As some of you may recall, my article, “Discovering Tinkhamtown” was published in the 2011 Winter Issue of The Upland Almanac. This article addresses some little known facts about Corey Ford’s classic, “The Road to Tinkhamtown.”
Today, I received my copy of the Spring 2012 Issue of The Upland Almanac and it looks like a good one. Notably, in the letters to the editor section on page 69, there were three comments praising “Discovering Tinkhamtown” which made my day.
In one of the letters to the editor from David Book of Helena, Montana, there was something that totally intrigued me. In my article, I recited the fact that Corey Ford, Dan Holland, Everett Wood (or “Woodie”), and Hank Doremus were all grouse hunting buddies. The premise of my article, “Discovering Tinkhamtown” is that Dan Holland actually discovered Tinkhamtown because of what he wrote in the introduction to his chapter on ruffed grouse in his nonfictional book, The Upland Game Hunter’s Bible, which is set forth below:
“Where’d you get the fine pa’tridges?” a farmer asked me as I dragged my feet wearily down the little New Hampshire road to my parked car.
“Tinkhamtown,” I answered.
“Ain’t no sech place,” he snapped back. “Lived in these parts all my life–well, not quite yet, but so far–and there ain’t no sech place.”
I told him that Tinkhamtown was across the mountain within walking distance of where we stood. I knew because I had been there, taken my limit of grouse and had come back all in the same day. The mystery was explained by an old map I had chanced on which clearly showed a town and farming community which no longer existed. Being a partridge hunter, I had hiked there, found the old cellar holes, the vanishing traces of pasture land, the overgrown orchards and ruffed grouse almost in flocks. I explained this to my friend. He cogitated for a moment and allowed as how it might be a fact: long ago there were farms over the mountain, but no more. The last resident had moved out at least sixty years ago.
“Over to Concord, that’s where they went, I warrant, ” he remarked a little scornfully, “Some of them went clean to Boston, maybe.” “Yep,” he added proudly, “it takes a right good man to farm this country.”
What I did not know when I wrote the article was that Everett Wood, or Woodie, wrote an article for Gray’s Sporting Journal in the Summer of 1982 entitled, “Last Hunt with Corey,” in which he claims he discovered Tinkhamtown. According to Woodie:
In the mid-fifties a local history buff had shown me a map of Lyme, New Hampshire, published in 1873. The map had indicated every road and building in the township, including a cluster of buildings located –not precisely — a mile or two east of the Canaan Turnpike in the southeast corner of Lyme. That cluster was the community of Tinkhamtwown . . . .
Some while later I mentioned Tinkhamtown to Corey, and of my plan to find it. Always intrigued with the character and flavor of words, Corey fell in love, at once and forever with the name. . . .
In the fall of 1957, I really did try to find that lost community and the incomparable grouse cover that must surround it. But I never found it. The dense woods and beaver ponds defeated me. After four attempts I stopped trying.
So now we have yet a third person who claimed to have discovered Tinkhamtown. The plot thickens and the mystery grows. I’ve got to get my hands on that article! I don’t think that it will change my analysis in “Discovering Tinkhamtown” because, by his own admission, Everett Wood never actually made it to Tinkhamtown.
On the other hand, I believe that both Dan Holland and Corey Ford both did, which fact is evidenced by their writings. I believe Dan Holland was the first person to actually make it to Tinkhamtown. Holland’s book was nonfiction and he had no reason, at that time, to lie. Laurie Morrow has written that Tinkhamtown is real and that it is exactly where Corey said it was, which implies that Corey had, in fact, been there. Apparently, neither Corey or Dan ever took their friend Woodie there. I guess some coverts are too special to share with everyone. Regardless of who discovered Tinkhamtown, it’s facinating to see three close hunting friends with three separate stories on how and by whom Tinkhamtown was discovered.
Good stuff my friends . . . good stuff!!!!
Upland Ways 
If you ever find that article I would love to read it as well. "The Road to Tinkhamtown" is a great read, so I am really enjoying the history of this as well. Thanks!
If you Google Tinkhamtown NH, you come up with a Tinkhamtown Brook in Grafton County….
Josh, Glad you enjoyed it! Corey Ford was great. The fun thing is that the deeper you dig, the more information and mystery you find. Can't wait to read Laurie Morrow's book on Corey Ford!Jerry, It sure would be fun to walk in Corey's footsteps. I wonder if anyone has ever done so and written an article on it. Where's all the diehard New Hampshire Corey Ford fans when you need them? Thanks for your comments guys!Andy
T realize that this thread is a might old, but I just ran across it today after reading the Corey Ford story. I had read the tale when it came out in Field & Stream decades ago, and was also curious to know if Tinkham Town actually existed. The best reference that I could find is a technical article “A Town That Has Gone Downhill” by James Goldthwait in The Geographical Review, Vol. XVII (4), October 1927. Goldthwait was a professor at Dartmouth College, and wrote about the de-population of the area around Lyme after the Civil War. There is a brief description of “Tinkham Town”, and also there are reproductions of maps of Lyme from 1830, 1860, 1892, and 1925 which show where Tinkham Town was and where the farmhouses sat. The ‘town’ (there were only two farm houses) was located about five miles east-southeast of Lyme on Tinkham Town Road and on Tinkhamtown Brook per the USGS quadrangles. 43°46’3.24″N, 72° 4’10.71″W In Google Earth it looks to be pretty heavily forested. Check the Historical Imagery tab for 1992 (‘leaf down’ image) and the road can be seen. The Appalachian Trail passes by less than a mile to the west.