Part of the Southbound class of 1989 at the 1989 Gathering.
My First Gathering
By Bill O’Brien
“Sprained Rice”
My first Gathering was in 1989, the year of wicked spring rains in the South for all the northbounders and a devastating blow for southbounders in September called Hurricane Hugo. I first heard about this group and its annual get-together during my first week on the trail in Maine. I was all alone in Cloud Pond Shelter, wishing I’d had more to read in the Wilderness, when I found a flier someone had stuck in the shelter announcing that a gathering by a long-distance hikers group would occur in October down in West Virginia, at a spot the flier said wasn’t far from Pearisburg. I pulled out my Databook and hoped I would be somewhere in the vicinity when the weekend rolled around. As it turned out, I was one of the southbound stragglers that year, but when the time came, nothing would keep me from that rendezvous, not even a hitchhike of a couple hundred miles. I did everything I could to try and get as many of that year’s southbounders to show up so we could all finally meet each other. I used the register for those Southies behind me, and the mail for those ahead of me. Imagine my joy one day when I read a register entry somewhere from one of the members of the "Downhill Duo," David Longlegs of Atlanta, who wrote me a note saying he received my card and would try and make this thing they called the Gathering. And oh, by the way, he wrote, "look forward to meeting you." Well, of the 22 or so southies in 1989, we had about 15 show up, which was pretty darn good for that time. Among them were "Lucky Lucky Lucky," "Olde Chuck" Engle, the "Maineac," "Osh Kosh B'Josh" and "David Longlegs," "Cracker Jack" Donn Allen, and "Let it Be" Namie Bacile.
When the weekend arrived, I was way the heck up in northern Virginia. Hadn’t even stepped foot in Shenandoah yet. But I was determined to get there. I spent the night before my trip at Manassas Gap Shelter, then the next day walked down the trail to where it crosses underneath Interstate 66 in Linden, clambered up the bank and stood on the highway -- totally illegally, of course -- with a hand-lettered sign saying, simply, "SOUTH," and a ferocious-looking backpack propped against my leg. In just a few minutes, a bright red sports utility vehicle pulled over and a young guy, about my age I guess, hopped out and asked me how far I was going. When I told him it was a little past Roanoke, he told me to throw my pack in the back and hop in. He was going to Roanoke. As we talked on the ride down, he asked tons of questions about the trail, treated me to lunch on the way, and, would you believe this? As we got closer and closer, he decided to keep on going and take me as far as Pearisburg. I knew I’d find someone there going to the Gathering, and sure enough, the hostel at the church was hoppin’ with folks headin’ for Pipestem. I couldn’t believe my luck. One of the guys there, Al "Mousecatcher" Sanders, offered me a ride right off the bat, starting bright and early next day. So I was on the doorstep. (Would you believe, too, that before the Gathering was over, Al would offer to drive me all the way back to Linden? Man, I was truly blessed that week.) And man, what a boost that Gathering gave me ... seeing all the northbounders again who I had met early on during my hike ... hearing the most moving testimonials you could ever hope to hear -- one from the legendary Hank Lanham, who pinpointed for me exactly "who we are" as hikers and maintainers, and another testimonial from a relative newcomer to ALDHA, the "Singing Horseman," who I’d met earlier that year along with about 10 other people and one sick Dalmatian puppy during a now infamous rainy night cooped up inside the old Congdon Camp in Vermont.
Other highlights included meeting the famous Warren Doyle for the first time, seeing Don West speak, and hearing, for my first time, a song about the trail sung by a hiker named "Raven." I also got the chance to meet for the first time this couple I had heard about through the grapevine and read about in registers. They were out clearing trail that was devastated by Hurricane Hugo in September of ’89 when a discouraged southbounder named Osh Kosh B’Josh came upon them. Disgusted with the hours and hours it was taking just to find the route of the trail, he happily volunteered to help clear trail with the crews when he met them, and afterward, this couple took Josh home with them. He stayed with them for about 2 weeks, waiting for other sections of the trail to be cleared. They put him back on the trail and his spirts were way up again. He made it to that year’s Gathering, and as soon as that couple walked in to the Arts Center auditorium, Josh ran up to them and jumped in their arms like they were his long-lost parents. Those generous folks, by the way, were Bill and Laurie Foot. It wasn’t until very recently that Laurie found out I had witnessed that emotional reunion, now 17 years in the past. But it is a scene that remains with me always and will forever define one of the best aspects of this thing we call the Gathering.
