National Park After Dark - The Lost Boy: Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument

Episode Date: March 4, 2024

In July 1939 12-year-old Donn Fendler was separated from his group while hiking Mount Katahdin. What ensued was one of the largest search operations in Maine state history and became a legendary story of one little boy’s will to survive.For the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!Thank you to this week’s partners!IQBAR: Text PARK to 64000 to get 20% off all IQBAR products and free shipping.BetterHelp: National Park After Dark is sponsored by BetterHelp. Get 10% off.Prose: Use our link for a free in-depth hair consultation and 50% off your first subscription order.For a full list of our sources, visit http://npadpodcast.com/episodes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Limitless. Now open your eyes. Go to Monday.com. Start for free and finally. Breathe. Girl, winter is so last season. And now Springs got you looking at pictures of tank tops with hungry eyes. Your algorithm is feeding you cutoffs. You're thirsty for the sun on your shoulders.

That perfect hang on the patio sundress. Those sandals you can wear all day and all night. And you've had enough of shopping from your couch. Done hoping it looks anything like the picture when you tear up on that envelope. It's time for a little in-person spring treat. It's time for a trip to Ross. Work your magic. Every life or death situation ultimately comes down to those two outcomes.

You will survive or you will perish. When people find themselves in those types of events, whether it be a natural disaster, accident or a violent crime, it is often not what we have that makes a difference, but what we think. Our brains can often be the most important tool for survival. State of mind often makes all the difference. In his 2010 book Survivors Club, The Secrets and Science that Could Save Your Life, Ben Sherwood lists 12 survival traits, psychological strengths that survivors consistently draw upon. Among them are adaptability, faith, resilience, hope, love, purpose, empathy, tenacity, and instinct. The will to survive is something all survivors have, and the key to that will lies in one's attitude.

your state of mind is everything, even if it feels as though all is lost, and so are you. Welcome to National Park After Dark. I wonder if I was the only one who was thinking when you were listing off all the traits that survivors typically have. I'm like, okay, do I have that? Do I have this one? Nope. No. I think you have the positive thinking.

I think I have that one. I think you have love, empathy, hope, for sure. You're like, tenacity, I don't know. I don't know. My survival's not looking really great. I don't know. You have like a very positive. Well, that's the thing.

It's like positivity. And I think that you emulate that overall. So you're welcome. Wow, what a great way to start this episode. I love it. I love this episode. This is so nice. Amazing.

And it's taking place in our home region in New England. So I hope you like it even more. Oh, I love going back to New England for some episodes. All right. So I don't think we have anything to really catch up on. It's hard when we do recording sometimes to like kind of shoot the shit in the beginning because Cassie and I talk all day long. So it's like, hi. Again.

Hey, I just saw you 20 minutes ago. But how are you? How are you? I'm good. How am I? I just burst into tears. It's like, okay, scratch that. Never mind.

You know, like when someone there's, what is it? It's like, you could say, how are you? But if you say, are you okay? It's over. It's over. It's over. I'm pursed to tears. Yeah. I know. I like the, how are you doing today? I think instead of like, how are you in the generalized sense? Because that's so complex. So to just be like, how are you doing today is, I think a lot easier to answer honestly than just being like, how are you? I like that. Yeah. Just a little rephrase of the, just add a word. The question. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. All right, well, I'm going to just tell you a story. I'm ready. The story I'm sharing today is actually a recommendation that two or three people have requested over the last few months. So I decided that I would go ahead and cover it, even though it's kind of your bread and butter and it's a survival story. I love hearing survival stories, though. You can tell you. Tell me as many survival stories as you want. I'm here for it.

Well, this is the only one I have planned for now. So we're going to go back to the year 1939. Albert Einstein and President Roosevelt began the Manhattan Project. Eugene Weidman was the last person to be publicly executed by guillotine in France. Gandhi wrote a letter to Adolf Hitler urging him to prevent a war. And Don Fendler was vacationing in Maine with his family. The Fenler family consisting of 12-year-old Don and his twin brother Ryan, their younger brother Tom, his father, Donald, and his mother Ruth had a home in Rye, New York, which is right along the Long Island Sound. But the Fendlers rented it out every summer so that they could escape up to Lake Sebastik in Maine, which was their favorite place to be.

Mr. Fendler ran a business in New York City, and he sent his family ahead of him that year. He called in early July and asked if Don and his brothers would like to go. go on an overnight fishing trip when he arrived in the following weeks. Roughly a week later, the trip took shape and on July 17th, Mr. Fendler, Don, Tom, and Ryan were sitting around a fire at the Katodin stream campground with their companions. They were joined by family friends, 17-year-old Henry Condon, the son of a local guide, and a young man named Fred Eaton. Henry had suggested that they spent the following day hiking out Mount Katan,

the state's highest peak, coming in at roughly roughly four. 5,267 feet. It was agreed upon in the following day shortly after lunch, they took off to make their ascent. So let's get familiar with the area before we move forward because I know a lot of New Englanders are really familiar with this area, but if you're not, the campground that they were staying at, Katodin's stream and the mountain they hiked Mount Katodin are located in the north woods of Maine within Baxter State Park. However, there is a national park tie in later, I promise you. There will be one. There will be one. In 1920. And actually, so I have never been to Baxter, have you? I was going to ask you that. No, I have been, I've been saying this for so many summers, I feel like, where, like, I'm going to go hike Katadden. I'm going to go out there. But it's, I want to say it's almost seven hours from my house. So it's not, it's not an easy drive to get to. But I have, I have friends who have worked up there. I have friends who have completed the AT.

and have hike Katadden and I've heard such good things about it that I want to. But you've never been there either, right? I have not. Nope. And it's a place that has a really interesting origin story, well, not origin story because we all know there's a lengthy indigenous history there. But as far as the establishment of the state park, that has a really unique story. In 1920, Percival Baxter, who would later become one of the governors of Maine, participated in an expedition up Mount Katodin that was dispatched to determine if the area would be a feasible national park site. And during that expedition, he fell in love with the mountain in the area. And the national park proposal eventually went flat, but Mr. Baxter was really determined to protect the area in any way that he could. He said of

the area, quote, man is born to die. His works are short-lived. Buildings crumble, monuments decay, wealth vanishes. But Kataddin and all its glory forever shall remain the mountain of the people of Maine. So he used his personal wealth to begin purchasing land from various entities in the area. A lot of them were like timber companies and just different companies that had leases on the land. And he donated them to the state of Maine with the condition that the land be used as a park and would be left forever wild. He continued to do this, like buying up little pieces of land and patchworking it together for over three decades. So he started in 1931 and that was when the park was first established. and the park today sits at roughly 209,000 acres of expansive idyllic main wilderness.

Wow. And Mr. Baxter's contributions account for roughly 200,000 of those acres. So all but 9,000? Yeah. Wow. That's wild. He bought that much land. That's really cool.

