Roskenney Farm was a private lodging establishment near the East Clarendon depot on the Rutland Railroad that served Long Trail hikers for more than two decades, from at least the early 1920s through the late 1940s. Never a Green Mountain Club facility, it was a working farm that offered meals and overnight accommodations to trail travelers who arrived by rail at East Clarendon — one of the principal points of entry to the southern Long Trail. The farm appeared in successive GMC guidebooks from 1924 through 1947 under a series of operators, and the name itself evolved over time: early editions spelled it "Roskenney" (the spelling retained in the GMC shelter database), while later editions and common usage shifted to "Roskenny." The last documented listing of the farm as a hiker accommodation was in the 1947 Long Trail Guide Book; by 1951 the name had disappeared from the guide entirely. The building no longer stands.
Setting
East Clarendon is a hamlet in the town of Clarendon, Rutland County, Vermont, situated where the Rutland Railroad (later the Central Vermont Railway) crosses the Mill River corridor. In the early twentieth century it was seven miles from Rutland on the main Boston line — a convenient arrival point for hikers heading north toward Killington or south along the Long Trail toward Wallingford and beyond. The hamlet had a small general store but no post office.
About a mile north of the East Clarendon depot, reached by a dirt road that wound up from the station, the Long Trail passed through Clarendon Camp: an open GMC camp with a stove and bunks for twenty people, set on a brook in a cow pasture (hikers were instructed to keep the porch gate closed on account of the cattle). Between the camp and the station, a road descended to the depot, giving hikers a direct connection to rail service. Roskenney Farm was located near the depot itself — convenient not for those sleeping in the hills but for those ending a hike and waiting for a train, or those arriving and needing a night’s rest before heading out.
The terrain around East Clarendon is one of the more dramatic passages on the southern Long Trail. Just southeast of the depot, the Mill River has carved Clarendon Gorge through solid rock in a series of rapids and cascades — "only ten minutes from the station," the guidebooks noted, well worth visiting before departing.
The Farm and Its Early Years
The GMC shelter database records a start year of 1917 for Roskenney Farm, suggesting it began accommodating hikers at or near the time of the Long Trail’s formal organization in that region. The farm did not appear in the earliest guide books: the 1920 edition (Edition 2) and the 1921 (Edition 3) and 1922 (Edition 4) editions all list East Clarendon as a rail stop without mentioning Roskenney Farm by name, directing hikers simply to the depot.
By 1924, the farm was prominent enough to earn a named listing. The Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 5 (1924), included it in both the narrative and the mileage table:
About a mile north of E. Clarendon station the Long Trail passes Clarendon Camp with stove and bunks for twenty people. This is on a brook and in a pasture; keep porch gate closed on account of cattle. A few yards to the west is a road terminating a little higher at a farmhouse. This road is followed down to the railroad at East Clarendon. The Roskenney Farm, near station furnishes meals and lodging.
The same edition’s mileage table placed the entry point at 780 feet elevation and listed "ROSKENNEY FARM" in capital letters at the East Clarendon depot entry. The farm appeared under identical description in Edition 6 (also 1924) and Edition 7 (1928).
Mrs. W. C. Lane and the Farm’s Peak Years
By 1930, Edition 8 of the Long Trail Guide Book named the farm’s operator for the first time, adding a detail not found in earlier editions:
Near the depot the Roskenney Farm kept by Mrs. W. C. Lane will take hikers as heretofore.
The phrase "as heretofore" — meaning "as previously" — signals that the farm’s hospitality to hikers was well established and expected to continue. Mrs. Lane’s tenure as keeper thus extended back at least to the farm’s early listing years, and possibly to the pre-guidebook period suggested by the 1917 start date.
That same summer, however, a party of through-hikers arrived at East Clarendon to find the farm closed. The Long Trail News for June 1930 recorded the disappointment:
At East Clarendon we went out for mail and were sorry to find Roskenney Farm closed, especially after we made the acquaintance of Mr. Farrell at the postoffice.
The circumstances of the closure — whether temporary, seasonal, or the beginning of a longer shutdown — are not recorded. Mr. Farrell, encountered at the post office, was not identified further. The farm’s 1930 guidebook listing had promised continuity, but the June hikers found the door shut.
Reopening and Later Operators
The farm evidently reopened and changed hands in the years following 1930. By 1937, Edition 11 of the Long Trail Guide Book listed it under a new name — "Roskenny Place" — with a new operator. The trail narrative in that edition reads:
The East Clarendon Railroad Station is ½ mile northwest along the railroad and East Clarendon with a small store where supplies can be purchased is 1 mile northwest along the road. The Roakenny Place for tourists is about 0 mile northwest along the road; mail and parcel post may be sent here in care of Mrs. Theresa Fitzpatrick, East Clarendon, Vt.
The shift in spelling — from "Roskenney" to "Roskenny" — accompanied the change in operator. Mrs. Theresa Fitzpatrick now kept the place, which the guide called "Roakenny Place" (an apparent variant spelling).
