Profile
Warren Doyle
By Larry Luxenberg
NE WEEKEND I stayed at Hemlock Overlook Center for Outdoor Education, which Warren Doyle runs. I told him I’d like to talk when it was convenient. He said “Let’s make it for 4 a.m. so we won’t be disturbed.” I thought he was joking, but Ron Keal assured me he was serious. At exactly 4:00 a.m. I heard Warren’s voice across the bunk room; we proceeded to talk in the cramped office off the dining hall kitchen. At 5:30 Indiana John stuck his head in the door and I joked, “I thought there wouldn’t be any interruptions.” By 6:50 Warren rested his head on the desk, weary after three hours of nonstop conversation.
Warren Doyle is a familiar figure to nearly everyone who’s come close to the Appalachian Trail in the last 20 years. He’s hiked the complete trail now 10 times, and he’s not finished yet. He’s continually hiking sections, attending meetings of hikers, showing his slides. His friendships and influence extend the length of the trail. It is not easy to be neutral about Warren, for he can be devoted friend or a determined adversary.
His appearance is deceiving. He does not have the lean, hungry __ almost emaciated __ look that one comes to expect in a long-distance backpacker. Nor does he have the detached manner of an academic, even though he is a professor of Appalachian studies at George Mason University in Virginia. He has more the fiery mien of a rebel leader preparing to man the ramparts, or a dissident tweaking the KGB. At 43, however, he is mellowing somewhat, sidestepping some of the battles he would have waged only a few years ago.
People question nearly everything about Warren: his beliefs, his sanity, his motives. But no one questions his love for the A.T. He has a family and many friends and interests, but his devotion to the A.T. is boundless. “When I like something, I approach it with intensity,” he said.
A testimony to Warren’s gifts as an organizer, his energy, and his strong personality is that he was able to form and keep together ALDHA, the largest group in the country devoted to long-distance backpacking. It’s hard to organize a bunch of antisocial individualists who have little patience for the paperwork and meetings that groups require. Many are cavalier about answering mail and telephones, and some don’t even have permanent addresses.
His slide show, polished over the years, displays his intensity, commitment and showmanship. He runs around, he sings, he recites poetry, he exhorts. It is a unique performance, for most thru-hikers could no more sing before a large group than fly under their own power.
Hemlock Overlook has sprouted practically from scratch since he went there eight years ago. Now nearly 30,000 students each year attend programs, making it one of the largest outdoor-education centers in the country. Warren also runs a canoeing concession on Bull Run, near the Civil War battlefield. Hemlock is no doubt the largest single employer of 2,000-milers, with a dozen on staff at any one time. At Hemlock, every incoming group hears “the speech,” often given by Warren, which stresses the need for cooperation over competition.
His introduction to hiking did not suggest a long-term interest. After his freshman year of college, he went climbing in the White Mountains carrying a duffel bag loaded with cans of food and soda. Despite his poor preparation, he was “amazed at the grandeur of everything, the indescribable feeling.” From then on, he would go camping whenever he could. As a graduate student in 1972, he hiked on the Long Trail in Vermont. He learned a lot by suffering. In his cheap boots, he developed blisters the size of half-dollars. He became dehydrated. Because it was mid-May, he encountered swarms of black flies. Later that summer, he ventured into the Maine wilderness, climbing Katahdin. At the Hurd Brook lean-to he met a 2,000-miler nearing the finish. “That sparked the idea of a thru-hike,” he said.
Meanwhile, his social conscience had awakened. After his junior year, he worked in the mountains of Jamaica. Later, he worked for poet Don West, who founded the Appalachian South Folklife Center in Pipestem, West Virginia, to educate mountain people about their heritage. Warren found that in both places, good people worked hard but were mired in poverty. He started to question society. He also started to read about primitive societies, their rites of passage, and their trials of fire. “I found nature to be very neutral with no prejudices,” he said. “It was my arena for personal growth.”