And he went a step further because he wanted to keep this area protected, even long after he was gone, this forever wild kind of mantra he had. So he left a trust of nearly $7 million to ensure that the park management had sufficient funds to continue on, at least for a little while, without having to even compete with tax dollars and other things like that. So he really set this area up for success. And his vision for keeping this place wild has come to life. Within its boundaries, there is no electricity and facilities within the park are considered to be truly rustic. Roughly 60,000 visitors come annually to experience. over 40 peaks and ridges, 215 miles of trails, backcountry campsites, and various lakes, streams, and rivers.

The wildlife here is diverse and includes moose, black bear, white-tailed deer, hawks, eagles, fisher cats, coyotes, and beaver. As the park lies within the northern forest region, the climate is typically wet. It averages about 37 inches of precipitation and 100 inches of snow a year. Wow. It's pretty far north, so that makes sense. It's true, yeah. Record lows have plummeted to 45 degrees below zero, and record highs have soared to nearly 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Spruce, maple, and birch blanket the landscape that is also home to the northernmost 10 miles of the Appalachian Trail, or the AT, kind of like you mentioned before.

Katahdin is the most notable feature of the park, meaning the greatest mountain. Katadin was named by the local indigenous peoples who called the area home for centuries, the Pinabscot. Although the mountain was and continues to be held sacred by the Malacete, Micmac, and Pasamaquoddy nations as well as the Penobscot. So there's a lot of different nations that really revere this mountain. And traditionally, the Penobscot lived in the surrounding regions of Katan, but were really wary of climbing to its peak. They believed that an evil spirit called Pomola resided there, meaning he who curses the mountain, Pomola is frequently described as a gigantic bird. like creature with the head of a moose and is associated with bad weather conditions like snow, cold weather, and severe storms. The Pinabscot believed that if they summited Ketodan, they would

either be killed or devoured by this evil spirit. So in order to appease him, they would provide offerings of food. In the early 1800s, ignoring the warnings of the Penobscots, American and European surveyors set their sights on the summit. In August of 1804, two native guides were hired for an expedition to the summit and they guided the expedition, showed them the ropes, but they themselves refused to ascend completely with the rest of their group, which then went on to become the first documented non-native summit of the mountain. Over a century later, Don Fenler was on his way to make his own summit attempt. The group took the hunt trail from their campground leading right up to the summit.

The trail, which is nearly 11 miles out and back, is a very popular. one and considered to be quite challenging, but the group was making good time and ran into no issues. Don and Henry in particular were the fastest hikers of the group and were often in the lead. And roughly a mile to the top, Don turned to his father and asked if it was okay to leave the group and go ahead with Henry. Mr. Fendler agreed, but with a warning, don't leave Henry. The boys made record time and stood atop the summit. The view was expansive and they could see for miles. enjoying the scenery, Henry glanced back behind them and called Don's attention. Just beyond them were large, dark, looming clouds, and they were rolling in quickly. Suddenly, they found themselves

in the thick of the clouds with mist surrounding them like a blanket, providing very small breaks in which they were offered a small window of views until it was quickly shut again by the fog. And that reminds me of our... Mooselock? Where were we? Moosealock. I know exactly what you're thinking. Yep. I have a picture at the summit with the dogs. I'm like, I hear the views are great, and it's just like this wall of fog behind me.

I just remember we did that hike at Moose Lock for people who aren't familiar is up in northern New Hampshire in the White Mountains, and it's one of the 4,000 footers. And Danielle and I did it with hopes of seeing beautiful views of the white mountain. Foliage. Foliage. I had this fall. fall yeah it was just like supposed to be a beautiful day in fall we were really excited that's when we got lost on too sure did so it was supposed to be i think eight miles round trip is that right something it was or maybe it was

11 miles round trip something like that but anyway it took us 16 miles according to our phones after we had walked wherever we walked i'm not sure but we got to the top and it was complete cloud cover Like so much cloud cover, we couldn't see 20 feet in front of us. Yeah. And on the way up, it was fine. Yeah. The way up was beautiful. It was great.

Yep. And then we got locks on the way down. And not because of the weather. I think we were just, I don't know what happened. There's multiple trail systems up there that connect to the summit. And I think what happened is we hopped on some other trails that later connected to where we were supposed to be or something. I don't know.

And I think we turned around at one point and went back. It's just, yeah, that whole. Yeah, it was a mess. I think if I can find it, I'll post it for this episode. I know what you're going to say. I have this video of Katzzi just like laying on the ground at the end. We were at where even were we? Some like lodge or at the bottom of the mountain there's a lodge. I think it was closed at the time because there was no one there. And I was laying on the ground yelling call 911. Because then we weren't even close to our car. Remember that? Because there were so many people there that day, we had to park far away from the trailhead. It was just a mess. It's a good story now. Yeah.

Thankfully, Chaska was good. My dog Chaska right now is having a lot of arthritic issues. But back then, he was a young spry man and could make it. But if not, I would have been carrying him on my back. Oh, my God, that would have been. No, both the boys were with us and they loved it. They didn't care that we got lost or that there were no views. They were having the time of their life.

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Watch only on Prime. Okay, so back to Don. The quick roll-in of the weather snapped a chill into the air, and Don started shivering while they were waiting for the rest of their group to appear. Off to their right, they saw a man on a spur of the trail that led to the popular Knife's Edge Trail. The man noticed the boys quickly waved to get their attention and started making his way over to them. It was hard to see his progress through the mist, and Don was getting really cold. He felt his teeth chattering as he wrapped his arms around himself to hold in his warmth, and the man was taking a while. So Don fed up with the cold, decided to head back down and hopefully out of the weather to meet up with the rest of the group.

Better stay put and wait for the rest, Henry advised. Henry's father was a guide, and he knew of the dangers that came when separating from others, especially in bad weather conditions. But Don peeled off his sweatshirt that laid under his fleece-line jacket and handed it to his friend to use to stay warm while he waited. Despite Henry's pleas, Don turned to head back down the trail, hopefully breaking out of the clouds that hugged the summit. Before he even reached a dozen yards away, Don looked back to see that the clouds had totally cut off Henry from sight. He continued down the trail, only to be slightly surprised that he started climbing over rocks he didn't quite remember on the way up. He shrugged it off, blaming the clouds for messing with his perception and his memory. And he continued on.

