288 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
LAprtl 10, 1897. 
MEN I HAVE FISHED WITH. 
XXXVni.-Alvah Dunning. 
Only men who possess strongly markerl personalities are 
capable of making strong friends and as equally strong ene- 
mies. The truth of this has been "well shown in the replies 
to lettf rs asking for informatioa about the old woodsman 
who is probably the oldest of Adirondack guides. Carefully 
sifting these replies, it seems that Alvah is well liked by 
sportsmen wliom he has served, and by a few dwellers in and 
around the great rfgiou of mountains and lakes which com- 
prise about one-third of the great State of New York. 
Others dislike him, and among Adirondack guides he is, for 
some reason, the most unpopular man in the woods. To me 
any old mao in the woods is interesting, and as individuality 
crops out more strongly in men who have never assumed the 
mask of civilization, we will try to see him. with unpreju- 
diced eyes. 
Alvah will be eighty one years old nfxt June. He is tall, 
spare and wiry. A look at his picture, taken a few years 
ago by Stoddard, will show that his .?troDg;y marked f ^ce is 
full of character, prit and determination, and it looks lik'^ a 
i'ace that could not be developed outside the woods You 
can see that he dressed himself before he would pose for 
Stoddard, and that his new hat must be "taken" at all haz- 
ards. That is not the hat that the old man wouM wear 
when tracking a deer or poking through the brush up a 
stream to observe where the otter '"uses." This proves that 
Alvah is really human and has his vanities as well as the rest 
01 mankind. 
It was in 186.5 that I first met Alvah. and 
fished for trout with him in the Brown Tract 
Inlet and Eacquette Lake, I was then regain-, 
ing health after a long struggle all summer, 
and a couple of weeks with Alvah put on the 
finishing touches. 
The old man— he was "old" to me then — 
tools good care of me, and I returned much 
improved His talk of woods life was very 
entertaining, and it was only a few weeks 
afterward that I became acquainted with his 
mortal enemy, jSTed Buntline. also a fishing 
companion, so that 1 got Alvah's story while 
it was fresh. Friends of each man have so 
mixed up the case that it resembles the his- 
tories of Bonararte as writtea by a French or 
an English pen. 
Although these sketches appear in the col- 
umns of ' Sea and River Fishing,'' there has 
been no attempt to tell fishing stories; the 
idea of the writer being to sketch the charac- 
ters of men with whom he had incidentally 
fished; and if upon any occasion he had sat 
upon one end of a log for ten minutes with a 
man who was fishing on the other end, then 
the other fellow was his victim for sketching 
as one of the "Men I Have Fished With," and 
his pen-poi'trait published so that his individ- 
uality might stand out, if the pen was able to 
make it prominent. 
Therefore, my trouting on this trip is 
skipped and the man is taken up. Said he: 
"These woods is a-gitttin' too full o' people 
fer comfort — that is, in summer time; rer 
they don't bother the Irsppin' in the winter; 
but they're a-runnin' all over here in summer 
a-shootin' an' a-fishin', but they don't kill 
much, nor catch many lith; but they git in the • 
way, an' they ain't got no business here dis- 
turbin' the woods." 
"They pay yru well for working fcr them, 
don't they, Alvah f 
"Yes, they do, durn *cmf or I wouldn't 
bother with 'em; but I druther thty'd stay out 
o' my woods. They'll come anyhow, an" I 
might as well guide 'em, fer ef I don''t some un 
else will, but 1 druther they'd keep their 
money and stay out of the woods. 1 can 
make a livin' without 'em, an' they'^d starve 
to death here without me. The j 're the 
durndest lot of cur'osities you ever seen; know 
more about guns an' killin' deer than any man 
in the woods, but when it comes to fishin' 
tackle you'd oughter see it." 
This talk occurred after we had fished sev- 
eral da^s and had looked over the otter "uses" and other 
interesting things to be found in the wilderness^ and the old 
man's remarks seemed to be so severely personal that they 
provoked me to say: "1 am very sorry to have disturbed 
you, and will go back home in the morning." 