When his older sister died suddenly at age 15, he felt he had to accomplish enough for two people. When he decided on the A.T. as his “rite of passage,” he included the added challenge of walking the trail in the shortest time. In 1973, at age 23, he set off on his first thru-hike. His father, Warren Sr., met him in Cloverdale, in southern Virginia, and continued to meet him until he passed Gorham, New Hampshire. Warren Sr. was concerned that his son had lost too much weight, and so began to cook for him and help around camp. “It made a big psychological difference” having his father along, Warren said. He ended the hike in record time, 66 and a third days, averaging 30 miles a day.
Back at school, Warren organized a series of day-hikes to do the Connecticut A.T. over seven Sundays. A core group formed, including his future wife, Ginger. On the last hike, people decided to walk the whole distance __ 56 miles __ in one day. Twelve people prepared for this superhike for two months. Warren found “tremendous energy” in the group. “It was a valuable learning experience,” he said, and he began wondering, “If all this can happen in one day, how much could a longer hike achieve?”
Two weeks later he had a dream. He saw a group of hikers with headlights, walking from Georgia to Maine. “It felt so right,” he said, “I couldn’t get back to sleep.” He had already started a doctoral dissertation on post-secondary aspirations of rural districts in Vermont. He dropped that topic and lost a grant. Instead, he began planning a group thru-hike. It would be the first group of more than two people to hike the A.T. As a practical afterthought, he decided, he would study the group dynamics for his new dissertation topic. He put his University of Connecticut students through two semesters of preparation and planning, complete with classroom discussions and practice hikes. Warren had acquired from Don West the belief that people could unite to achieve a common goal. One of the group’s objectives was for all 19 people to finish the trail together __ and they did. For this hike, Warren developed the concept of having a support van meet the group nearly every day. That way, people could hike with day packs, walking more miles each day, and squeezing in the entire trail between the spring and fall semesters. “I had a vision of a new world where people walk together and leave no one behind,” he said.
While many 2,000-milers give moving testimony to the profound positive effects of a thru-hike, these effects have proven difficult to measure. In Warren’s doctoral dissertation, standard psychological tests were unable to measure changes in students resulting from the 1975 group thru-hike. But Warren could point to claims by participants that powerful changes had indeed taken place. They were more confident of their physical endurance, mental discipline, and tolerance of other people.
Before his second group thru-hike in 1977, he created an interdisciplinary course covering the Appalachians, flora and fauna, mental and physical preparations for the trail, and other topics. This was the only one of his four expeditions from which people dropped out, one each in Vermont and New Hampshire. He also led groups in 1980 and 1990. A member of his 1975 group, Kirk Sinclair, led another group hike in 1983. A group scheduled to hike in 1995 began forming in 1992. (Editor’s note: That group finished together successfully.)
Testaments to Warren’s physical feats are a staple of trail legends. Albie Pokrob was hiking near Pearisburg, Virginia, when he ran into Warren. Warren asked if Albie wanted to drive to Connecticut for a slide show. Albie said he didn’t want to be gone so long; his trail friends would hike ahead in the meantime. Warren promised to get him back by the next morning. Warren did all but one hour of the 28 hours of driving, putting on a 90-minute slide show in between.
Warren is known for being among the most frugal of hikers. Before his last thru-hike he went to the Salvation Army and bought six pairs of sneakers for one dollar a pair __ and used only three.
“Katahdin is my holy mountain. I try to climb it at least twice a year,” Warren said. He still does long day-hikes, including an annual “Damascus by Dawn” 64-mile trip. Another of his trips was the “Winter Wipeout,” in which he climbed the seven highest peaks in New England and New York in five days.
Warren has now complete the A.T. 10 times, including his early speed hike, five group hikes, and four section hikes. Even still, “I always seek new things on the trail. That’s why I keep walking,” he said. “It’s healthy for me. It’s a leisure activity that’s also goal oriented. That’s my religion, that’s my faith.” He loves swimming in the streams along the way, playing, having fun. “It’s a giant playground,” he said. “Every day I can pick out three or four wonderful things. I wouldn’t want to hike the trail if it wasn’t fun.”
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