Great articles, thanks for posting. My kind of guy.
This is a real treasure trove for information that will help find some of the lost trails.
One that popped out for me is what he refers to as East Mountain Trail, which I've always assumed was Fish Creek Ridge Trail. I've tried following it from just below Skookum Lake but it soon disappears at a road cut. Could never find anything from the road or in forays into the brush. Now that I know that it follows an "open ridge top" starting at 1.85 miles past Skookum at least there is something definite to go on.
I see from the articles that he surveyed the trails as well. That explains the hundredth of an mile accuracy in his logs. We should check his figures against current trail logs. Of course the trails could have been changed - maybe by him!
Does anyone know if his position in the FS was ever filled again after his retirement?
It was my understanding (from emailing with Howard's daughters) that Roger Bell took over Howard's position when he retired. Roger recently retired as well.
Regarding these old trail logs, I'm wondering how they came up with the mileages for the various trails. Were these simply estimates, did they pace them off, or did they use some sort of measuring device?
I don't know how the calculated those distances, but I know on the old Cadastral maps they used "chains" (surveyors chains) to determine distances. I think a chain is 66'.
If you go to this map (which is fed from FS GIS data):
If you click on a trail it will tell you how the distance was calculated. Who knows when that data was updated, though.
Not much info, I know....