Category: Essays & Stories

Author’s Note: This story appeared in the September 9, 2021 online edition of The Adirondack Almanack. “Adirondack lean-tos are so much more than simple cedar log structures built in the woods.” “The Bull Rush Bay lean-to is scheduled some time later this month to be demolished and replaced.”     ...

“The untold story of how the Adirondack Park Agency’s scheme blocked the Environmental Conservation Department team from certain canoe racing victory” **********       The year was 1977. I was 13 years old. It was the summer before I entered my freshman year at Saranac Lake High School.  My Dad,...

Author’s note: This story appeared in The Adirondack Almanack’s Friday, August 13th, 2021 online edition. “While many pickled pepper’s Peter Piper may have indeed picked, I sometimes ponder: How many pickled pecks would have Piper picked if perhaps Peter were instead picking dill pickle pike.”      My first youthful...

Author’s note: I penned this story several weeks back, right after my son RJ & I came out of what (as can be seen in the photo above of RJ kayaking into camp) after a very wet start, turned out to be a great 4th of July weekend in...

A Great Pre-Cooked First Night Camp Meal ********** *Author’s Note: As we all eagerly look forward to packing our gear and heading into camp, I thought I’d share a Monroe family “1st Night in Camp” meal tradition: “Hunter’s Stew”.      I first drafted this piece shortly after my “Cliff...

(All Loon Photography Courtesy of Peggy Ivimey) *An edited version of Serenade of the Loon appeared in the Adirondack Almanack’s April 12, 2021, on-line edition. *A Brief Author’s Note: I first drafted “Serenade of the Loon” several years back. I had plans to submit it to Adirondack Life magazine,...

Author’s Note: This story was published in The Adirondack Almanack’s December 3, 2021, online edition.      It was getting late. Time measured by the near empty whiskey bottle and battalion of “dead soldier” beer bottles standing in neatly rowed formation on the floor in one corner of the cabin....

********** This was actually the last in a series of stories I submitted to Adirondack Life Magazine. They declined it. Their staff’s advice to me at that point was, “Dick, you should take all your fun tales and stick them in an album to share with your grandkids.” I...

“Beware! He’s Watching.” **********      His ears suddenly perked up. He lifted his head, put his nose to the air. He could smell it almost as soon as he heard the boat’s engine cut off.      “Humans.” His keen nose soon confirmed it.  The mixed aroma of campfire smoke,...

“Don’t heed the voice and put shovel to earth, unless mentally prepared to uncover the truth.” ********** “African-Americans made up approximately twenty five percent of the U.S. Navy during the War of 1812. In July, 1813, Commodore Isaac Chauncey reported “nearly 50 blacks” on board his flagship, the General...