Mount Tremper
Encyclopedia
Mount Tremper, officially known as Tremper Mountain and originally called Timothyberg, is one of the Catskill Mountains
in the U.S. state of New York. It is located near the hamlet of Phoenicia
, in the valley of Esopus Creek
.
At 2740 feet (835.2 m) in elevation, it is well below the higher peaks
of the region. Its slopes were a source of two major local products during the 19th century: hemlock bark, a source of tannin
, and bluestone used in construction. Later it was the site of Tremper House, one of the Catskills' earliest railroad resorts. Henry Ward Beecher
and Oscar Wilde
were among the guests there.
In the 20th century it was acquired by the state and became part of the Catskill Park Forest Preserve
. Its location in the Esopus Valley between the northern and southern Catskills made it an ideal place for a fire lookout tower
, which still stands on the mountain's summit. The Mount Tremper Fire Observation Station
has been restored
and listed on the National Register of Historic Places
. Hikers often follow the old road to it from Phoenicia, also a section of the Long Path
long-distance trail, to enjoy the views from the tower.
on the southwest and the Beaver Kill on the southeast. The latter three are closely paralleled by state highway
s 214
, 28
and 212
. Its summit dominates the view from westbound Route 28 at the small hamlet of Mount Tremper
.
The mountain's lower slopes are gentle, becoming steep around 2200 feet (670.6 m) and then leveling off again at the summit ridge. Unnamed tributaries of the surrounding creeks run down narrow valleys on the mountain's slopes. The summit ridge continues northeast to an unnamed summit and then Carl Mountain, both higher than Tremper at 2820 feet (859.5 m) and 2880 feet (877.8 m) respectively.
Most of the mountain is within the Town of Shandaken
, whose largest population center, the hamlet of Phoenicia, is at the southwest foot of the mountain. Another smaller settlement named after the mountain is to its south. A small portion of the mountain's lowest eastern slopes is within Woodstock
. Most of the land on the mountain is part of the Phoenicia Wild Forest management unit of New York's Forest Preserve
, part of the Catskill Park. The rest, including most of the slower slopes, is privately owned. The public land is managed by the state Department of Environmental Conservation
(DEC).
, Tremper was formed not through the upthrust of rock layers but by the gradual erosion of stream valleys in an uplifted region about 350 mya. Its rock layers and bedrock are primarily Devonian
and Silurian
shale
and sandstone
. Bluestone is present in enough quantity that a quarry
was once located on the south side of the mountain at an elevation of 1495 feet (455.7 m). Its remains are still visible today from the old road to the fire tower, which passes it.
, hickory
and pine
species, with some basswood and poplar
scattered in lower elevations. Chestnut
were once common as well, but most died off in the blight
of the early 20th century. Some Eastern hemlocks, once more widespread before they were harvested for their tannin
-rich bark, remain, primarily higher on the mountain where the barkpeelers never reached. The summit ridge has some areas of the northern hardwood forest (beech
, birch
and maple
) more common on higher Catskill slopes. The more shade-tolerant
northern hardwoods are slowly invading the southern hardwoods as an understory
; due to the cessation of human intervention in the forest they will eventually displace the southern hardwoods.
Tremper has a typical assortment of animal life for the Catskills. Herbivores such as white-tailed deer
, chipmunk
s and porcupine
s dominate the lower end of the food chain, with predators like fishers
and black bear
at the top. The ledges in the former quarry are one of the few rattlesnake
habitats in the Catskills close to a hiking trail, with at least one confirmed den, and visitors should exercise caution if they wish to explore it.
of the Catskills. The area was first settled in the 1780s. Its location near the creeks and valleys made it ideal for barkpeeling, the first major industry of the Catskills. Bark from the many Eastern hemlocks on its slopes was a rich source of tannin
, and leather hides were often brought to the region to be tanned
. The creek valley made it possible to easily transport them to and from the Hudson River
at Kingston
to the east, and the later development of the Ulster and Delaware Railroad
(UDRR) made it even easier. The road up the south side of the mountain, which forest historian Michael Kudish
calls the best example of an extant bark road in the Catskills, was built for this purpose. By the end of the century, since a synthetic process for creating tannin had made it less necessary to harvest large acres of forest, it was being used for quarrying instead.
