Goodbye, Mountain Man!

The mountain man has always held some level of prestige in our society. Rugged, ambitious and fiercely independent, he fights the elements to survive in the wilderness and make a living off the land. Many say the era of this woodsman is over nowadays, while others contend that the mountain man is not defined by an era, but by a state of mind.

Recent popular television shows, including one titled “Mountain Men”, highlight folks making a living in the deep woods even today. Perhaps they are our modern version of the mountain man. Still, the mountain men who were in their prime in the first half of the 20th century were one of a kind, and would have been a true sight to see.

In his 1976 book, “Goodbye Mountain Man!”, Donald Jack Anderson wrote about three mountain men who symbolized this era – Walter Arnold, V.E. Lynch, and E.J. Dailey. These were men of great influence in what many would call the formative days of the modern fur trapping era.

Walter Arnold

A history of trapping in Maine wouldn’t be complete without a heavy dose of Walter Arnold. Born in a lumber camp in 1894, Arnold was meant to be a trapper. He worked in various other occupations early in life, including lumbering and building cabins, making snowshoes and selling trapping lures and supplies. Still, the wilderness trapline tugged heavily on Arnold’s heart strings, and each fall he’d head to a deep woods trapping cabin to spend a long, harsh winter catching furs. He also wrote extensively in a diary and penned articles for national trapping publications of the day, as well as authoring several books on trapping methods. Even at an old age, Arnold continued to live in a cabin he built in the backwoods on Indian Pond. A true example of a mountain man, I’ve always thought the life and times of Walter Arnold were worthy of a book.

V.E. Lynch

They called him “Wildcat”. Virgil E. Lynch was born and raised in Missouri, but the lure of deep wilderness led this young trapper to the backwoods of northern Maine, in the Machias River country west of Ashland. Lynch was a true woodsman, guide and fur catcher who saw more adventure in his lifetime than most. While he enjoyed guiding hunters for deer, moose and bear, Lynch loved the the trapline, and his true passion was chasing bobcats, which earned him the name “Wildcat”. Though outsiders are not always welcome in this rough wilderness country, Lynch made a name for himself in northern Maine. He wrote books and articles on trapping, made lures and developed quite a reputation as a mountain man before old age lured him back to his childhood home in the Ozarks. Oscar Cronk, another noted Maine trapper and lure maker, wrote a book about Lynch’s life.

E.J. Dailey

In the old days, the Adirondacks of upstate New York rivaled the North Maine Woods as prime trapping grounds for men of the wilderness. Stubborn and independent, trapper and woodsman E.J. Dailey spent winters on his Adirondack trapline despite physical limitations. A bad knee and poor eyesight didn’t stop Dailey, who had never worked for another man in his life, from being a successful fur trapper. His articles in trapping magazines of the day gained him notoriety in the trapping world. He developed lures and trapping techniques, and even had a trap model named after him. Dailey was forced from his cabin on Cold Creek by the closure of marten and fisher trapping in the Adirondacks. Legend has it that he and his partner stashed 300 traps in a nearby swamp that have never been found. Despite leaving the cabin, Dailey persevered, running a trapline on the outskirts of civilization in his later years. It was Dailey who held the strong belief that the era of the mountain man is never dead.

Though the times are ever-changing, the spirit, drive, independence and ties to the land will always ensure that a few mountain men will always remain among us. Donald Jack Anderson’s “Goodbye Mountain Man!” can be found online or at used book stores. It’s a short, quick read that also describes Anderson’s boyhood trapping experiences and local ‘mountain man’ characters around his Pennsylvania home.