The 1937 Edition also listed, separately, a second private lodging stop in the same trail division: the home of Mrs. Valier Bersaw in Cuttingsville, several miles north of East Clarendon along the trail. The appendix in that edition enumerated the Division V lodging options as "East Clarendon, Roskenny Place, Mrs. Valier Bersaw, Long Trail Lodge" — four separate stops. Mrs. Bersaw’s home and Roskenny Place were distinct establishments run by different women. (See also the entry for Bersaw Home, GMC ID 000284.)
Edition 12 (1940) continued to list "Roskenny" for Division V. Edition 13 (1947) named yet another operator:
Division V: East Clarendon, Roskenny, Mrs. Minnie B. Blanchard, Wallingford, East Wallingford, Long Trail Lodge.
Mrs. Blanchard became the farm’s final documented keeper. By the time Edition 14 appeared in 1951, the Roskenny name had vanished from the guidebook entirely. In its place, Division V listed:
East Clarendon; Beacon Tourist Home, Mrs. Minnie B. Blanchard, No. Clarendon, Vt.; East Wallingford, Long Trail Lodge.
Mrs. Blanchard had moved her operations to a "Beacon Tourist Home" in North Clarendon — a different community, several miles from the old East Clarendon depot. The farm itself was no longer in service to hikers. The last year Roskenney / Roskenny Farm appeared in the Long Trail Guide Book as a recommended hiker accommodation was 1947.
Decline and Disappearance
The farm’s exit from the guidebook coincided with larger changes in how hikers accessed and traveled the Long Trail. The Rutland Railroad’s passenger service declined through the 1940s, reducing the role of station-side lodgings that had served the early trail community. GMC camps and shelters had multiplied along the trail, reducing hikers’ dependence on private farmhouses for overnight stops. Roskenney Farm, which had thrived as a waystation in the age of rail travel, was less necessary when most hikers arrived by automobile.
No record has been found of when the farmhouse itself was demolished. The GMC shelter database records it as no longer extant.
Sources
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 2. Green Mountain Club, 1920. p. 21. [East Clarendon listed as depot stop; no mention of Roskenney Farm.]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 3. Green Mountain Club, 1921. pp. 22, 24. [East Clarendon listed; no mention of Roskenney Farm.]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 4. Green Mountain Club, 1922. pp. 26, 31. [East Clarendon listed; no mention of Roskenney Farm.]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 5. Green Mountain Club, 1924. pp. 29, 32. [First listing: "The Roskenney Farm, near station furnishes meals and lodging"; mileage table lists "ROSKENNEY FARM" at East Clarendon depot entry, elevation 750 ft.]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 6. Green Mountain Club, 1924. pp. 34, 38. ["The Roskenney Farm, near station, furnishes meals and lodging."; mileage table lists "ROSKENNEY FARM."]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 7. Green Mountain Club, 1928. pp. 39, 42. [Mileage table: "ROSKENNEY FARM. Long Trail 1 mile east of depot"; narrative: "The Roskenney Farm, near station, furnishes meals and lodging."]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 8. Green Mountain Club, 1930. pp. 38–39. [Narrative: "Near the depot the Roskenney Farm kept by Mrs. W. C. Lane will take hikers as heretofore"; mileage table: "ROSKENNEY FARM."]
- Long Trail News (June 1930). Green Mountain Club. p. 3. [Through-hiker account: "At East Clarendon we went out for mail and were sorry to find Roskenney Farm closed, especially after we made the acquaintance of Mr. Farrell at the postoffice."]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 11. Green Mountain Club, 1937. pp. 25, 70. [Narrative p. 25: "The Roakenny Place for tourists is about 0 mile northwest along the road; mail and parcel post may be sent here in care of Mrs. Theresa Fitzpatrick, East Clarendon, Vt."; appendix p. 70, Division V lists as separate stops: "East Clarendon, Roskenny Place, Mrs. Valier Bersaw, Long Trail Lodge."]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 12. Green Mountain Club, 1940. p. 73. [Division V: "East Clarendon, Roskenny, Wallingford, East Wallingford, W.V. Stork, Long Trail Lodge."]
- Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 13. Green Mountain Club, 1947. p. 71. [Division V: "East Clarendon, Roskenny, Mrs. Minnie B. Blanchard, Wallingford, East Wallingford, Long Trail Lodge."]
-Green Mountain Club. Long Trail Guide Book, Edition 14. Green Mountain Club, 1951. p. 64. [Division V: "East Clarendon; Beacon Tourist Home, Mrs. Minnie B. Blanchard, No. Clarendon, Vt.; East Wallingford, Long Trail Lodge." — Roskenny name absent for first time.] - Woodward, Paul and Joanne. Long Trail System Shelter History, 2nd edition. Green Mountain Club, September 10, 1999. p. 150. ["Roskenney Farm — Near E. Clarendon station furnishes meals and lodging."]
