Mount Holyoke
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Mount Holyoke (elevation 940'/286m) is the western-most peak of the Mount Holyoke Range State Park located in the Connecticut River Valley of western Massachusetts and is the namesake of nearby Mount Holyoke College.
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[edit] Origin of name
The mountain was named after Elizur Holyoke. Contrary to some records, the city of Holyoke, Massachusetts and Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (now Mount Holyoke College) were both named after the nearby Mount Holyoke and not directly after Elizur Holyoke.
[edit] Location
Mt. Holyoke is the home of J.A. Skinner State Park which is accessible from RT-47 in Hadley. While the Mt. Holyoke Range extends into the towns of Belchertown, Granby, Amherst, Hadley and South Hadley, Mt. Holyoke itself straddles just Hadley and South Hadley.
[edit] Grounds and history
At the summit is the historic Prospect House, an old hotel first opened in 1851. It was the first of several other mountain houses on nearby mountains including Mt. Nonotuck, Mt. Tom, and Mt. Sugarloaf.
In its heyday, a steamer would pick up guests at the Smiths Ferry railroad station across the Connecticut River in what was then Northampton, ferry them to a tramway leading to the Half Way House. From there guests could take a steep inclined tram to the summit. The Prospect House was expanded twice, first in 1861 and again in 1894. The 1894 annex was badly damaged in the Great Hurricane of 1938 and demolished. Soon after Joseph Allan Skinner donated the hotel and the surrounding land to the State on the condition it become a state park. The dedication ceremony was held on June 19, 1940. In 1942 the enclosed tramway to the summit house broke down. A heavy snow storm in 1948 collapsed sections of the roof. Despite proposals to repair the tram it never ran again. The tram was finally demolished in 1965.
State funds for maintenance of the summit house during the 1950s and 1960s were never adequate and by the mid-1970s there were proposals to condemn and demolish the summit house. This led to a public outcry and in the mid-1980s the summit house, consisting of the original 1851 structure and the 1861 addition, was restored by the state. The summit house is now open to the public only on weekends or for special events such as a summer concert series sponsored by the Friends of the Mount Holyoke Range (FOMHR).
The summit house with its wide porch and nearby picnic grove offer a spectacular view of the Connecticut River Valley. The park is typically open from late May to mid-October and during this time one may use the steep and windy auto road that leads to the summit. Hiking is permitted 12 months of the year.
[edit] Trivia
- Every year in October since 1838, students from nearby Mount Holyoke College participate in Mountain Day. On this day, at the sound of ringing bells from Abbey Chapel on a random Autumn morning, all classes are cancelled for that day and students hike to the summit of Mount Holyoke [1].
- On May 27, 1944, a B-24, flying a night training mission out of Westover Air Force Base in Chicopee, MA, crashed into the top of the mountain, killing all ten crewmen.
- A section of the Metacomet-Monadnock Trail, which starts near Meridian, CT and runs to Mount Monadock in NH, runs along the ridgeline of the Mt. Holyoke Range. In June 2001 the National Park Service designated sections of the trail on the Mt. Holyoke Range ridgeline as a "National Recreational Trail".
- Skinner State Park shares the mountain range with another state park: the Mt. Holyoke Range State Park. Its visitor center is located at the "Notch"... where RT-116 crosses the range.
- In the 1950s, the United States Air Force built and operated a backup command and control facility buried deep in the mountain operated by personnel assigned to Westover AFB.[2]
