Alvah Dunning, photograph by Seneca Ray Stoddard, 1891.

COURTESY OF THE ADIRONDACK MUSEUM, BLUE MOUNTAIN LAKE, NY.

Lloyd Blankman

The following account of the Adirondacks’ most primitive man appeared in the Utica Saturday Globe about 1897.

Alvah Dunning is a type of a fast-vanishing class of men. They may only be found in a new country and disappear with the advance of civilization. Cooper immortalized them in his character of Natty Bumppo, the hero of the Leather-Stocking Tales. They are the men of the woods, the hunters and trappers, simple, honest, hardy folk who live close to nature and who find contentment in the solitudes of the forest, with the bear, the deer and the panther for companions. You can find a few of them yet in the backwoods of Maine, the Adirondacks and the Rocky Mountain wilderness, but before another generation they will have passed away, as has the moose and the buffalo.

Most Famous Alvah Dunning is the most famous of Adirondack guides and hunters. Famous men have followed him through the forests and streams of the great New York wilderness and have slept in his cabin on Raquette Lake. The snows of 83 winters have fallen upon him, but he is still hardy as the oak. Dunning was born in the woods of Hamilton County, where his father was a trapper. His home has always been among the trees. For years he lived on Long Lake, but more than half a century ago he built a camp on an island in beautiful Raquette Lake, and there he lives his simple, lonely life. Around him, on the lake shores, are the luxurious cottages of the rich who come from the cities to the woods in summer and bring their fashions with them. But, though he mingles with these people, Alvah is uncontaminated by the habits of civilization. He is the primitive child of nature, who knows every tree, every flower, every animal of the forests, and who finds in them more to satisfy him than in the arts of society.

Last Moose

Dunning killed the last moose in the Adirondacks 32 years ago. He killed the last panther eight years ago. He may put a bullet through the last wolf, only a few of which are left. Black bear are still quite common, but these and deer are all that remain of the big animals that roamed through the Adirondacks in Dunning’s younger days. The number of beasts which his gun has brought down, not counting smaller game like foxes, mink, otter and birds, will reach far into the thousands. He killed 102 panthers in eight years. The biggest catch of fish was made by him in 1833, when he pulled 96 pounds of salmon trout out of Piseco Lake in two hours. The largest salmon trout on record was caught by Alvah’s hook and it weighed 27½ lbs. Writer’s Friend Dunning was long the friend and guide of the famous writer, “Adirondack Murray,” whose tales of life in the woods have fascinated many, and the old woodsman has been the original of some of his characters. A picture of Dunning seated beside his cabin door with his faithful dogs at his side and five dead deer in the background attracted much attention at the World’s Fair.