The railroad made another industry possible at that time. In 1879, after hotelier Jacob Tremper opened the Tremper House, a resort on its slopes near Phoenicia, that part of the mountain became known by his name, He invited a number of prominent clergymen of the time to its dedication. Henry Ward Beecher
, the main speaker, asked for God's blessing on the location and predicted a prosperous future. Another celebrity guest, Oscar Wilde
, shocked the region during a lecture at the Tremper House in 1882 when he proclaimed its location at the foot of the mountain aesthetically preferable to those of hotels such as the Catskill Mountain House
located on mountaintops since in valleys, "there the picturesque and beautiful is ever before you".
It remained in business until 1904, when the town, under pressure from UDRR magnate Samuel Coykendall, who owned several competing resorts, rescinded permission for it to become a sanatorium
for tuberculosis
patients. Coykendall, and other hoteliers in the region, alleged that tourists would avoid the region if those patients were present anywhere within it. The vacant hotel buned down four years later, in 1908, and was never rebuilt.
A decade earlier, the legislation that created the state's Forest Preserve
, with its "forever wild" clause, had been added to the state constitution
. The state acquired Tremper's summit and some of the other land on its eastern slope in 1901, and established a plantation there for reforestation
. A mix of eastern white pine
, Norway spruce
and Scots pine
were planted. Unusually for the Catskills, the underlying land was not former pasture
but forest that had been cut and burned repeatedly by barkpeelers. It did not establish itself although the land eventually reforested on its own.
pickers every year through 1916, the year the state built the 47 feet (14.3 m) fire lookout tower
on the mountain and extended the old board road to make it accessible for observers
coming by vehicle. It replaced another tower that had briefly stood on Slide Mountain, the Catskills' highest peak, a few years earlier. Tremper was chosen since it offered views of the lowlands that could not be seen so easily from the fire towers on Hunter
and Belleayre
mountains.
In 1921 the state bought more of the mountain, allowing it to designate the road as a hiking trail
. By 1931 it had been extended beyond the tower as a footpath, descending the northeast side of the mountain into Hoyt Hollow to Willow. Later in the 1930s a lean-to
was built at the summit for backpackers
to camp in.
This trail system remained unchanged for most of the mid-20th century, save for the construction of a new lower section of trail and a trailhead
about 0.3 mile (500 m) east of the foot of the road just outside Phoenicia. When the dormant idea of the Long Path
was revived in the 1960s, the trail over Tremper was included. A wayward campfire
led in 1966 to a wildfire
that burned 10 acres (4 ha) just below the summit. Four years later the state closed the tower.
In 1976 the state purchased some more land along the trail and built another lean-to at 2100 feet (640.1 m), along the trail below the summit. The next year the tower's two support structures, the observer's cabin and a storage shed, were removed. These were the last significant changes to facilities on Tremper for two decades.
At the end of the century interest in restoring
and preserving the fire tower led to a local fundraising campaign after DEC proposed to remove it as a structure incompatible with the Forest Preserve. It was reopened in spring 2001 and listed on the National Register in late 2001. A new extension of the Long Path along the ridge past Carl Mountain to Plateau Mountain
was opened that year as well.
, the former bark road extended to the fire tower, is a widely used route to Tremper's summit. Blazed
with red plastic DEC markers, it begins 1.6 miles (2.6 km) south of Phoenicia along Old Route 28 (now Ulster County Route 40), across from the Esopus. It joins the old road after a half-mile (1 km) and follows it through several switchback
s past the old quarry, a spring
, the Baldwin Memorial Lean-To and another spring. It reaches the lean-to and fire tower at 2.8 miles (4.5 km), after climbing nearly 2,000 vertical feet (610 m) from the trailhead.
Less used is the approach from the northeast via the Willow Trail. Its yellow markers begin at the intersection of Jessup and Silver Hollow roads in Willow. It follows Jessup for a mile (1.6 km) before turning into the woods and ascending the south wall of Hoyt Hollow 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to its end at the blue-blazed Warners Creek Trail (also the Long Path). From there the summit and fire tower are 2.2 miles (3.5 km) to the south. This route requires less vertical ascent (1640 feet (499.9 m)) but is longer (3.8 miles (6.1 km)). Hikers sometimes park cars at both Willow and Phoenicia to do a 7-mile (10.2 km) shuttle hike across the mountain.
The Warners Creek Trail also makes a long approach possible from Stony Clove Notch
to the north. It is 7.6 miles (12.2 km) from the parking area on Route 214 to Tremper's summit, with the trail going over one mountain and up the north slope of Tremper from Warners Creek.