Glancing around at the trees, worry started to mount when none of the white blazes marking the trail were anywhere. to be seen, and neither were any of his group members, which he should have run into at this point. He shouted to no answer, repeating again several times he received nothing in return but the whistling of the wind. But he kept going, climbing over a mess of rocks and rubble, worried he was close to the edge of a cliff, unable to see more than a few yards ahead of him. To make matters worse, it started to sleep. And a layer of thin ice started forming on all of his clothing, seeping into his blue dungarees and chilling him to the bone. Don decided to stay put for a while, thinking that his dad and the rest might be just around the corner and that they would happen upon him

at any moment. He did some dances to keep warm, some jumping jacks, some running in place, but soon tired of it and decided to continue down the mountain because he just had to get out of this weather. As he went, the terrain started feeling different. It changed from rocks and boulders to thick scrub brush. It was so dense, he was having a hard time. getting through it and at one point it was so thick he just ended up walking right over it suddenly he felt the ground give way under his footing on the vegetation and he was falling in a flash he reached out to the vegetation to grab a hold and looking down past his dangling feet saw that he was hovering over an opening of some type a depression a hole a cliff he wasn't sure but it was at least 20 feet deep and littered

with sharp boulders at the bottom terrified and praying that the roots would hold his weight, he scrambled his way back up to the lip of the hole and pulled himself out. And this is really when panic started to set in. By now, he knew for a fact he was off the trail. His group couldn't see him or hear him and vice versa. And the weather was only getting worse. He started crying and he fell to the ground and started scanning it in hopes of picking up the trail that he had lost at one point. But the combination of the worsening cloud cover and the sleet made it nearly impossible to navigate. The wind picked up And Don knew that he should stay put. In scouts, he had been taught that this tactic would give him the best shot at being found,

but the weather was just too bad to handle. He didn't have adequate gear on, and he was just being pummeled by not only the mist, the cloud cover, the winds, but now the sleet. He needs some type of shelter at this point. Yep. Besides a small area on his chest, he was now completely soaked. And the wind gusts made the predicament even worse. The decision to continue on,

was made solely based on the weather conditions because the treeless area he was in just wouldn't do. And he was desperate to, at the very least, reach the tree line in hopes of getting some sort of cover and shelter. And it was a good thing that he did because that night a significant storm raged at the summit, producing over 40 mile an hour winds. Wow. So this wasn't just a passing. And what time of year is this again? This is July. July and it's sleeting and 40 mile per hour winds.

It's cold. Dang. Yep. Okay. Soon, Don ran into trail signage, but his mounting hopes were quickly deflated as he read the words saddle trail. First, this is not the one he was looking for. Remember, they were on the hunt trail before? Mm-hmm. But second, he had heard of this trail before, and it's dangers.

It had a reputation for being a strenuous, long climb with risks of rock slides and loose terrain. So he was torn. It was the first actual sign. and marked trail that he had seen in a long time at this point hours. His clothes were becoming stiff as a board and following the trail would offer him at least the possibility of running into somebody. Yeah. So he contemplated what to do, but ultimately decided against following it.

Worrying that it would lead him further away from his camp and deeper into the woods, he elected to continue on trying to find his original route. So staying off trail. Yes. Like he was going to try and. and find his original trail. If you're on a trail, you're going to run into someone. Let's also all remember he's 12 years old.

Okay. That puts a lot of context to it. Yes. I mean, he does have the knowledge of, you know, this may give me a better chance. Like, he's not, he's contemplating the pros and cons. It's not like he just made a blind decision. But he is extremely young. Yeah.

I mean, it sounds like he had a reason behind his decision. But man, staying on the trail is always a better. If you find a trail, stay on it because someone's going to walk on that trail at some point, especially in the middle of the summer. Right. The going was as tough as ever. The rocks were so sharp that they started cutting up his sneakers. And he fell a few times over the rough terrain. He continued to shout and listen, shout and listen.

And his shouts soon became desperate cries and the panic started to mount. He cried a lot and thoughts of his parents worrying about him, getting injured alone. becoming more lost, not being able to see where he was going, and the bad weather started swirling together and just making him freak out, essentially. Finally, after what Dawn estimated to be maybe three or four miles, he came across another sign. Elated, he ran towards it, only to quickly realize it read Saddle Trail. And not only that, it had the same small black scuff on the side that he had noticed before. So who's back at the same spot? Yep. He had wandered. He had wandered. in a great circle. The clouds were thinning a bit and it was easy to see that night was beginning

to descend. Don made his way down the mountain, a combination of walking, jogging, and crawling, until the trees grew taller and he was well within the tree line. It was clear that he would be spending the night there and he searched for a place to rest. Coming across a cave, he tossed a rock into it and scurried away, thinking that maybe some sort of animal was using it as shelter. It looked like the perfect spot out of the rain and sheltered from the wind and he debated again for a while about crawling inside. Despite no critter scurrying out after his rock toss, he decided against it because he was too worried that whoever used it as home would come back in the middle of the night as he was asleep inside. Instead, he found a large tree with big exposed roots. He laid down in some

moss amongst the root system, stripped off his soaked pants and tattered shoes, and tucked in for the night. He was slightly warmer than he had been earlier that day, but he was still exposed and chilly. His stomach gurgled and Don kicked himself for eating all of his reasons, the only snack that he had, and he had eaten them on the way up. He swatted the mosquitoes and black flies swarming his face and drifted off to sleep thinking of his parents, how worried they must have been in that very moment, and how badly he felt for causing them concern. When his eyes opened the next day, Don saw Henry. His 17-year-old friend, with all the knowledge of Katodin, from what berries and mushrooms are good to eat and which ones are bad, and how to navigate the terrain and what to do in an emergency situation. He was right there, and what a relief.

Henry, Henry, Don yelled as he scrambled to his feet and waved his arms, but Henry didn't move. Instead, he just gazed across a small stream from behind a log, directly into a small clearing. Don followed his gaze and to his horror saw four men draped in white cloaks, that stretched to the ground, each moving towards Henry with outstretched arms. Don was yelling for Henry to come to him, but there he stood, unbudging. Next, Don saw a man riding a black horse, wander by Henry, followed by a car carrying his dad. Incredulous, Don scrambled to his feet, plunged into the stream, separating them, and yelled for his father until his voice went hoarse.

Running out of the stream, the woods were suddenly devoid of everyone but Don, realizing his delusion, he fell to his knees and wept. This is how people lose it, he thought. This is when people start to run and tear off their clothes. But no, not me, not if I can help it. Keep your head and you'll be okay. And that became his mantra and he repeated it over and over in his mind. That's a lot for a kid to realize you're hallucinating, to talk yourself out of it, to be out in the woods all night alone. This just sounds like such a scary experience. I know me as a 12-year-old, this would have been so scary. Yeah.

And the, I mean, the way he describes that delusion, which we'll get into a little bit more. But he said that it was like as if somebody was standing right in front. Like it was so real. And it was so frightening because the scene was like, yeah, seeing his father was a relief. But the whole thing with the white cloaked men and Henry and stuff, like it was scary. It wasn't just a vision. It was a scary one. After he realized his mental state, his delusions, he shook it off. It was time to get moving. He had to get going. But his shoes no longer fit. His feet were way too swollen to get the shoes back on and his pants were too cold to be put back on his body as well. After saying his morning prayers, he threw his pants over his shoulders, took his shoes in hand and continued the journey. Reflecting back again to his scoutmaster's teachings, he decided to stick along the street. He decided to stick along the street.

