PEAVEY HEAD

In 1806 the College was on the ropes financially. Former New Hampshire congressman and Dartmouth trustee Jonathan Freeman lobbied the state to grant Dartmouth 27,000 acres in the northern part of the state. Trees, not crops, were the Second College Grant’s economic engine. For more than a century the harvesting of softwoods brought in cash. Around 1930 the College began managing the land for selective cutting and multiple uses, which continues at the Grant under the management of forester Kevin Evans. He found this logging tool, dating to the 1850s and used to slide or rotate large logs, in Squeeze Hole Brook 13 years ago. When he stopped to take a break while laying out a clearcut, he looked down and there it was. Evans estimates the Grant pumps about $700,000 into the North Country economy, providing jobs to about 20 local contractors. The Grant is also valued by students and alumni as a place for research, hiking, hunting and camping.