at an astonishing three days and 21 hours. Nevertheless, the Three Musketeers’ more leisurely and contemplative style of hiking is still how most people enjoy the Long Trail. 

While debate still continues over the “right” way to hike, the hiking community has largely embraced a new ethos summed up by the acronym, HYOH: hike your own hike.

Read the story on VTDigger here: Then Again: Treasuring the trail.

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