Catskill Mountains
The Catskill Mountains, an area in New York State northwest of New York City and southwest of Albany, are a mature dissected plateau, an uplifted region that was subsequently eroded into sharp relief. They are an eastward continuation, and the highest representation, of the Allegheny Plateau...
in the U.S. state of New York. It is located near the hamlet of Phoenicia
Phoenicia, New York
Phoenicia is a hamlet in Ulster County, New York, United States. The population was 381 at the 2000 census.Phoenicia is located in the northeast part of Town of Shandaken, on Route 28. It is the largest community in the town...
, in the valley of Esopus Creek
Esopus Creek
Esopus Creek is a tributary of the Hudson River that drains the east-central Catskill Mountains of the U.S. state of New York. From its source at Winnisook Lake on the slopes of Slide Mountain, the Catskills' highest peak, it flows across Ulster County to the Hudson at Saugerties. Many tributaries...
.
At 2740 feet (835.2 m) in elevation, it is well below the higher peaks
Catskill High Peaks
The Catskill High Peaks are all of the mountains in New York's Catskill Mountains above 3,500 ft in elevation whose summits are separated either by one-half mile or a vertical drop of at least 250 ft between it and the next nearest separate summit...
of the region. Its slopes were a source of two major local products during the 19th century: hemlock bark, a source of tannin
Tannin
A tannin is an astringent, bitter plant polyphenolic compound that binds to and precipitates proteins and various other organic compounds including amino acids and alkaloids.The term tannin refers to the use of...
, and bluestone used in construction. Later it was the site of Tremper House, one of the Catskills' earliest railroad resorts. Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher was a prominent Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, abolitionist, and speaker in the mid to late 19th century...
and Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
were among the guests there.
In the 20th century it was acquired by the state and became part of the Catskill Park Forest Preserve
Forest Preserve (New York)
New York's Forest Preserve is all the land owned by the state within the Adirondack and Catskill parks, managed by its Department of Environmental Conservation. These properties are required to be kept "forever wild" by Article 14 of the state constitution, and thus enjoy the highest degree of...
. Its location in the Esopus Valley between the northern and southern Catskills made it an ideal place for a fire lookout tower
Fire lookout tower
A fire lookout tower, fire tower or lookout tower, provides housing and protection for a person known as a "fire lookout" whose duty it is to search for wildfires in the wilderness...
, which still stands on the mountain's summit. The Mount Tremper Fire Observation Station
Mount Tremper Fire Observation Station
Mount Tremper Fire Observation Station is a historic fire observation station located on Mount Tremper at Shandaken in Ulster County, New York. The station and contributing resources include a , steel frame lookout tower erected in 1917 and a jeep trail that extends from the base of the mountain...
has been restored
Building restoration
Building restoration describes a particular treatment approach and philosophy within the field of architectural conservation. According the U.S...
and listed on the National Register of Historic Places
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places is the United States government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects deemed worthy of preservation...
. Hikers often follow the old road to it from Phoenicia, also a section of the Long Path
Long Path
The Long Path is a long-distance hiking trail beginning at the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey and currently ending at Altamont, New York, in the Albany area...
long-distance trail, to enjoy the views from the tower.
Geography
Tremper is a sprawling mountain at the south end of a range of low-elevation peaks between Warners Creek and Silver Hollow on the north, Stony Clove Creek on the west, Esopus CreekEsopus Creek
Esopus Creek is a tributary of the Hudson River that drains the east-central Catskill Mountains of the U.S. state of New York. From its source at Winnisook Lake on the slopes of Slide Mountain, the Catskills' highest peak, it flows across Ulster County to the Hudson at Saugerties. Many tributaries...
on the southwest and the Beaver Kill on the southeast. The latter three are closely paralleled by state highway
State highway
State highway, state road or state route can refer to one of three related concepts, two of them related to a state or provincial government in a country that is divided into states or provinces :#A...
s 214
New York State Route 214
New York State Route 214 is a short but scenic state highway in the heart of the Catskill Park. It runs north–south from near the hamlet of Phoenicia up near an old railroad route into the narrow pass known as Stony Clove Notch, then down into the upper Schoharie Creek valley to end...
, 28
New York State Route 28
New York State Route 28 is a state highway extending for in the shape of a "C" between the Hudson Valley city of Kingston and southern Warren County in the U.S. state of New York. Along the way, it intersects several major routes, including Interstate 88 , U.S. Route 20 , and the...
and 212
New York State Route 212
New York State Route 212 is a state highway located entirely within Ulster County. It runs from the interior of the Catskill Park to the west bank of the Hudson River, providing a key interchange with the New York State Thruway along the way.It visits the picturesque and historic villages of...
