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What’s in a name? Nothing that couldn’t be changed, judging by the changing names of Tupper area lakes, streams, and mountains over the years. Little Wolf was once Lake Pomeroy; Tupper Lake on some early maps was Mort Lake, or its rough English equivalent, “Dead Lake.” Eagle Crag and Mount Arab Lake located near Conifer were, until 1916, known as Long Lake and Pleasant Lake respectively.

It did come as a surprise, however, to see area newspapers refer to Cooney Mountain in their account of last week’s forest fire off Route 30 near Lumberjack Springs. As most readers of this column will readily know, they were referring, of course, to Coney (Cone) Mountain. Since future historians may well wonder where “Cooney” (sic) Mountain is, we will try to set the record straight.

First, there was indeed a fire. The nightmare that had been troubling the sleep of local rangers Joe Kennedy and Clyde Black was now a reality. Weeks of above normal, record-breaking temperatures had made the forest floor a tinder box, and with Memorial Day weekend bringing to the woods scores of hikers and campers, their worst fears were realized, and a forest fire was raging on the mountain. Where and when it would move was anyone’s guess.
There is no question that, given the conditions, it could have easily been a disaster, and even the century-old Litchfield Chateau was at peril. A forest fire is a scary ordeal. You are fighting a natural force that is insensitive and often goes beyond any human control. Fortunately, human intellect can provide a control that exceeds that abstract insensitivity provided by the fire.

It starts with a plan, and the DEC has proven to be very professional in that respect. The site plan chief, Lt. Barstow of Region Six, had several positive things going for him. First, he got full local cooperation.

Gregg Spangler, for instance, who runs Long Lake’s Adirondack Air Service and who had spotted the fire at about 1 p.m. that day while conducting a scenic flight, called Shawn Wright, Long Lake fire chief, and gave him the combination to the locked gate into Sperry Pond at the base of the mountain that proved an invaluable source of water for the helicopter and the foot crews.

Most important to the plan, though, were the neighboring volunteer fire departments who had the manpower, the determination and the stamina that allowed them to hoist 70-pound Indian pumps on their backs and labor up the steep side of Coney Mountain, sometimes crawling and heaving themselves to reach the fire’s location. It also involved finding a helicopter. In this case, the Lifeflight helicopter came to the rescue and from its helio pad site across from Lumberjack Springs on Route 30 and was instrumental in “ferrying water and supplies to the mountain during the seven-hour ordeal.”

This successfully controlled fire was a test of individuals, of a plan well executed. It was also a test of how well our local and surrounding fire departments could and would work together. They can all be proud of a job well done. That said, let’s straighten out the misnomer Cooney Mountain.

As you travel up Route 30 near the intersection that leads to Bog River Falls (Route 421 formerly a nineteenth-century wagon road), you will notice two conical-shaped peaks with partially bald tops. Each is in a block of state land surrounded by privately owned property (Litchfield and International Paper Company). One is called Litchfield Hill, or as I prefer, Goodman Hill, named after the Goodman family, who owned a fine stone camp on Big Tupper Lake for years. You may recall that Andy Goodman, son of the elder Mr. Goodman, gave up the pleasures of summer life at the family camp to help in the integration effort in the South and was brutally murdered by white supremacists and callously buried in the wet cement of a dam that was under construction. (See “Mississippi Burning.”)

The other peak is Coney Mountain with an elevation of about 2,227 feet. If you look closely, you will see a large wooden cross erected by a couple of devout Tupper Lake residents to symbolize their faith in Jesus Christ, and who, perhaps, were influenced by the mountain’s similarity to Golgotha (Calvary), where Jesus was nailed to a similar cross.

It was on Coney Mountain that in 1772 one Archibald Campbell and a group of Indians ended their survey of the northern boundary of the Tatten and Crossfield Purchase. They had bushwhacked east from the northwest corner, chopping blazes to establish the boundary of the first major land purchase in the central and western Adirondacks. By the time they reached Coney, they were tired, but they had another more sufficient reason for ending the ground survey here, content with a line of sight eastward. “The rum gave out” was the clinching explanation in Campbell’s field notes.

In the fall of 1972, two centuries later, the late Bill Verner of Long Lake and the curator of the Blue Mountain Lake Museum, with some staff members, climbed Coney to commemorate the anniversary of Campbell’s aborted survey. After lolling about under the September sun, they descended and drove into Tupper to the nearest bar to share a celebratory shot of rum. As Paul Jamison has noted, “Things are too easy today.”

It may be of some interest that Lumberjack Springs was discovered by Louis Osier (Oshier) in 1910. Today it is routinely tested by the New York State Department of Health and continues to run cold and pure.

In 1937 three enterprising Tupper Lakers, who described themselves as Camp Cove (Goodman’s Shelter Cove Camp) lumberjacks, erected the splendid spring house that still stands. We can thank Ed Sabourin, Emil Sabourin, and Pat Arsenault for their talented and thoughtful workmanship.

Puzzler: Was the name Coney originally Cone (i.e. conical in shape) as some sources indicate? Was Goodman Hill also referred to as Cone Mountain (it is also conical in shape), thus making Cone the plural Coney to describe the Coneys? Or was Coney an individual and was Coney Beach (Little Wolf) named after him as well? If so, who was Coney?

Copyright William C. Frenette Collection