It wasn't a big body of water by any means. It was kind of more like a small babbling brook. But Don was taught that small streams connect to larger rivers and if he followed it downstream, eventually it would lead to some sort of civilization. With no distinguished trail, navigating the shoreline was rough going. His toenails started breaking on the rocks and his feet started bleeding. He lost his shoes while crawling through some of the dense shrubbery and became slightly worried when he pinched his big toe and couldn't feel anything. His feet were going numb. Noting his growling stomach again, he wandered away from the stream for a bit in hopes of finding food. He stumbled upon a large patch of

blue-colored berries, but despite his aching hunger, he was too afraid to eat them. He was unsure of exactly what type of berries they were and he didn't want to take the gamble. Instead, he fell asleep on a rock, only to wake up to the sounds of thunder and water droplets on his face. Sitting up, he glanced around to see hoof tracks all around his rock. A deer or maybe a moose, he wondered, had come to investigate him while he slept. He spent the rest of the day battling the unrelenting biting of mosquitoes and black flies. They were absolutely relentless. Every single bit of exposed skin, including his eyelids, up his nose, and inside of his ears were being ravaged by the biting. And remember, he also has no pants or shoes. So they can get him everywhere, pretty much.

Everywhere. And if you know, if you know New England flies. Oh my God, that's why I don't live there anymore. They're bad. They're so bad. They're so bad. There is no, like, you know what a nice peaceful evening out on the porch, on your rocking chair. No, no. What is that like? That is not a thing. Unless you have a screen in porch, being outside in the summer of New England is not a thing. Unless you like me. Especially in the north woods of Maine. Bugs don't like me for some reason. So I'm like bug repellent for people. If you stand next to me and we're outside, you'll be good. Yeah, in Alaska, I was being like eaten alive. And Cassie was like, oh, I have like one mosquito bite on my leg. Like, oh, what's that like?

As I'm in a head to toe bug net. I was also in one too, but that was more for fun. Yeah, that was for show. Yeah, that was for show. Just to show I brought the necessities with me. But mosquitoes don't like me. They never have. So it's a blessing. Yeah. So all of this biting and the insects, that's mostly what kept him in

perpetual motion, just trying to escape the unrelenting swarms until night fell and he found shelter in a hollowed out tree for the night. The next day, so this is now day three, the sight of a bird searching for worms in the morning sun triggered Don's stomach again. He just had to eat today. His body was extremely sore, stiff and achy, so it took him quite a while to be. He took him quite a while to to haul himself to his feet. Despite knowing that he was very lost, the severity of his situation hadn't quite completely sunk in yet. Like, yes, he knew he was lost and he was in a bit of trouble, but he didn't realize just how bad. Or how remote of a place he was actually in. Yeah, because he had no idea where he was. Sure. And he knew that he was in a bad spot, but in his mind, he said that in,

you know, in 1939, in the United States of America, no one could possibly get so lost that they wouldn't see another soul for days. Like that's what he. And again, he's from like the New York region, like New York City region. Rye is really close to the city. So for him, I mean, I know he's spent time in Maine. His family vacations there a lot. But his day-to-day life for the most part is in an area with a lot of people. So in his mind, there's just got to be someone around. Before long, he came by another patch of berries. But this time, he knew what they were, wild strawberries and lots of them. Nice. He got down on all fours and shoved them into his mouth, leaves and all, and ate like a bear until he cleared the entire patch. He made his way up back to the water,

which by now had gotten a little larger and could comfortably be called a stream rather than a brook. A point came where he had to jump across some of the boulders that were separated by water, and he threw his wet pants over first, but they fell short of their target, slipped into the water, and were quickly washed away. I don't know. The first thought that he had about this was how embarrassed he would be when he had to walk into camp with no pants on. He thought that everyone would laugh at him and it would just be such an embarrassing moment.

Oh, that's such a little kid thing to do though. Like, everything was embarrassing when you were 12. I know. Well, Anne, it kind of speaks to at this point in time at least how he wasn't thinking like, oh, my form of protection for my legs is gone. Like, it was about how embarrassed he would be later. And maybe still not the severity of what was going on. Right, exactly.

People weren't, when people see him in reality, they would more than likely be relieved and excited to see that he's alive, not pointing and laughing that he doesn't have any pants on. Right. I have pants on. And then the second thought that he had was he thought of the rock that he was carrying in them at the summit of, Totten, he had picked up a rock and put it in his pocket intending to give it to his mother as a gift when he got back from their camping trips.

So when it, you know, the pants disappeared into the water and the rock got washed away, he was sad about that. So it just shows like little thoughts and moments like this about, you know, his child, he's a child, you know, and I don't know. A sweet child. Yeah, a very sweet one. Yeah. Unable to retrieve his pants.

Sad his gift was gone and stressed about being a laughingstock at camp. He continued on. The rest of that day was spent much like the day prior, swatting bugs, navigating boulders, rocks and shrubs that lined the water until day blended into night and he curled up at the base of a tree for his third night on the mountain. So scary. The morning of day four brought new challenges. His body was absolutely covered in insect bites and he had been scratching at them.

The itching was so intense because he was blanketed and bites. Don had ended up scratching his skin so viciously it was starting to bleed. And like the top layer of skin at points was kind of no longer there. So before long, ants, mosquitoes, and biting flies were boring down into his open wounds, making the pain and discomfort much more intense. Sticking to the stream was his game plan. But the marshy, boggy terrain around it was making his insect problem way worse. So he decided to pull away a bit.

He came across more berries and sat down for another meal. While eating, thinking of his family, he wept. He was starting to get discouraged and his strength was starting to disappear. He continued along, scoring through the thickets of Breyer in search of strawberries. And it was tough going. His jacket was getting stuck in the thickets and tearing and his exposed legs were being torn by the thorns. Stumbling through and back down towards the river, he suddenly stopped when he came face to face with a black bear. It too had been munching and the two stumbled upon each other so quickly that they were both momentarily stunned.

The bear hopped up onto his hind legs and quickly bounded off to the side, letting out a surprised cry. Don was shocked. He was still halfway crouched down and frozen in surprise when he says he's like, I don't know how else to describe this. The bear, it screamed. He was like a scream. He like startled the bear. Yeah. Yeah. What are you doing here?