. Its summit dominates the view from westbound Route 28 at the small hamlet of Mount Tremper
Mount Tremper, New York
Mount Tremper is a populated place in Ulster County, New York, USA. Mount Tremper is situated to the east of New York State Route 28 and to the north of New York State Route 212 within the Catskill Park. The community is located at...
.
The mountain's lower slopes are gentle, becoming steep around 2200 feet (670.6 m) and then leveling off again at the summit ridge. Unnamed tributaries of the surrounding creeks run down narrow valleys on the mountain's slopes. The summit ridge continues northeast to an unnamed summit and then Carl Mountain, both higher than Tremper at 2820 feet (859.5 m) and 2880 feet (877.8 m) respectively.
Most of the mountain is within the Town of Shandaken
Shandaken, New York
Shandaken is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States. United States. As of the 2000 census, the town had a total population of 3,235. The name is from a native phrase for "land of rapid waters."...
, whose largest population center, the hamlet of Phoenicia, is at the southwest foot of the mountain. Another smaller settlement named after the mountain is to its south. A small portion of the mountain's lowest eastern slopes is within Woodstock
Woodstock, New York
Woodstock is a town in Ulster County, New York, United States. The population was 5,884 at the 2010 census, down from 6,241 at the 2000 census.The Town of Woodstock is in the northern part of the county...
. Most of the land on the mountain is part of the Phoenicia Wild Forest management unit of New York's Forest Preserve
Forest Preserve (New York)
New York's Forest Preserve is all the land owned by the state within the Adirondack and Catskill parks, managed by its Department of Environmental Conservation. These properties are required to be kept "forever wild" by Article 14 of the state constitution, and thus enjoy the highest degree of...
, part of the Catskill Park. The rest, including most of the slower slopes, is privately owned. The public land is managed by the state Department of Environmental Conservation
New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation is responsible for the conservation, improvement, and protection of natural resources within the U.S. state of New York. It was founded in 1970, replacing the previous Conservation Department...
(DEC).
Geology
Like the Catskills as a whole, a dissected plateauDissected plateau
A dissected plateau is a plateau area that has been severely eroded so that the relief is sharp. Such an area may be referred to as mountainous, but dissected plateaus are distinguishable from orogenic mountain belts by the lack of folding, metamorphism, extensive faulting, or magmatic activity...
, Tremper was formed not through the upthrust of rock layers but by the gradual erosion of stream valleys in an uplifted region about 350 mya. Its rock layers and bedrock are primarily Devonian
Devonian
The Devonian is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic Era spanning from the end of the Silurian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya , to the beginning of the Carboniferous Period, about 359.2 ± 2.5 Mya...
and Silurian
Silurian
The Silurian is a geologic period and system that extends from the end of the Ordovician Period, about 443.7 ± 1.5 Mya , to the beginning of the Devonian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya . As with other geologic periods, the rock beds that define the period's start and end are well identified, but the...
shale
Shale
Shale is a fine-grained, clastic sedimentary rock composed of mud that is a mix of flakes of clay minerals and tiny fragments of other minerals, especially quartz and calcite. The ratio of clay to other minerals is variable. Shale is characterized by breaks along thin laminae or parallel layering...
and sandstone
Sandstone
Sandstone is a sedimentary rock composed mainly of sand-sized minerals or rock grains.Most sandstone is composed of quartz and/or feldspar because these are the most common minerals in the Earth's crust. Like sand, sandstone may be any colour, but the most common colours are tan, brown, yellow,...
. Bluestone is present in enough quantity that a quarry
Quarry
A quarry is a type of open-pit mine from which rock or minerals are extracted. Quarries are generally used for extracting building materials, such as dimension stone, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, and gravel. They are often collocated with concrete and asphalt plants due to the requirement...
was once located on the south side of the mountain at an elevation of 1495 feet (455.7 m). Its remains are still visible today from the old road to the fire tower, which passes it.
Flora and fauna
Because of its low elevation, the forests on Mount Tremper are dominated by a forest type referred to in the Catskills as southern hardwoods. This is dominated by oakOak
An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus Quercus , of which about 600 species exist. "Oak" may also appear in the names of species in related genera, notably Lithocarpus...