We southbounders sure made a nuisance of ourselves that weekend. We entered Trail Jeopardy as a team, putting Cracker Jack, David Longlegs and Josh together as the "Southbound Sloths." Unfortunately, not knowing the southernmost leg of the trail, they came in last. But they proudly won $5 from the ALDHA treasury and went out and bought a pizza with it across the street from the Concord campus. (Hard to believe now, but they might have gotten change for that 5 back then!) On Sunday afternoon, all the southbounders gathered in front of the hallowed halls of Concord College to pose for a shot that was appropriate for hikers who were constantly being told they were doing the A.T. backwards ... We did a moon shot. (I am easy to pick out in the lineup: I think I had the whitest buns in the picture. Maineac easily had the most muscular.) Other highlights included the square dance and seeing Lucky Lucky Lucky dance up a storm; a skit put on by Cindy Ross, Todd Gladfelter, Bob and Rose Goss, Frank and Victoria Logue, and Frank Krajcovic, who probably wrote the skit 5 minutes before showtime. It was wickedly funny, with well-meaning lampoons of Ed Garvey (played by Bob) and Jean Cashin (played to a T by Rose), and a cameo appearance that lasted all of about 5 seconds by Mary the Elephant. (Frank K, you’re a hilarious genius, but you already know that.)
It was so great to see some of the northbounders and flip-flops I’d encountered early in my travels. "Route Step" from Georgia was there with his wife, having finished his flip-flop in Duncannon. The "Rock Hoppers" were there, Tom McCarthy and Janet Valine, who I’d met just before Mombasha High Point in New York and who gave me all sorts of good tips when they met me, including the one about that great tent site on top of Mombasha, with a view of the World Trade Center and the rest of Manhattan. Sunday morning at the Gathering, they graciously drove me into Pipestem State Park for a view of the fall foliage over the New River Gorge below. I got to see some of "The Traveling Wilburys" again, as well as "Oxford" and "J-Walker," "Stats Godric," Lanny "Half/Fast" Hartmann, "Mr. Worcester," Ken "Six Feet" Miller, Kurt "Swallow" Seitz and Al "Keys" Lemire. And, in the gym showers of all places, I met a hiker who, it turned out, lived not more than 20 minutes from me in Connecticut and who is quite a hiking legend in his own way, "Cool Breeze." I drive by his house about once a week now, and shame on me for not keeping in closer touch when I’m home. We see each other more at trail functions, ironically. And, of course, David, Josh and Don, whom I had adopted -- without them even knowing me -- as my soulmates on that hike, reading their register entries so religiously, I was actually able to correct their recollections of things that had happened to them along the way because I’d followed their exploits in the lean-tos every night. Fittingly, it was that trio who would drive me and hiking partner, Andrew Sam, to the top of Springer three years later for the start of a northbound thru-hike in 1992. (It was on the way up to Springer, by the way, in Cracker Jack’s vehicle, where the term "Traveling Garveys" was coined.)
Postscript
I was not able to reach Springer in ’89. Ironically, I had just reached the hostel in Pearisburg -- by foot this time, the week of Thanksgiving -- after having my own dismal time of it on Peters Mountain, where the trail was still a horrible mess from Hugo’s blowdowns months earlier (that maintaining club has since been booted out of ATC). The second night I was at the hostel, I got a call on the outside pay phone from my uncle in Florida, telling me that my Mom had just had a stroke down there and I was to come when I could. I caught a bus north to Connecticut, grabbed my car and my brother, and drove nonstop to Florida, where I stayed during the course of the winter helping my Dad help my Mom recover. She came through pretty good, and by March, it was clear my Dad didn’t need me anymore, so I figured I would head back to the trail and finish her up. I started at Springer and walked north to Pearisburg. It turned out to be a godsend, because making up these miles in March and April of 1990 gave me the chance to meet Andrew Sam, who hiked with me for two weeks in the South and then flew to New Hampshire to hike with me for another three weeks as I made up the chunk of miles I lost after a bad sprain the year before (hence the trailname, "Sprained Rice.") In late June, after finishing every last mile, I reclimbed Katahdin and called myself through, just under one year. Some might say I shouldn’t claim to belong to the Southbound Class of 1989, but I can’t help it. It was my first momentous year on the Appalachian Trail, my baptism into the Appalachian Trail family, and my first brush with ALDHA and the Gathering. And oh, by the way, I have not missed a single Gathering since.
Is there a blogger inside of you yearning to tell the story of your first Gathering? Please, write it down and send it to us, with pictures if you have them, and we will post them here on ALDHA’s Web site as we gear up for the 25th anniversary Gathering in October 2006.