Yeah. And then the bear took off across the stream as Don stood there, half crouched down, stunned. And then for the first time and days, Don felt some sort of levity and started to laugh. As the bear wandered off without incident, Don continued on. His thoughts floated to his father and the others in his group worried that they'd be mad that they would have to miss out on the second part of their trip, which was a visit to the city of Caribou, which is further north in Maine. So again, another like, not what your focus should be, but like these are the thoughts that he's having. Yeah, like things that do not matter in real life. No one

cares that they're missing this. They're worried sick about you, I'm sure. On and on he went, stopping only to cry or to pray. When he'd do so, he'd have to find a patch of moss to kneel on before he got down to say his prayers because his knees were so badly torn and sore, he couldn't stand having them just on the ground. That's heartbreaking. Just like he was raised in church and he's still bringing that into the forest and he's in pain and just picturing a little kid doing all of this. Just like hearing adults do it is really sad too, but just knowing he's a little kid is

just like, oh, this poor, he's just like, he's really going through it. He worried about his feet and prayed that he wouldn't have them take. taken from him. At this point, he was no longer able to feel his feet and he was unable to curl his toes. So he was really concerned about them. Yeah. And here's a little throwback to the episode I did on The Third Man Factor. I don't know what episode number it is. I know I titled it, Spirit or Science. So if you're interested in this, there's a whole episode on it. He says, quote, it's funny what things go through a fellow's mind at a time like that. There were times it seemed to me that I wasn't talking to myself at all. Instead, somebody inside of me was doing

all the talking, someone who was encouraging me, who wanted to get me out of the woods and home to mommy and daddy, somebody who would keep me from going crazy if I just listened. So it kind of comes into play again a little bit in a couple minutes here, but that's the first. When I read that, I was like, oh, wait a way, it sounds like, I've heard of this before. The day took a turn for the better when Don stumbled across a tote road. It was an old one. It was dirt with overgrown vegetation, no signs of recent travel, and it was spayed with logs, but it was at least a semblance of some sort of man-made road. People had been here at some point. At some point. And he was confident that this road would lead somewhere. He spent the rest of the day following the road and the night

sleeping alongside it, but tossed and turned as the chattering of frogs kept him awake most of the night. A chipmunk woke him up the following day. It chattered to him all morning, almost encouraging him to get up and to get moving. This was the first day that Don really dreaded getting up. He was discouraged, tired, hungry, and just hurting from head to toe. Knowing each step was torture kept him anchored to the ground until finally he peeled himself up and began his journey. The chipmunk followed him for a good while and Don thought of all the woodland creatures he had seen on his journey so far and how thankful he was for their company between the deer chipmunk squirrels the bear everyone but the bugs to hell with those bugs he thought after four miles or so dawn started finding tin cans

littering the road they were old and rusted but a sign of people encouraged he rounded a bend in the tote road and came across a clearing with a log cabin smack in the middle he was overjoyed he could almost smell breakfast cooking inside and could almost see someone coming out of the front door and spotting him, asking him what the heck he was doing all the way out there, but as he approached, none of that happened. In fact, the cabin was long since abandoned. The door barely hung on the hinges, and aside from some salt and coffee in the cabinets, it had no food. And the smell of animals, he thought either a skunk or a porcupine, filled the entire space. He found pieces of iron and smashed them together, creating sparks. He tried to start a fire, but to no avail. And even if he

did start a fire, Don was worried, here we go again. He was worried that he would start a forest fire and that it would destroy the forest. That's really nice. That's really sweet. Probably not a concern in Northern Maine. I mean, maybe in July, there have spent forest fires up there. Well, on their hike into, you know, their original hike up Katodin and getting to the campground and all that, his father had pointed out the yellow signs warning about the damage that forest fires could cause. And that was enough to make Dawn stop his pursuit. Like he wasn't really getting anywhere anyway, but I feel like maybe he could have. He was more concerned about the forest than of alerting someone of him existing there.

Yeah. Or like having some warmth or whatever. Yeah. I mean, that's very nice. The forest is important. I know. So considerate. Yeah. But it's also day five and you're starving and lost. But anyway. He's very considerate. Abandoning that pursuit, he looked over at the bed. An old tattered blanket lay on a pretty disgusting looking mattress and Don grabbed it. With no pants, he needed something for protection. But to his surprise, a mouse was under it and clung to the blanket as he raised it up. For a moment, Don considered leaving the blanket, feeling as if he was stealing the mouse's warm home. Oh, stop. God. This kid is so sweet. Ultimately, leaving the cabin with the blanket,

he continued forward. 7-11, people always call me loud. And I'm like, yeah, I know. I'm crispy. Did you expect me to whisper? If you want quiet, go eat some soup and reflect. Like, I know I'm a handful. I'm bold, I'm juicy.

Throw some pickles and barbecue sauce on me, and baby, I'm a whole meal. And with seven rewards, I'm just $4. Quiet, no. Krispy, saucy, and $4? Very. Only at 711. Valley 3-6-2326, participating stores only while supplies lastly out for full terms. Don spent almost all of day six.

sleeping. He laid out the blanket in a clearing and completely was just overcome with drowsiness and fatigue. He napped most of the day. He awoke to searing pain on the back of his legs. Glancing back, he noticed it wasn't just the bug bites. It was worse this time. His legs already swollen with hundreds of bites were now deep red because he had slept so long and so hard on his stomach, he hadn't moved. And now he had the worst sunburn of his entire life. Oh, no. Man, can't catch a break. Yeah, with no options, though. Like, what are you going to do about it? There's nothing to put on it. You can't just stop. Like, he had to keep going. And that's what he did. Joy came that day with the sight of an old telephone wire nailed to trees along the tote road. But despair came in the form of an airplane.

Don was bent down, drinking from the stream when he heard the hum of a plane increased to a roar. It was so loud and must have been directly over his head. He leapt up, screaming and crying and waving his arms, but the dense canopy of tree tops concealed him. Things must be really bad for a plane to be involved now, he thought, and the tears came again. He started to question everything. What if that road went nowhere? What if that telephone line was long since abandoned like the cabin he had just found? and what if he was following the road for nothing? Or even worse, the road and the wire were leading him further away from camp and not towards it.

Despite his dark thoughts, the voice inside him urged him forward. Stumbling along, the blanket was heavy and bulky. And he does say it smelled like the worst thing he's ever smelled and it was like making him sick. There was some mice living in it. So I can imagine. Yeah. He tripped on it several times, knocking him to the ground. and eventually he tossed it aside and left it where it lay. It was just too much of a problem. It was causing issues and it was gross. Yeah, fair. Continuing on, he started blacking out,

coming too only to realize that he was in the middle of doing something, like walking, drinking from the stream, sitting down. And on one of those occasions, he came to and he was examining his feet. And at first, he didn't recognize them as his own. So this is the point in time, day six, that he's starting to, his mind is starting to go a little bit. And in search of strawberries, he came across another bear.

This one didn't see him, and he lay down quietly, and Don watched it as it munched along. He was so happy for the company and cried of sadness when the bear eventually wandered away. The loneliness was starting to wear him down just as much as the physical difficulties

that he was experiencing. He could barely bend his knees at this point and would have to take each and every step like a peg-legged pirate. Thorns were embedded into the souls of his cut and bleeding feet, but it didn't matter much to him at the time because he couldn't feel them anyways. Oh my gosh. Day seven brought a choice.

