March 27

Sherwood treads the late-season snow on Steam Sawmill Hill, an isolated protuberance in the Chenango Valley between North Norwich and Sherburne, NY, in 1962. These short, slender trees were, to me, what a hardwood forest looked like, but they really represented an immature recovery. From the mid-1800's until the early-mid 1900's, this land was cleared farmland. AfterWorld War II, its rocky, hilly terrain made it less and less profitable in the new age of industrial farming, so it gradually returned to forest. This photo was taken just a few decades after the land's abandonment to its original form; today, its woods are a closer approximation to what Natty Bumpo might have felt comfortable in.

Notice that my young self's boots leave no tracks in the snow. What that means will be left to the reader's imagination.

Date: March, 1962
Location: Chenango County, New York
By: LH