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N.H. remembers Old Man of the Mountain
State makes an effort to preserve the face-like granite formation, tourism
 | Old Man of the Mountain, then and now. The granite formation continues to crumble and lose its distinctive profile. |
Jim Cole / AP file |
FRANCONIA NOTCH, N.H. - The majestic Old Man of the Mountain kept watch over New Hampshire for thousands of years. Richard and Carolynn Hansen missed it by five months.
The couple from Ukiah, Calif., had wanted to see New England's fall foliage for years, so in early 2003, they booked their flight and plotted their itinerary. High on their list of destinations was the Old Man of the Mountain — a massive, naturally formed granite profile that had been attracting tourists to Franconia Notch since the early 1800s and had become integral to the state's identity.
And they weren't deterred when the 40-foot-high ledges crumbled 1,200 feet to the ground just months before their arrival.
"It was a given that you have to go there. It's like a pilgrimage," said Richard Hansen, 54, the marketing director for an Internet service provider. "So in spite of the fact that Mother Nature had taken its toll on it, we still made the trek over there to make sure we saw it, or at least get an idea and perception of where it was."
The Old Man crumbled on May 3, 2003, and five years later, it's tough to get a clear picture of how the collapse has affected tourism in the White Mountains or to predict whether a planned memorial for the site will continue to lure visitors. But the few statistics available, coupled with anecdotal evidence, suggest that that unlike the Hansens, some tourists are staying away.
Sales at an ice cream shop near the Old Man site dropped 68 percent between the summers of 2002 and 2006, according to statistics from the state Department of Resources and Economic Development. The number of riders on the Cannon Mountain Aerial Tramway decreased 25 percent, and visitors to the Flume, a natural granite gorge featuring waterfalls, glacial boulders and historic covered bridges, fell 23 percent.
Mark Okrant, director of the Institute for New Hampshire Studies at Plymouth State University, notes that all those numbers already were declining before the Old Man fell and that other factors — mainly weather — could account for the fluctuations. But he does believe tourism has suffered.
"Anecdotally, we are hearing that business has not been good since the Old Man fell in the communities immediately north of the notch. And frankly, while I was skeptical about the impact right after it happened, I am no longer skeptical," said Okrant, whose institute researches state tourism trends. "I do believe that the Old Man's falling has had a negative impact on the visitor traffic north of Franconia Notch."
Dick Hamilton, who retired in 2005 after decades spent promoting the White Mountains as a tourist destination, said even before the Old Man's fall, he noticed a reduced interest in the Old Man and the state's other natural attractions.
Hamilton is on the board of directors of the Old Man of the Mountain Legacy Fund, which is raising money to build a memorial. Construction hasn't begun yet, but the design calls for five granite stones — including the largest ever quarried in North America — to be placed in such a way that when they are viewed from a raised platform, they merge into one form evoking the outline of the rock profile.
In addition to the stone monoliths, a gateway consisting of stones held in place by cables and turnbuckles will be constructed to honor the Old Man's caretakers, who used such equipment to secure its uppermost rocks for decades.
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