, hickory
Hickory
Trees in the genus Carya are commonly known as hickory, derived from the Powhatan language of Virginia. The genus includes 17–19 species of deciduous trees with pinnately compound leaves and big nuts...
and pine
Pine
Pines are trees in the genus Pinus ,in the family Pinaceae. They make up the monotypic subfamily Pinoideae. There are about 115 species of pine, although different authorities accept between 105 and 125 species.-Etymology:...
species, with some basswood and poplar
Poplar
Populus is a genus of 25–35 species of deciduous flowering plants in the family Salicaceae, native to most of the Northern Hemisphere. English names variously applied to different species include poplar , aspen, and cottonwood....
scattered in lower elevations. Chestnut
American Chestnut
The American Chestnut is a large, deciduous tree of the beech family native to eastern North America. Before the species was devastated by the chestnut blight, a fungal disease, it was one of the most important forest trees throughout its range...
were once common as well, but most died off in the blight
Chestnut blight
The pathogenic fungus Cryphonectria parasitica is a member of the ascomycota category, and is the main cause of chestnut blight, a devastating disease of the American chestnut tree that caused a mass extinction in the early 1900s of this once plentiful tree from its historic range in the eastern...
of the early 20th century. Some Eastern hemlocks, once more widespread before they were harvested for their tannin
Tannin
A tannin is an astringent, bitter plant polyphenolic compound that binds to and precipitates proteins and various other organic compounds including amino acids and alkaloids.The term tannin refers to the use of...
-rich bark, remain, primarily higher on the mountain where the barkpeelers never reached. The summit ridge has some areas of the northern hardwood forest (beech
Beech
Beech is a genus of ten species of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia and North America.-Habit:...
, birch
Birch
Birch is a tree or shrub of the genus Betula , in the family Betulaceae, closely related to the beech/oak family, Fagaceae. The Betula genus contains 30–60 known taxa...
and maple
Maple
Acer is a genus of trees or shrubs commonly known as maple.Maples are variously classified in a family of their own, the Aceraceae, or together with the Hippocastanaceae included in the family Sapindaceae. Modern classifications, including the Angiosperm Phylogeny Group system, favour inclusion in...
) more common on higher Catskill slopes. The more shade-tolerant
Shade tolerance
In ecology, shade tolerance is a plant's abilities to tolerate low light levels. The term is also used in horticulture and landscaping, although in this context its use is sometimes sloppy, especially with respect to labeling of plants for sale in nurseries....
northern hardwoods are slowly invading the southern hardwoods as an understory
Understory
Understory is the term for the area of a forest which grows at the lowest height level below the forest canopy. Plants in the understory consist of a mixture of seedlings and saplings of canopy trees together with understory shrubs and herbs...
; due to the cessation of human intervention in the forest they will eventually displace the southern hardwoods.
Tremper has a typical assortment of animal life for the Catskills. Herbivores such as white-tailed deer
White-tailed Deer
The white-tailed deer , also known as the Virginia deer or simply as the whitetail, is a medium-sized deer native to the United States , Canada, Mexico, Central America, and South America as far south as Peru...
, chipmunk
Chipmunk
Chipmunks are small striped squirrels native to North America and Asia. They are usually classed either as a single genus with three subgenera, or as three genera.-Etymology and taxonomy:...
s and porcupine
Porcupine
Porcupines are rodents with a coat of sharp spines, or quills, that defend or camouflage them from predators. They are indigenous to the Americas, southern Asia, and Africa. Porcupines are the third largest of the rodents, behind the capybara and the beaver. Most porcupines are about long, with...
s dominate the lower end of the food chain, with predators like fishers
Fisher (animal)
The fisher is a medium-size mammal native to North America. It is a member of the mustelid family, commonly referred to as the weasel family. The fisher is closely related to but larger than the American Marten...
and black bear
American black bear
The American black bear is a medium-sized bear native to North America. It is the continent's smallest and most common bear species. Black bears are omnivores, with their diets varying greatly depending on season and location. They typically live in largely forested areas, but do leave forests in...
at the top. The ledges in the former quarry are one of the few rattlesnake
Rattlesnake
Rattlesnakes are a group of venomous snakes of the genera Crotalus and Sistrurus of the subfamily Crotalinae . There are 32 known species of rattlesnake, with between 65-70 subspecies, all native to the Americas, ranging from southern Alberta and southern British Columbia in Canada to Central...
habitats in the Catskills close to a hiking trail, with at least one confirmed den, and visitors should exercise caution if they wish to explore it.