Dawn came to a fork in the road. The telephone wires went one way along with the tote road, and the stream followed the other direction. He pondered what to do, worried no matter what he would make the wrong decision. But his scouts training kicked in, and he decided to stick the water. There were too many unknowns about the wire and the road, but the stream would always provide water, number one. And number two, it would hopefully lead to people. He veered off and immediately missed the somewhat easier travel that that road had provided as he struggled along the stream shores once again.

He was so fatigued, he was tripping and stumbling easily, once falling into the stream headfirst and almost drowning. Pulling himself to shore and fully exhausted, he fell asleep where he lived. lay, waking hours later to the sun setting. In the dusk hours, he continued on as far as he could before calling it an early night. The next morning was the first that he truly debated whether or not it was worth going on. He was starving. He could barely walk, and now he could barely lift his arms, which were weakened and bony. He was starving and becoming delirious. Everything hurt, except his feet, which he couldn't feel. And he finally got moving, saying he felt as if he was walking on stilts and quote, I didn't dare walk much for a while because I was afraid my feet would just fall apart and leave me walking on just my bones.

On he went, navigating the boulders along the water until he slipped off of one in into neck deep water. And he kind of just sat there for a second. He's like, oh my God, like, now I'm in the water and I can't get out. And he just kind of like, he wasn't at a risk of drowning. He could stand. It was just up to his neck. Just kind of like, why? Like a why moment.

Yeah, like, God damn it. So he finally gets the strength to pull himself out, but was absolutely disgusted to find himself covered from the neck down in leeches. Oh, my God. No, this poor kid. Don had always been really grossed out by bloodsuckers as he refers to them. And he was just like kind of like this like, ew moment. And I picture it as, so one of my favorite movies of all time is Ace Ventura. Your favorite movie is always.

Snowflake. Not the original one with Snowflake, the dolphin, but the one with the bat in Africa. Do you know what I'm talking about? Yes, I've seen. I've actually, I've seen Ace Ventura. Okay. And like, of course, out of all the animals that Ace Ventura loves, you know, he loves the animal kingdom, but he is wicked grossed out by bats. And he goes into the cave and all the bats start fluttering around and he runs out of the cave and it's like slapping them.

all over and he's like, ugh, sick. And that's kind of how I picture him with the leeches, like peeling them off of himself. Yeah, so he's like wildly slapping them away and he was pulling them off that were like dangling all over him. And some of them were latched on so well that he just had to roll and scrape himself with sand from a nearby sandbar to get them to detach. And after this episode, he's disgusted and exhausted but leech free. So he lay in the sun on the sandbar fading in and out of delirium. He woke up feeling better and started his journey again. And then this is the second point in time where the third man factor comes back into play. So he's dragging himself along. He trips and he falls. And of this particular time, he says,

quote, and this is a direct quote from the book, which I'll get into at the end of the episode. But I didn't want to paraphrase because I love the third man factor. And I wanted his direct experience. He says, quote, I don't know whether I ought to tell something that happened that very morning, but I guess I shall. It's all right, of course, but people who don't believe as I do may think it's all imagination. I believe in guardian angels. And on my trip through the woods, one of the things that comforted me and helped me bring myself out to safety was this feeling that I wasn't entirely alone. In the night, in those dark woods, that feeling helped me. And in the daytime when the going was awfully hard, I felt as though I had someone.

to lean on, and that helped too. I was flat on my face. I couldn't get my arms underneath me. They were so weak at the elbows. I just lay there and waited. Suddenly, I felt something take hold of me by the shoulders, something like strong, gentle hands, and I felt myself lifted slowly until I was on my knees. I looked around, expecting to see a man, a guide maybe, and I was surprised when I could see nothing, not a thing, but the hands were still there and they were lifting and lifting. I got first one foot under me and then the other, then I straightened up. I was stronger and I could walk. So that's his experience with physically feeling like someone was there with him. Whether that's delirium or not, it made a huge difference. Yeah, we have this whole discussion in the other episode about the third man

factor. But it made, yeah, that's absolutely right. It made the difference that he needed. So whether it was his own brain firing off or it was an outside force, it made a difference to him. It took a long time and a lot of praying for dawn to get moving the morning of day nine. Day nine. He struggled along for hours until he noticed a stream becoming wider and calmer. He found himself in and out of brownouts, but suddenly he was in front of what he thought to be a lake or a pond or some sort of large river, and just across it, he saw a dock. His eyes traced the land up from the dock to a clearing with two overturned canoes, right smack dab in front of two. cabins. It was a mixed bag of emotions. He couldn't help but hope this would be the place that would

provide him with something to eat or even better. It would be occupied by somebody. And he was working his way around the vegetation of the water trying to get closer to the dock and the shore. And he spotted a log jutting out of the water. So he crawled onto it and just started screaming. Meanwhile, inside, Nelson McMorrin was taking a nap. His wife, Lena, heard what she thought. ought to be an animal crying or screaming or making some sort of guttural sound outside near their cabin. Rousing her husband awake, she urged him to go investigate what the heck was making all that noise. Nelson emerged from the cabin and his eyes landed on Don, who was trying his best to yell and wave his arms across the water. He turned inside, rushing to tell his wife to notify the Ranger Station immediately because he knew who Dawn was.

At this point, everyone in the area knew. Nelson rushed across the lake in his canoe to Don's side, and as he scooped him up, Don blacked out. He woke up in a bed. Lena had helped clothe him, tend his insect bites, and various wounds, and had been hand-feeding him tomato soup. Don was so exhausted. He was in and out of sleep, but when he awoke, he was given the telephone. His family was very eager to speak with him.

So we know Don's experience up until this point, but of course, there's a whole other eyes. side of the coin going on here. Yeah, what's his family going through? Right. The rescue team, I mean, I'm assuming there's rescue teams that have been looking for him. Yes. So back at the summit, the man that Henry and Don were waiting for initially, remember they saw that man in the mist and that's, Henry's like, let's wait for this guy and then we can head down together. His name was Reverend Charles Austin and he had actually reached Henry 10 minutes or so after Dawn decided to head down on his own. Henry and the Reverend weren't surprised that they didn't see Don on their way down the trail because the time difference, obviously, they took off at different times.

And of course, the weather conditions are bad. It's only when they met up with Don's father and the rest of their group, roughly a mile down the trail and saw that Don was not with them at all, that they realized something happened and perhaps he was lost. Don's father and Tom, Don's youngest brother, teamed up and Henry and the Reverend teamed up to head back up the trail to the peak in search for Don. They were yelling his name and scanning the mist for any sign of him anywhere around. But after an hour or so, it became really clear that the situation was worse than they thought and they needed additional help. Forest Rangers were alerted and a search party was dispatched right away. One of the Rangers in the search party described how he had been a mountaineer for years. He had climbed and hiked many of the mountains in New England, but nothing compared to how difficult Katahdin was. He described the awful weather, the difficult terrain, how much he was aching,

and even just all in a single day and how much he worried for all the ways that the boy could have perished out there. Like in his mind, he's like, damn, like, I do this for a living and this is tough for me. Not encouraging at all. That's- Right. Adding validity to how serious this really is. Dawn's father was frantic with worry and notified as many people as possible to garner attention and it worked. Aside from the first groups of rangers, several different branches of the U.S. Forest Service, got involved, along with different timber crews that worked in the area, civilians, and members of the nearby Mill-in-knocket paper mill, and the main state police, who eventually got bloodhounds onto the trail. The dogs picked up Don Sent pretty quickly, but lost it at the precipice of a sheer 400-foot drop called saddle slip.