The old man looked up and said: "I didn't mean ycu; 
'cause you seem to know how to sit inter a boat an' to know 
the voices of the birds an' how to fish. Now don't you go 
an' take a meanin' outer my words that I didn't mean!" 
"All right, Alvah! But if these people don't kill much 
game or fish they can't disturb you much, and I'm a little 
curious to know why you object bo much to their coming 
here. The woods belong largely to the State, and they cer- 
tainly have the right to come into them." This had the 
desired effect; it made the old man angry and drew his 
fire. 
"Yes," he said, after turning the thing over inhis mind in 
the deliberate manner common to mm of the woods, "that's 
the worst of it; they've got a right to come here and disturb 
men who've made their homes in these woods all their hves, 
and many of 'em 's fools. I hate fools, don't you?" 
Here was a chance to classify fools and to quote Touch- 
stone: "1 met a foolin the forest;" but that course might 
not have drawn the old man out, so I simply said : "I dunno,. 
why?" 
"Oh, they pester one so. A few years ago one came up 
here and tried to make me believe the world is round and. 
turns over upside down in the night, and they all believe it, 
all of 'em, every durned one that I've spoke to about it. 
What d' ye think o' that?" 
"1 think they're wrong, of course, for we can see that 
these lakes don't spill out in the night. Yet this world 
can't be as flat as a pancake, for here are the mountains 
which disprove that, and as for turning over — " 
"You don t believe it?" 
"Not a word of it!" And we were friends. 
"When we met again in 1883 he recalled the trip, and at 
his camp on Racquette Lake he said: "Times is different 
now, an' wus. In them days nobody said a word if a poor 
man. wanted a little meat an' killed it. but now they're a- 
eavin' it until the dudes gel time to come up here an' kill it. 
an' some of 'em leave a deer to tot in the woods, an' on'y 
take the horns ef it's a buck, or the tail ef it's a doe, just 
so's they can brag about it when they go home, an' they'd 
put me in jail ef I killed a deer when I needed meat. 1 
dunno what we're a-comin' to in this free country." 
There was nothing to be said on this subject and I said it. 
When dinner time came he called me from the lake, and as 
we two sat at table said : "There's some cold boiled ham 
and here's a stew o' mountain mutton. Mebbeit's agin your 
principles to eat our mutton in June, so I sot out the ham. 
I'm goin' to eat the mutton, you can do as you like," 
Ham can be had at any lunch counter. The deer had 
been killed, and a refusal to eat a portion of it would not 
restore it to life. Writing of it at this late day recalls 
Wilmot Townsend's picture of the flight of fourteen ducks 
and the ciuery below: "Where would you hold?" The 
Lady or the Tiger? 
While Alvah is unpopular with many of the modern 
woodsmen, he has warm friends, and this proves that he has 
sterling qualities in his manly make-up which are overlooked 
by those who revile himi as "an old pot-hunter." In the mass 
of letters from men who know him this term occurs three 
times and proves the statement that begins this biography. 
Alvah Punning still lives and is well worth a visit from any 
man who loves to study a type of man which is rapidly 
passing. Mr. Charles H. Bennett, the well-known Adiron- 
dack boat, now of The Antlers, on Racquette Lake, takes 
it upon himself that the old man shall be cared for in the 
winter; and Mr. J. H. Higby, who runs the summer camp on 
Big Moose Lake, also keeps an eye out for this last of the 
ALVAH DUNNING. 
Prom photograph, copyright, 1891, by J. R. Stoldard. 
old-timers of a period before the Adirondacks became a 
fashionable resort. 