History
Tremper's human history has two stages. For the century after the area's first settlement it was primarily an economic resource, sustaining several industries. Since the end of that period it has become a recreational resource.1780–1900: Barkpeeling, quarrying and hotels
The mountain was first known as Timothyberg, in the vernacular of the early Dutch settlersDutch colonization of the Americas
Dutch trading posts and plantations in the Americas precede the much wider known colonization activities of the Dutch in Asia. Whereas the first Dutch fort in Asia was built in 1600 , the first forts and settlements on the Essequibo river in Guyana and on the Amazon date from the 1590s...
of the Catskills. The area was first settled in the 1780s. Its location near the creeks and valleys made it ideal for barkpeeling, the first major industry of the Catskills. Bark from the many Eastern hemlocks on its slopes was a rich source of tannin
Tannin
A tannin is an astringent, bitter plant polyphenolic compound that binds to and precipitates proteins and various other organic compounds including amino acids and alkaloids.The term tannin refers to the use of...
, and leather hides were often brought to the region to be tanned
Tanning
Tanning is the making of leather from the skins of animals which does not easily decompose. Traditionally, tanning used tannin, an acidic chemical compound from which the tanning process draws its name . Coloring may occur during tanning...
. The creek valley made it possible to easily transport them to and from the Hudson River
Hudson River
The Hudson is a river that flows from north to south through eastern New York. The highest official source is at Lake Tear of the Clouds, on the slopes of Mount Marcy in the Adirondack Mountains. The river itself officially begins in Henderson Lake in Newcomb, New York...
at Kingston
Kingston, New York
Kingston is a city in and the county seat of Ulster County, New York, USA. It is north of New York City and south of Albany. It became New York's first capital in 1777, and was burned by the British Oct. 16, 1777, after the Battles of Saratoga...
to the east, and the later development of the Ulster and Delaware Railroad
Ulster and Delaware Railroad
The Ulster and Delaware Railroad Company was a Class I railroad located in New York State, headquartered in Rondout and founded in 1866. It was often advertised as "The Only All-Rail Route To the Catskill Mountains." At its greatest extent, the U&D ran from Kingston Point, on the Hudson River,...
(UDRR) made it even easier. The road up the south side of the mountain, which forest historian Michael Kudish
Michael Kudish
Michael Kudish is an author, railroad historian, forester, and retired professor. He received his Ph.D. in 1971 from the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry at Syracuse. His dissertation, on the history of Catskill forests, was the beginning of a lifelong...
calls the best example of an extant bark road in the Catskills, was built for this purpose. By the end of the century, since a synthetic process for creating tannin had made it less necessary to harvest large acres of forest, it was being used for quarrying instead.
The railroad made another industry possible at that time. In 1879, after hotelier Jacob Tremper opened the Tremper House, a resort on its slopes near Phoenicia, that part of the mountain became known by his name, He invited a number of prominent clergymen of the time to its dedication. Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher
Henry Ward Beecher was a prominent Congregationalist clergyman, social reformer, abolitionist, and speaker in the mid to late 19th century...
, the main speaker, asked for God's blessing on the location and predicted a prosperous future. Another celebrity guest, Oscar Wilde
Oscar Wilde
Oscar Fingal O'Flahertie Wills Wilde was an Irish writer and poet. After writing in different forms throughout the 1880s, he became one of London's most popular playwrights in the early 1890s...
, shocked the region during a lecture at the Tremper House in 1882 when he proclaimed its location at the foot of the mountain aesthetically preferable to those of hotels such as the Catskill Mountain House
Catskill Mountain House
The Catskill Mountain House was a famous hotel near Palenville, New York in the Catskill Mountains overlooking the Hudson River Valley, built in 1824. In its prime, from the 1850s to the turn of the century, it was visited by three U.S. presidents The Catskill Mountain House was a famous hotel...
located on mountaintops since in valleys, "there the picturesque and beautiful is ever before you".
It remained in business until 1904, when the town, under pressure from UDRR magnate Samuel Coykendall, who owned several competing resorts, rescinded permission for it to become a sanatorium
Sanatorium
A sanatorium is a medical facility for long-term illness, most typically associated with treatment of tuberculosis before antibiotics...
for tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
patients. Coykendall, and other hoteliers in the region, alleged that tourists would avoid the region if those patients were present anywhere within it. The vacant hotel buned down four years later, in 1908, and was never rebuilt.