The dogs also had a really difficult time navigating the terrain, which was so sharp that their paws started shredding up. Oh, poor thing. Additional dogs were sent in, and this time with fitted leather booties to protect their feet. The National Guards supplied an additional 65 searchers and the State Forestry Service provided a plane. For the first five days of this search, it was believed that Dawn hadn't made it below the timber line, and therefore the search was focused solely in the alpine zone. It's only after Mr. Fenler urged rescuers to move their operation below the tree line that they did. He was confident that his son was alive, and meanwhile, most of the search party believed that by that point, five days in, they were searching for a body and spent a lot of time searching in the deep crevices between the large boulders for his remains.

Throughout the search, Mr. Fenler gave many different interviews and spoke to the press at length, including the Boston Globe, stating, quote, I'm still trying to make myself believe there's a faint threat of hope, despite all of the failing hope of the officials around. him. At its height, the search comprised of 500 people, the largest search effort in the state's history up until that point. But after a week, it dwindled to just a handful of volunteers led by Don's father who was just adamant in, had so much faith in his son that he just knew he was alive. When the news that Don had been found reached Mr. and Mrs. Fenler, they were actually in the hospital. Mr. Fenler had sustained a pretty significant eye injury during the search, and word that their son had been found, reached them when he was admitted, and his wife was visiting with him. Don's two uncles arrived to the Nelson's cabin several hours after Don was rescued and were

got out, along with a physician. And the following day, Don was transported by canoe to be reunited with his family and then was transported to a larger hospital in Bangor, Maine. His reunion with his mother, father, and siblings was touching, and millions of people across America breathed a collective sigh of relief. His story had been circulating newspapers and was broadcasted on the radio waves all week long, and much of the nation had been following Dawn's search effort closely. Oh, wow. So his story of survival gave hope to thousands of people. When recreating Dawn's wanderings and mapping out the route that he took, Rangers, guides, and people alike were absolutely astonished. The most direct route that he described was 48 miles long. Wow. But it was

estimated that he had actually traveled at least twice, maybe even three times that distance, because he was wandering, making circles, he doubled back several times. Like, this wasn't just a point to point thing. Like, that would have been the absolute minimum that he would have done. So 48 miles minimum in nine days by a 12 year old boy that just went through all that other stuff. Yeah. Had no gear. He was shoeless. He was, yeah. This meant that he averaged 10 to 14 miles a day. It's like walking the AT. That's like what through hikers do. Unintentionally.

Yeah. And through hikers are not always, but normally adults. And prepared. And if they are kids, they usually have family with them or an adult. I know where they're going. Yeah. Yeah. Despite the extensive search efforts that took place, based on the recreation of his route,

after that first night, searchers were never within 10 miles of dawn, who had gone off the mountain on the north side straight into the backcountry that is seldom. ever traveled. Don had been lost for eight nights and nine days. He was 12 years old, four feet seven inches, and 74 pounds when he was separated from his group. When he was rescued, he weighed 58 pounds. Oh my gosh. After his rescue, Maine and the nation celebrated. Don became an icon in the state of Maine, but like I said, his story had reached millions of people, especially after Life magazine and the New York Times picked up his story. Parades were held in his honor and the governor of Maine declared him the most courageous boy in America. And a year after his rescue, he was invited to the White House,

where he was granted the Army and Navy Legion of Valor Medal from President Roosevelt, recognizing him as the outstanding youth hero of 1939. His life returned to normal. He went on to graduate from the New Hampton School, which is a private college prep school in New Hampshire. He enlisted in the Navy and served as a CB during World War II. Next, he went on to study forestry at the University of Maine before training as a Green Beret and making a career in the Army and serving in Vietnam. Wow, so he never got sick of the tough lifestyle. Sure did it. He married and had four children and retired at the rank of Lieutenant Colonel in 1978 and settled in Tennessee. However, Maine had always had his heart. And he returned.

turn to the state every single summer and every fall, he went on to speak prolifically at Maine schools well into old age, giving presentations to children about his ordeal, how to stay safe in the wilderness, how to prepare for hikes, and most importantly, the importance of never giving up. He became a local legend, icon, and hero, and in fact, for years, his book was required reading for Maine school children. I love that. It was like part of his career, their college. curriculum. That's really cool. Yeah, the book that I'm referring to so much is called Lost on a Mountain in Maine. And it's by Don Fendler, but it's as told by Joseph B. Egan. And it's interesting because the published date in the book, if you look at it, says like 79 or something. But it was a

typo. And it was actually published in the like the late 30s and 39 pretty soon after his experience. And what happened is he didn't write it himself. He told his story to Joseph B. Egan and he basically just transcribed it into this book. So it's all first person perspective from him as a child pretty much right after it happened. So the book is really small. It's less than 100 pages, but it's coming directly from Don right around the time that he actually went through this. And the cabin that Don eventually stumbled upon on day nine is referred to as the Lung-Suz camp and is actually quite far from any real civilization. It's 14 miles from a small community called grindstone and seven

miles to the village of Staceyville, which is really difficult to reach from that point. So if he hadn't stumbled across that cabin, he probably would have died at that point because he was still really far from civilization. And at that point, he was just, his body was shutting down. And he probably would have died in the, in the woods. And the fact that people were there when he got there. Right. Right. The Lungu's camp is now a historic site within the Kataddin Woods and Waters National Monument. There it is. Here we are. Here it is.

It's a national park. Located at the heart of the monument on the east branch of the Penobscot River, this area has a lengthy indigenous history as well as European settler, farmer, and trapper history. Cabins and camps were built in this area in the 1800s and one of which Dawn came upon. Today, the Lung Suz area offers picnicking, paddling, and campsites, and it has a really small boat launch that serves as a put-in point for people paddling the Penobscot. Katadden Woods and Waters National Monument covers 87,500 acres directly next to Baxter State Park and actually borders it to the east. Established as a national monument in 2016 and certified as an international dark sky sanctuary in 2020, artists, authors, scientists, conservationists, recreationists, and, others have been drawn here to create, study, and to explore. As with Baxter State Park, the monument

in Maine's North Woods is rugged. There's no cell service, few amenities, and no formal services. Water purification or bring your own water is necessary. And most of the roads are unpaved, with the exception of the Katahdin Woods and Waters National Scenic Byway, which leads from Baxter State Park into the monument. In the summers, fishing and boating are popular in the lakes, streams, rivers within the monument and in the winters, snowshoeing, snowmobiling, and ice fishing are fun activities that people partake in. Like I mentioned, the book, most of my research came from it, again, called Lost on a Mountain in Maine by Don Fendler, as told by Joseph B. Egan. I also watched some excerpts from the documentary called Finding Don Fendler, which is really cool because I only,

and I don't know if like my research skills are getting rusty or something, but I could only find 20 minutes of an excerpt from this documentary. But it's really cool because it's a lot of different footage of him doing presentations to school children recounting his experience. And there's a lot of interviews just one-on-one with him. And he's an old age now, like at this point, he's probably in his 70s. He's still alive today? No, I'll get to that. But in this documentary. Oh, okay. And then it's also, they also have patchworked in. It's so cool. So remember how I said his two uncles. went to the cabin when he was originally rescued. Yes.

