Author Archives: Gary Sanderson

A South Deerfield, Mass., native, Gary was the longtime sports editor at the Greenfield Recorder, a daily newspaper in Greenfield, Mass., where he retired in June 2018, having worked parts of five decades over 39 years. A senior-active, nearly 40-year member of the New England Outdoor Writers Association and the Outdoor Writers Association of America, his Thursday column "On The Trail" ran for nearly 40 years, ostensibly focusing on fish and wildlife, conservation and issues pertaining to them in the Connecticut Valley, where his roots reach deep into its oldest burial grounds. He and wife Joanne live in a historic Greenfield Meadows tavern today known as Old Tavern Farm, which has a rich history dating back to the mid-18th century. The home, which became a National-Register-of-Historic-Places building on his watch, served as a small, seasonal bed and breakfast from 1999-2015. Gary's other interests include history, anthropology, archaeology, literature, genealogy, Americana, country auctions, and early-American architecture and landscapes, as well as hunting, fishing and especially reading. His primary focus is the Pioneer Valley, its people, places and critters.

Wipeout

A neighbor and I were on our way to Halifax, Vt., Saturday morning when, coming around the corner to a small East Colrain produce farm, we were confronted by an unexpected catastrophe. Farmer and friends were standing on the driveway below his hillside home, marooned from West Leyden Road by a muddy torrent as wide as […]

Tommy

I went through the wake, the funeral and a reception, spoke to many and wrote only ”Andy, 13” in my notebook. He’s Tommy Valiton’s grandson, lives in Austin, Texas, left an indelible impression. I spotted the boy with the kind, smiling eyes opposite me in the J-shaped greeting line and knew immediately who he was. […]

Keeping Up

If you want to find out where you stand physically, try following two enthusiastic English Springer Spaniels through dense, wet, tangled cover for the first few days of the pheasant season. It’ll put you in you place fast if you’ve made your living sitting behind a desk for any length of time. So I guess […]

No Holding Back

Sometimes a story changes abruptly and forces a ”touch-up” like this one did late Tuesday afternoon. It was supposed to be a tale about a lean and leggy four-month-old pup’s first pheasant hunt, the trials and tribulations of a mere baby trying to learn a new game while figuring out how to maneuver through dense, […]

Free & Easy

After enduring the frightful years of parenting difficult adolescents, you tend to forget the joys of young, sponge-brained, preschool boys, eager to absorb whatever you throw at them. Then, if you’re lucky, a grandson arrives and drops a refresher course right into your breadbasket. This past weekend was a case in point, when Jordan Steele […]

How Many’s Too Many?

For pure pleasure and optimal efficiency, you can’t beat one flush-and-retrieve bird dog between two hunters combing a dense, wet, thorny covert. When the dog’s working between the two of you and under control, a flush is usually a kill. But when the gun dog “makes game” and trails a running bird left or right […]

Cy’s Cellar

People often ask why I write about locations I’m unwilling to pinpoint. The answer is simple: Maps draw crowds that compromise special places, which soon lose their sacred status, be they fishing holes, deer stands, strut zones or historic sites buried under a forest canopy. I found such a site just this week, one I […]

Peter’s Grief

There was nothing unusual at the start of our telephone conversation last week, me at my Recorder desk, he his New Salem home, after dark. Pretty typical for my rambling chats over the years with Peter Mallett, brainchild/promoter in chief of the Miller River Fishermen’s Association. An affable sort, he’s always been upbeat and enthusiastic […]

River Ramble

Yes, the brook’s roaring, the songbirds’re singing, the snowbanks’re shrinking, and my last load of cordwood’s drying ever so slowly, stacked under the eaves of the sunny carriage sheds. No, it isn’t time for stream-fishing here in the northern tier of Franklin County. Too much snow, way too much, in fact; even worse, annoying mud […]

Rebel Retreat

An undisturbed snowplow ridge told the story: It had been months since a four-wheeled vehicle had driven the aboriginal trail that became a Colonial path, then a well-used thoroughfare from Williamsburg to Conway until discontinued around 1950. Because the mud season hadn’t yet arrived, I decided to give it a shot, convinced I’d stay atop […]

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