A decade earlier, the legislation that created the state's Forest Preserve
Forest Preserve (New York)
New York's Forest Preserve is all the land owned by the state within the Adirondack and Catskill parks, managed by its Department of Environmental Conservation. These properties are required to be kept "forever wild" by Article 14 of the state constitution, and thus enjoy the highest degree of...
, with its "forever wild" clause, had been added to the state constitution
Constitution
A constitution is a set of fundamental principles or established precedents according to which a state or other organization is governed. These rules together make up, i.e. constitute, what the entity is...
. The state acquired Tremper's summit and some of the other land on its eastern slope in 1901, and established a plantation there for reforestation
Reforestation
Reforestation is the natural or intentional restocking of existing forests and woodlands that have been depleted, usually through deforestation....
. A mix of eastern white pine
Eastern White Pine
Pinus strobus, commonly known as the eastern white pine, is a large pine native to eastern North America, occurring from Newfoundland west to Minnesota and southeastern Manitoba, and south along the Appalachian Mountains to the northern edge of Georgia.It is occasionally known as simply white pine,...
, Norway spruce
Norway Spruce
Norway Spruce is a species of spruce native to Europe. It is also commonly referred to as the European Spruce.- Description :...
and Scots pine
Scots Pine
Pinus sylvestris, commonly known as the Scots Pine, is a species of pine native to Europe and Asia, ranging from Scotland, Ireland and Portugal in the west, east to eastern Siberia, south to the Caucasus Mountains, and as far north as well inside the Arctic Circle in Scandinavia...
were planted. Unusually for the Catskills, the underlying land was not former pasture
Pasture
Pasture is land used for grazing. Pasture lands in the narrow sense are enclosed tracts of farmland, grazed by domesticated livestock, such as horses, cattle, sheep or swine. The vegetation of tended pasture, forage, consists mainly of grasses, with an interspersion of legumes and other forbs...
but forest that had been cut and burned repeatedly by barkpeelers. It did not establish itself although the land eventually reforested on its own.
1900–present: Hiking destination
The Timothyberg side of the mountain was regularly burned over by blueberryBlueberry
Blueberries are flowering plants of the genus Vaccinium with dark-blue berries and are perennial...
pickers every year through 1916, the year the state built the 47 feet (14.3 m) fire lookout tower
Fire lookout tower
A fire lookout tower, fire tower or lookout tower, provides housing and protection for a person known as a "fire lookout" whose duty it is to search for wildfires in the wilderness...
on the mountain and extended the old board road to make it accessible for observers
Fire lookout
A fire lookout is a person assigned the duty to look for fire from atop a building known as a fire lookout tower. These towers are used in remote areas, normally on mountain tops with high elevation and a good view of the surrounding terrain, to spot smoke caused by a wildfire.Once a possible fire...
coming by vehicle. It replaced another tower that had briefly stood on Slide Mountain, the Catskills' highest peak, a few years earlier. Tremper was chosen since it offered views of the lowlands that could not be seen so easily from the fire towers on Hunter
Hunter Mountain Fire Tower
The Hunter Mountain Fire Tower is located on the summit of the eponymous mountain, second highest of the Catskill Mountains in the U.S. state of New York. It was the first of 23 fire lookout towers built by the state in the region, and the next-to-last of the five still standing to be...
and Belleayre
Belleayre Ski Center
Belleayre Ski Center, in Catskill Park in the United States, is owned and operated by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation...
mountains.
In 1921 the state bought more of the mountain, allowing it to designate the road as a hiking trail
Trail
A trail is a path with a rough beaten or dirt/stone surface used for travel. Trails may be for use only by walkers and in some places are the main access route to remote settlements...
. By 1931 it had been extended beyond the tower as a footpath, descending the northeast side of the mountain into Hoyt Hollow to Willow. Later in the 1930s a lean-to
Lean-to
A lean-to is a term used to describe a roof with a single slope. The term also applies to a variety of structures that are built using a lean-to roof....
was built at the summit for backpackers
Backpacking (wilderness)
Backpacking combines the activities of hiking and camping for an overnight stay in backcountry wilderness...
to camp in.
