Louise Dickinson Rich
Aerial view of Forest Lodge. Photo: Zillow.
Best-selling author and licensed Maine Guide, Louise Dickinson Rich famously wrote a witty account about her family’s life at their Oxford County, Maine camp they lovingly named “Forest Lodge.” Published in 1942, “We Took to the Woods,” was an instant success and was widely read in part because it was distributed as a pocket-sized edition to troops in World War II. It gave many Americans a literary escape during the difficult war years. It was named in the Book of the Month Club in December 1942.
“Forest Lodge” was perched above the Rapid River deep in the woods near Middle Dam. Their nearest town, Upton (population 174 in 1940) sat on the Maine – New Hampshire border. No roads connected to her camp to town. “Forest Lodge” comprised a complex of small buildings: a summer house, a winter cottage, as well as a guide’s house and a number of small out buildings. They had no electricity, and their phone only connected to three distant neighbors, one of whom she never met in person.
Louise Dickinson met her future husband, Ralph Rich while she was on a canoe trip in the north woods with her sister in 1933. The next year they married, and she joined him at Forest Lodge. Here they raised two children and made the camp their year-round home from 1933 to 1944. Louise left after Ralph died in 1944 but continued to return to Forest Lodge as her summer home until 1955.
Louise developed her literary skills at Forest Lodge and was paid for stories published in magazines beginning in 1936. The Riches made most of their income, however, transporting hunters and fishermen and their gear along the “Carry Road” between two Rangeley area lakes. The Rapid River which connected the lakes was the fastest moving east of the Mississippi River and was impassable by boat. The Riches dreaded the phone ringing after sunset, especially in deer hunting season. Hunters inexperienced in the deep woods often became lost and needed to be rescued. Louise wrote that “Ralph collects his compass, a lantern, his gun with lots of cartridges for signaling, and sets forth into the night.” If Louise was lucky, she could stay back with the kids and have hot tea ready for Ralph and the lost parties.
Following the untimely death of her husband, Louise supported herself and her two children by continuing to write until she passed in 1991. She authored 24 books and over 50 short stories and articles.
