About Connections: Love it or hate it, history is a map. Those who hate history think it irrelevant; many who love history think it escapism. In truth, history is the clearest road map to how we got here: America in the 21st century.
The Mohawk Trail began as a 100-mile-long Native American footpath. The trail, through what is now Berkshire County, was a trade route connecting Atlantic tribes with tribes in Upstate New York. Indigenous peoples called its highest point Spirit Mountain. Thee trail touched five rivers and climbed a mountain with many stopping places. Later, the highest point (2,272 feet) was named Whitcomb Summit; the rivers were dubbed the Connecticut, Millers, Cold, Deerfield, and Hoosic, and the mountain named Hoosac. One stopping point on the trail became known as Florida, Massachusetts.
Although Florida was not incorporated until 1805, white folks started to settle there as early as 1740. Some had horses, oxen, or donkeys, but many walked in, that is, “used shank’s mare.”
During the Revolutionary War, travel on the trail was pageant-like as soldiers in full dress uniforms massed and marched through. They say the most picturesque was on the morning of August 16, 1777. The Charlemont Minutemen were marching to reinforce “the patriots” at the Battle of Bennington. Needing to make quick work of the journey, they “rode and tied.” That is, the first man rode a horse to a predetermined spot. He tied up the horse and finished the journey on foot. A second man rode to a predetermined spot, tied the horse, and walked to the next horse. All the Minutemen did the same. That way, the men walked and rode, the horses carried and rested. They made the 35-mile-trip in more time than one man and a fast horse would, but far less time than a man walking could.
For ordinary folk, walking or riding, there were turnpikes and shunpikes. Rich men with large tracts of land put in turnpikes and charged travelers a toll. Poorer men found alternative trails to avoid paying, that is, shun the tolls. One story is an extreme example of the desire to shun tolls.
A wealthy man near Florida, one Colonel White, built a turnpike. He hired the Widow Nelson to live in the tollhouse beside the road. Conscientious, she would pop out of the toll house and block the road, if necessary, to collect a toll. One night, she did just that.
The rider, however, was bent on not paying. He scooped her up and rode off. The exact toll is not recorded, but it was probably less than what that impetuous move cost him. He put the widow down at an inn, paid for her night’s rest, and gave her 5 pence to hire someone to take her back to the tollhouse in the morning. Evidently, for this rider, it was not the amount of the toll but the principle.
In 1848, Williams students ran along the trail for sport and exercise, outpacing the ox carts. In the 1850s, Nathaniel Hawthorne drove it and declared, “I have never driven thru such romantic scenery.”
Driving through
In 1914, the Massachusetts Highway Department completed the Mohawk Trail as a scenic drive. It does not actually trace the Mohawk’s trail; it crisscrosses it often and mirrors it sometimes. It also has its own name, Mass 2 and Mass 2A, and goes from Westminster to Williamstown.
The modern Mohawk Trail is only 69 miles of the original 100. Still, paved or unpaved, traversed by horse or horsepower, it is considered one of the most beautiful drives in the state. One hundred seventy years after Hawthorne, it is still a drive worth taking.
The Elk was placed at Whitcomb Summit in 1923, and “Hail to the Sunrise” was placed in Mohawk Park in 1932 as a tribute to Native American heritage. Between the two, the views are grand. A portion of the trail parallels the Deerfield River, passes through the village of Shelburne Falls, and crosses the Bridge of Flowers.
The route is not flat, smooth, or fast, and that is half the fun. It also has a few thrills; there is a hairpin turn that overlooks North Adams and the Taconics, and the Connecticut River crossing at the old King’s Bridge pump offers just the right amount of adrenaline. At another point, the trail descends sharply down the eastern slope of the Hoosac Range to “Dead Man’s Curve.”
Part of the historic footpath that runs through Florida, Savoy, and Charlemont was placed on the National Register of Historic Places almost 50 years ago. Honoring the history is understandable, but why was it called the Mohawk Trail? No one knows. The Mahicans were settled in Berkshire County, the Pocumtucks settled near Deerfield, and both were farmers. At most, the Mohawks walked through. They traveled from hunting ground to hunting ground here, in New York and Canada. So, why name the trail after a peripatetic people who were hunter/gatherers and fishermen passing through?
One guess is that they were also warriors. They fought with bow, arrow, club, and shield. It was told that in the late 17th century, Mohawks passed through what would become Deerfield. They attacked and wiped out the Pocumtucks and marched on. Soon, the empty farmland was taken over by the first white settlers — the Dutch and French. They continued to move east, and finally, walked into Florida.