This trail system remained unchanged for most of the mid-20th century, save for the construction of a new lower section of trail and a trailhead
Trailhead
A trailhead is the point at which a trail begins, where the trail is often intended for hiking, biking, horseback riding, or off-road vehicles...
about 0.3 mile (500 m) east of the foot of the road just outside Phoenicia. When the dormant idea of the Long Path
Long Path
The Long Path is a long-distance hiking trail beginning at the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey and currently ending at Altamont, New York, in the Albany area...
was revived in the 1960s, the trail over Tremper was included. A wayward campfire
Campfire
A campfire is a fire lit at a campsite, to serve the following functions: light, warmth, a beacon, a bug and/or apex predator deterrent, to cook, and for a psychological sense of security. In established campgrounds they are usually in a fire ring for safety. Campfires are a popular feature of...
led in 1966 to a wildfire
Wildfire
A wildfire is any uncontrolled fire in combustible vegetation that occurs in the countryside or a wilderness area. Other names such as brush fire, bushfire, forest fire, desert fire, grass fire, hill fire, squirrel fire, vegetation fire, veldfire, and wilkjjofire may be used to describe the same...
that burned 10 acres (4 ha) just below the summit. Four years later the state closed the tower.
In 1976 the state purchased some more land along the trail and built another lean-to at 2100 feet (640.1 m), along the trail below the summit. The next year the tower's two support structures, the observer's cabin and a storage shed, were removed. These were the last significant changes to facilities on Tremper for two decades.
At the end of the century interest in restoring
Building restoration
Building restoration describes a particular treatment approach and philosophy within the field of architectural conservation. According the U.S...
and preserving the fire tower led to a local fundraising campaign after DEC proposed to remove it as a structure incompatible with the Forest Preserve. It was reopened in spring 2001 and listed on the National Register in late 2001. A new extension of the Long Path along the ridge past Carl Mountain to Plateau Mountain
Plateau Mountain (New York)
Plateau Mountain is a mountain located in Greene County, New York.The mountain is part of the Devil's Path range of the Catskill Mountains.Plateau has a two-mile-long summit ridge above ....
was opened that year as well.
Access
The Phoenicia Trail, part of the Long PathLong Path
The Long Path is a long-distance hiking trail beginning at the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, New Jersey and currently ending at Altamont, New York, in the Albany area...
, the former bark road extended to the fire tower, is a widely used route to Tremper's summit. Blazed
Trail blazing
Trail blazing, or trailblazing, is the practice of marking paths in outdoor recreational areas with blazes, markings that follow each other at certain — though not necessarily exactly defined — distances and mark the direction of the trail...
with red plastic DEC markers, it begins 1.6 miles (2.6 km) south of Phoenicia along Old Route 28 (now Ulster County Route 40), across from the Esopus. It joins the old road after a half-mile (1 km) and follows it through several switchback
Hairpin turn
A hairpin turn , named for its resemblance to a hairpin/bobby pin, is a bend in a road with a very acute inner angle, making it necessary for an oncoming vehicle to turn almost 180° to continue on the road. Such turns in ramps and trails may be called switchbacks in American English, by analogy...
s past the old quarry, a spring
Spring (hydrosphere)
A spring—also known as a rising or resurgence—is a component of the hydrosphere. Specifically, it is any natural situation where water flows to the surface of the earth from underground...
, the Baldwin Memorial Lean-To and another spring. It reaches the lean-to and fire tower at 2.8 miles (4.5 km), after climbing nearly 2,000 vertical feet (610 m) from the trailhead.
Less used is the approach from the northeast via the Willow Trail. Its yellow markers begin at the intersection of Jessup and Silver Hollow roads in Willow. It follows Jessup for a mile (1.6 km) before turning into the woods and ascending the south wall of Hoyt Hollow 1.5 miles (2.4 km) to its end at the blue-blazed Warners Creek Trail (also the Long Path). From there the summit and fire tower are 2.2 miles (3.5 km) to the south. This route requires less vertical ascent (1640 feet (499.9 m)) but is longer (3.8 miles (6.1 km)). Hikers sometimes park cars at both Willow and Phoenicia to do a 7-mile (10.2 km) shuttle hike across the mountain.
The Warners Creek Trail also makes a long approach possible from Stony Clove Notch
Stony Clove Notch
Stony Clove Notch is a narrow pass, roughly 2,220 feet in elevation located in the Town of Hunter in Greene County, New York, deep in the Catskill Mountains. It is traversed by New York State Route 214, although in the past the Ulster and Delaware Railroad went through it as well.The notch divides...
to the north. It is 7.6 miles (12.2 km) from the parking area on Route 214 to Tremper's summit, with the trail going over one mountain and up the north slope of Tremper from Warners Creek.