Forty years ago Alvah and one of his brothers visited 
relatives at Albany, 111., and his brother died there. That 
one visit satisfied Alvah with the outside world and he re- 
turned to Lake Pleasant, and since that time he has never 
been outside of Hamilton county, N, Y., where he has 
lived by hunting, trapping and guiding. The younger 
generation are disposed to crowd the old man out of the 
woods on account of his following his belief that game is 
free at all times to those who need it and that the State has 
no right to pass laws concerning it. In conversation with 
me, my old friend and guide E. L. Sheppard ("Jack") said: 
"I have known Alvah for thirty years, and he is an attable, 
hospitable man of the old style, all of whom looked on 
garne laws as infringements on the rights of men T^ho live in 
the woods. He is the last of a tjrpe that has passed. He 
kills a deer when he needs it, catches a trout out of sea'^on 
to bait his trap, firmly believes it a sin to kill wastefully, 
and destroys less game than many who cry out against him." 
There you have the opinion of one of the best of the Adir- 
ondack guides, as well as a picture of the man. 
Mr. Bennett, of The Antkrs, tells me that Alvah will not 
write any more, but in a recent ioterview with him he got 
the following from Alvah : "In 1858 Ned Buntline came 
into the woods to get away from civilization and write 
novels. Ned built a cabin on Eagle Lake which he calJed 
Eagle's Nest and hired Alvah to work for him. They 
quarreled and Ned killed Alvah's hounds and they threatene d 
to kill each other. In 18()5 Alvah built a camp on Racquette 
Lake, where he lived alone, trapping, drawing his fur on a 
hand sled fifty-five miles to Boonville and bringing back 
provisions. It took a week to make the trip. One winter 
his skins of otter, fisher, marten, mink and bear brought 
him $743. In 1874 his camp on Sunny Island was burned 
and he lost everything he owned. That fall he built a camp 
on Eighth Lake, Fulton Chain, to get out of the way of 
travel, but in a few years returned to Racquette and built at 
Brown's Tract Inlet, where he now lives, a much dis- 
gruntled man, who says the people are wandering all over 
and spoiling the woods. Fifty years ago the Adirondacks 
was indeed a wilderness known to hut a few sportsmen. 
There were but few boats in it and no mode of travel except 
by water. Here Alvah Dunning lived, hunted and reigned 
supreme in 'his woods.' " 
Alvah's father was also a hunter, and in 1804 tnoved fronr 
Vermont to Lake Pleasant, in Hamilton county, N. Y , 
where Alvah was born a dozen years later. If there is any- 
thing in heredity Alvah had the advantage of it, for his. 
father was not only a trapper, but also a noted Indian fighter 
under Sir William Johnston Vefore and during thg Revolu- 
tionary War. Shoitly after that war a few men were in a 
village tavern talking over Revolutionary exploits when an 
Indian — of whom there were several in the company — boast- 
ed of having committed a particularly atrocious miirder of a 
young white woman who had lived in the vicinity during 
the war. Dunning caught up a bundle of traps thai lay near 
him and crushed the Indian's skull by a single blow". He 
was tried for his life and acquitted. With such a father 
and such an environment, the younger Dunning naturally 
became a perfect woodsman. 
Rev. Thomas Qt. Wall, D.D., of New York city, to 
whom much of the inf(rmaiion in this sketch is due, says: 
"Dunning has lived like an Indian, and forty years ago he 
looked like one, and is a very close imitation of some of 
Cooper's models— silent, stealthy in movement, f\ill of le- 
sources; he could almost speak the language of the animals. 
I have seen him, by a peculiar chipper, call a mink from 
its hiding place in the rocks and shoot it, and have known 
him to bring a deer back into the water by bleating and mak- 
ing the noise of wading. Dunning was a true sportsman, 
never allowing more fish or game to be taken 
than was needed. He was employed by our 
party in 1856, when I first met him, and 1 have 
been with him many times since, and always 
enjoyed his society. Indeed, his excellence, 
when in his prime, was so generally known 
that it excited much of the enmity with which 
he was regarded by some, for if he could be 
had he was always first choice." 