So one of his uncles had a film camera, not like a camera, a video. Why can I say? What the hell am I trying to say? A video camera? Yeah, a video camera. Yes. I just forget what it's called in the third. You know, there's a special, an old video camera. And several years later, they found the footage. And he was shooting footage of Dawn and his reunion with his family. and the cabin. And it's really greeny. And I mean, it's from the 30s type of footage. But then he would do the landscape of like the area that he was found in. So there's footage from that day.

That's in that documentary. That's really interesting. Yeah, which is really cool. But excitingly, there is a major motion picture. So a movie that is set to hit theaters and hopefully some major streaming platforms. And it's in the works as we speak. As I've been researching this, This is early 2024. It says that Sylvester Stallone's production company called Balboa Productions is currently in the post-production stage on this movie that is going to be titled Lost on a Mountain in Maine, 80 miles, nine days, one step at a time. So hopefully we should see this movie sometime. I don't know how movies work, but maybe late this year or early next year, if it's in post-production. Yeah, because that means it's already been filmed.

It's just being edited and thrown together and finding. people to sell it to? I don't know. I don't know how films work. But if it's in post-production, it means it's already been done. Yeah. So I'm really exciting. Yeah. I want to see that. I'm so curious of how it'll come out. And where they'll film it, where they will film it because they did that. I'm sure it's on location in Maine, I don't know, because remember they did the Pam Bale story in the White Mountains and they filmed it in like Switzerland or something like that. And hold on a minute. It was supposed to be on Mount Washington. Like, Mount Washington does not look like that. Where is this?

And that's so interesting. I know there's probably a lot of decisions behind that. But to me, it's like if you're recreating a true story at a place that's extremely accessible to film in, why wouldn't you do it there? It is a winter story on Mount Washington. So it's not extremely. Okay, but they went to Switzerland. Yeah, but Switzerland, you can get into high alpine zone areas. in like good weather and it be okay versus good weather on Mount Washington. It's one of the windiest places in the world. I imagine that that would be very difficult to film in.

But I agree. I agree. However, there are some, there are some scenes that she's just like driving or there's like landscaped like footage. It's like, okay, that is very clearly not New Hampshire. Like they could have used the lodge that she went to and they could have done at least the beginnings of the trails, you know, their signage and stuff. But she's very clearly hiking in some places that are not New Hampshire. Yeah. Even slight. Like they don't even try to make it look like New Hampshire. So misleading. Because someone who's never been to New Hampshire is probably like, wow, what an amazing place. There's a TikTok going around right now. And it's like, this is Manchester, New Hampshire. And it's, have you seen it? And it's like the Italian coast.

Yeah. Like that is not. Manchester, New Hampshire, but we could dream. Yeah. Okay. To wrap this up. In 2008, Don was quoted in the Bangor Daily News saying, quote, I hope the message that I give sinks in. It's really about faith and determination. That's the whole message. It was that exact formula, faith and determination that Don attributes to his success in 1939. He may have walked out of the woods then, but he ultimately returned. He told the Bangor Daily News in 2014, quote, when I die, my ashes are going over Mount Katodin. My brother said he'd fly or get someone to fly up. Yep, they're going to put me in a bean can. Don Fendler passed away on October 10th, 2016 at the

age of 90. Maine locals or Mainers, as they are referred to, can be a hearty, tough crowd. Under normal circumstances, no one is considered a local, a true manor unless they were born and raised in the state. but Don Fendler is the exception. He became so beloved by the state that July 25th, which was the day he was rescued, officially became Don Fendler Day in the state of Maine. I love that. That's really cool. Don's account of his endeavor in his book Lost on a Mountain in Maine ends with how thankful he was to be laying in that cabin safe and sound.

He thanked God for his good parents and for all of his help in the wilderness. His scout training certainly played a role in his survival, but ultimately it was his determination and strength of will that led him out of the woods. And that is the story of Don Fendler and his crazy time on Mount Katodin. Well, thank you for telling that story. I love when you do survival stories. I think that they're so fun and I love hearing them. And the fact that he was a kid who went, this would be tough for anyone.

And the fact that he was a kid, it just, it's an amazing story. It really is. And I liked how you started the story with talking about how your point of view and how that can be a huge impact on your survival. And like you said, a lot of it through it is he didn't really realize maybe the severity of it. But he always kept the thought of just around the corner, just around the corner. And then, of course, you've referenced his faith that he had throughout. I mean, you detailed him having trouble getting down to his knees because he was. was injured, like, just in so much pain. And it was a really cool story that I'm very happy,

had a good ending, because if you had told that entire story and then he died in the end, I think we all would have been. Yeah, I know. It is, it's a cool story. And I'm glad for everyone who recommended it. The book, like I said, is a quick, easy read. So I definitely recommend it. We'll put it on the book rec section. of our website and hopefully the movie comes out. We can all have a group watch party. That would be fun. You know how Amazon you can do that?

Like you can link with everyone. We can just be like, all right, everyone watch the movie now. And go. I'll imagine like crash Amazon. That would be fine. 10,000 people doing it at once. I'm sure they get listening. Sylvester Stallone would be like, wow.

This was a good movie to get behind. Okay. Cool. Well, that's it. Thanks for hanging out with us. And we'll see you next week. In the meantime, enjoy the view. But watch you're back. Bye, everyone. Bye. Thank you so much for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale or story suggestion, send us an email at Stories at NPAD Podcast.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NPAD podcast. Join our Outsiders only community on Patreon or Apple subscriptions to listen ad-free, unlock monthly bonus episodes, and exclusive content.

And remember, when you support our sponsors, you are supporting our show. For our exclusive discount codes and source information from today's episode, check out the show notes. For more information on our show, our book recommendations, merch updates, and more. Visit our website at npaddpodcast.com. And please rate, review, and subscribe from wherever you listen to podcasts. You're listening to this podcast, so I know you've got a curious mind. Here's a helpful fact you may not know yet. Drivers who switch and save with Progressives save over $900 on average.

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