The Wild West
New Ipswich Historical Society
New Ipswich?
This photo makes me think about every cowboy movie I’ve ever seen. Anyone have an idea where in New Ipswich this house was located?
Newspaper Clipping - 1931
WAPACK SKI TRAIL 1931
This is as good a season as any to remind residents of the Montachusett region that there starts within the territory the only cross-country ski trail in New England, and probably the only one of its size in the country. It follows roughly the old Wapack foot trail from Watatic mountain to North Pack Monadnock, and is known as the Wapack Ski trail.
To negotiate its full length the skier must devote at least two days and possibly three, but its pleasures may be sampled for a day anywhere along the trail. The whole course traverses five mountains and stretches for 2 miles, but one can cut across it by auto on any of several roads in south- ern New Hampshire.
A Boston skier has written: "If you want a pleasant, not-too-hard section of the trail to try out for just one day's skiing . . . the south slope of Barrett probably is the best. You can ski in on an old country road that cuts the trail southeast of Binney pond. Perhaps the sportiest section is on the middle summit of Temple; pick up the trail for there where it crosses the highway through the Peterboro Gap, or else ski in from the west on the country road that loops off from the Peterboro-New Ipswich road, and climb the mountain from the south.
The pleasures of skiing through woodland, over mountain and down dell are still to be tasted by many hereabouts, but the opportunity is there for the residents of Montachusett, an opportunity that is not offered anywhere else in this entire section.
James Roger diary entries
19th July 1912
Cloudy, cool morning; wind northwest; fair and good breeze. Dave & Henry mowing in the meadow. I fixed Hall for the Public meeting tomorrow afternoon and tossed hay in orchard. Also went to Greenville for Alice’s box and the barrel she sent off some days ago..
I think you slipped a digit on the length of the Wapack. Today the trail is ~21 miles or so from Watatic to North Pack Monadnock.
The Midstate Trail, https://www.midstatetrail.org, connects with the Wapack. I have backpacked it from the Audubon property in Princeton, over Mt. Wachusett, past Redemption Rock and Crow Ledges, (where I had a bear encounter), to its northern terminus where it connects with Wapack at Mt. Watatic and then on to Wapack's end in Greenfield.