When I met Alvah the last time — some 
half d( zen years ago— he was living in the 
past. The future had nothing in store but the 
destruction of the forests, or, what was as bad, 
their being lun over by tourists or the build- 
ing of expensive "camps" by wealthy men. 
The good times were in the distant past, when 
he never snw a strange face unless he went 
into the si ttlements. "They're puttin' steam- 
boats on the lakes to scare the trout to death, 
an' have built a railroad into Old Forgo. 
They've put a lot o' black bass into Racquette 
Lake to eat up the few trout that's lett^ an' 
what good anyone sees in a black bass is 
raort'n I know." 
To encourage him to ta^k, I said: "The 
black bats is a gamy fish — not as gamy nor as 
good for table as a trout — and I suppose they 
thought 'em better'n no fish ;" and to I excused 
the crime of putting bass in Adirondack 
waters just to see what Alvah would say. 
He said: "They ain't a bit better than a 
sucker out of a cold brook, either to eat or to 
bait a trap and as for game — well, 1 fish for 
fish when I want 'em, an' don't fool away my 
time playin' a trout, lettin' him run off an' 
then reelin' him up just to see the pole bend. 
When I hook a fish I use tackle that will 
stand it and bring him in 'thout watchin' his 
fightin' qualities, but I show him seme of 
mine if he's got lime to think about 'em afore 
he's my fish. No, sir, them black bass is the 
worst thing they could have put in these 
waters— worse'n pickerel, for the young pick- 
erel can be eaten by a trout because his fins 
are soft, but these bass are like big suufish, 
and not a bit better." 
The old man was not far out of the way in 
this matter. Pie had watched the new tish, 
and sized them up in his own fashion. The 
State Fish Commission had put the fish in the 
waters— or rather Seth Green did it in the 
name of the Commission, for in that early day 
be ran the work as he pleased— but the result 
was a howl, and a law was passed restraining 
the Commission from planting certain fishes 
in Adirondack waters. 
About this time there was a discussion in the papers as to 
the scream of the panther, as the North American cougar, 
or puma, is called in the East, and while 1 was positive that 
I had heard one when a boy T wanted tne opinion of the old 
woodsman, and as he was baiting his hook I said: "Some 
people say that a panther screams and others say it never 
does. What's your opinion?" / 
He unhooked a trout and replied: "A panther is like a 
cat, hunts like a cat, always still. Now a cat is a silent 
animal and never makes a noise unless it wants something. 
A dog will bark just to hear his own voice, but a cat 'II lie 
around the stove for a week and never make a sound unless 
it needs something. If it's hungry it may meow a little 
just to let you know it, but that is different from a mating 
call. Now, when the panther wants to find one of its kind 
it can get up a good loud screech. It's got to, for they ain't 
plenty and that call has got to go miles through the woods. 
Yes, they can put up a good stiff call for a partner when 
they want one, but Ihey don't do it often A man might be 
in these woods a hundred years and not hear a panther call 
moi'fc'n half a dezen times. They don't do it often and they 
are never plenty, like deer and bears. " 
"How long since there were any wolves in the Adiron- 
dacks, Alvah?" 
"Wall, I don't just know azackly. When I was a boy 
they was common an' you could hear 'em howl o' nights 
along the lakes or up the mountains, an' we used to shoot 
'em an' trap 'em, but never did no p'izinin', like the' do cut 
West. Let's seel They was plenty up to about the time 
Gineral Taylor died. When was that?" 
' That was in 1850." 
"The wolves went off about that time; some said they 
went into Canada an' some thought they died. I guess if 
they'd a died we'd a seen some o' their bones som'ers, but a 
few was around here durin' the war, in the 60,3, an' 1 killed 
a big one then, but ain't seen none since. Some men say 
they've seen 'em o' late years off toward the Saranacs, but I 
can't say. While the war was goin' on there wa'n't so many 
men comin' to the woods an' things picked up a little." 
Last fall the New York published an account of "the 
last Adirondack moose." According to the writer of it the 
